“Costera paella!”
I’m back to weekly posting again – I’m too old to try and remember things from multiple weeks ago. When I left you last week, we were contemplating heading back to the Blues and BBQ festival in Lafayette square. Denny picked us up and we saw Little Freddie King and Shemeika Copeland perform. Both delivered great sets.
Here’s a sample of Shemeika:
And here’s Diana dancing to “It’s 2am, do you know where your baby is?”:
We stopped at an amazing Halloween display on the way home. Ghost Manor is on Magazine street and features animatronic skeletons, videos on the upstairs windows, and excellent music and lights. Best Halloween display any of us have seen.
The Cowboys were able to eke out a close win against the Chargers on Monday night football. Both the 49ers and Eagles lost – so we’re only one game behind in the standings.
We took a walk through our new neighborhood on Tuesday. The weather was perfect and there are so many beautiful houses to see. The actor John Goodman’s home is a couple of blocks away. He bought it for $1.8 million in 2005 and I’m sure it’s worth at least three times that now.
A coffee and browse through the shops at the Rink, across from our new home, followed the walk. I really enjoyed the Garden District bookstore and picked up a signed copy of the new Richard Ford book. It’s the fourth installment in the Frank Bascombe series that I enjoy so much.
I treated McD to a late lunch at the Columns on Wednesday – another perfect day. It’s been a while since we visited, a weekly tradition when we were renting the condo. Tatum was a great waitress, even though she was single handedly setting up for an evening event.
Kenny and Kara joined us at Chickie Wah Wah on Thursday night to see the band Deer Tick. The start time was pushed back because of a Saints game, and the place was very crowded, but we hung around for a few songs and thought the band sounded very good. They just needed a larger venue like Tipitinas.
Jeff and Merry Lee were in town for the Saints game, and so we met up for dinner on Friday at the wonderful Costera. Our Uber ride over didn’t work out too well. The driver was talking loudly on a hand held speaker phone. After a few minutes, we asked him to be quiet and use both hands on the wheel. He promptly pulled over and asked us to get out. Good grief – so rude! As you can imagine, Uber has my feedback on the incident.
The meal was amazing – such delicious Spanish tapas, culminating with the best paella I’ve ever had.
It takes most of the day to fly from New Orleans to San Francisco. We were pretty tired by the time Adamo and the monsters picked us up on Saturday evening.
The weather has been beautiful in Pacifica all week, and now as the plans to celebrate Adamo’s 50th birthday are underway, it’s a cold and rainy day. So much for the band playing outside. Maybe it’ll clear up in the afternoon.
I finally completed “The Four Winds” by Kristin Hannah. I read it on my iPad and was pretty frustrated when I found that all my highlights were lost. I’m going to have to switch back to real books. The book is not as compelling as a few others by Hannah, but still an enjoyable read.
“My land tells its story if you listen. The story of our family.”
Here’s an online summary:
“Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the future seems bleak. Until the night she meets Rafe Martinelli and decides to change the direction of her life. With her reputation in ruin, there is only one respectable choice: marriage to a man she barely knows.
By 1934, the world has changed; millions are out of work and drought has devastated the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as crops fail and water dries up and the earth cracks open. Dust storms roll relentlessly across the plains. Everything on the Martinelli farm is dying, including Elsa’s tenuous marriage; each day is a desperate battle against nature and a fight to keep her children alive.
In this uncertain and perilous time, Elsa―like so many of her neighbors―must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or leave it behind and go west, to California, in search of a better life for her family.
The Four Winds is a rich, sweeping novel that stunningly brings to life the Great Depression and the people who lived through it―the harsh realities that divided us as a nation and the enduring battle between the haves and the have-nots. A testament to hope, resilience, and the strength of the human spirit to survive adversity, The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.”
Rhonda, self proclaimed “best mail delivery person in the world”, dropped off my new Tipitina’s record club offering this week. It’s always exciting to unwrap the package and I now have the Linn turntable properly set up to play vinyl. The last album before Walter Wolfman Washington’s passing last year is very enjoyable, bringing back lots of fond memories of watching him in small New Orleans venues over the years.
Coexist peacefully, with kindness and patience for all!