Brown bread

Exhausting day today of seriously getting our life into boxes and bags, preparing for the movers who arrive in a few days. Up until this point, it’s been alright to ignore the piles of “I don’t know what to do with this stuff” in each corner; but absolutely all of it needs to go into containers at this point.

Over the last few months, I‘ve been saving the newspaper each day, stashing it on the shelf in the hall closet. At the time, it seemed like way too early to be saving newspapers but here I was, taking down the pint glasses and plates and bowls and wrapping them up individually.

With each coffee cup and spatula, I reread the news of the recent past: the four cops shot dead in Oakland, the Madoff financial scandal, the avocadoes and sliced turkey on sale at the local Safeway. It was a miniature retrospective of my last days in the Grand Lake neighborhood.

Today, our last Monday: bright blue sky with a sharp wind, we woke at 7am, the usual walk in the squirrel-grove with Django and then back home by late morning. I got to work packing and what seemed like just a few hours later looked up and it was 4pm.

At 5:30pm we were perched on bar stools at Garibaldi’s (perhaps for the last time in a long while?) – a few crisp martini’s with a plate of thick crust baguette and chunky olive dip. The main gripe on the Chiang Mai forum seems to be related to the quality of the bread. Where can one get a decent loaf? It seems not much has changed in the ten years since we lived there. I’m a rice fiend, so quite happy with the local grain, but I remember how amazing it was back then to stumble across the few places in Chiang Mai that served a worthy baguette or plate of brown toast (Irish Pub being one memorable place).

I’m living it up this week: Acme poppy seed rolls, Arizmundi garlic bagels, Whole Foods deli counter, Trader Joe’s eggplant hummus and Soy Delicious chocolate ice cream, cheap-cheap-cheap California wine. I suppose next week I’ll be waxing rhapsodic about Kaeng Keow Wan and Gai Yang.