Road Trippin Picture Pages!!

        

   A little background information for you: I had a week off of work and during that time my mother and one of my best friends came to stay with me.  The week included one little road trip to Indianapolis, IN to see The Rosebuds and Bon Iver, lots of hanging out, some shopping, cooking and eating local fare, spending time in Columbus parks, and napping.  But now my staycation is drawing to a close.  Big Sigh

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The road trip to Indianapolis began early afternoon on Monday July 25th.  We had decided to make stops at the quirkiest roadside attractions along the way.  And research had been done ahead of time.  In fact, what we were really looking for was the largest ball of twine.  No joy. But Marisa, the navigating genius, found us several other awesome attractions.  So westward we headed, armed with a lovely GPS lady who politely guided us from Marisa's blackberry.

The three photographs above were taken at Clara's Pizza King in Richmond, IN which was our first stop.  During Marisa's extensive research into the quirky, she found several mentions about this pizza parlor.  Apparently, this location of Pizza King is the best.  I mean, you place your order by telephone at your table, there is a double-decker bus parked in the restaurant and the breadsticks are the best I have ever eaten. 

And they have Ms Pacman in the entryway.  This kind of game totally reminds me of when I was a kid going to get pizza with my family.  I love it.  Notice the Twenty Year Reunion... Really??  This pizza place is a winner!!

Stop 2: Do I really need to say anything? I will say this.  This shoe, which is the size of a car, is located about a half an hour from Indianapolis.  It can be found in front of a travel lodge with a sports theme.  Only in the United States......

This is called a Twisted House. It is part of a twelve acre sculpture garden at the Indianapolis Art Center in Indianapolis, IN.  This place is TOTALLY cool.  Admittance is free. All sorts of classes are offered.  There are all different kinds of artwork on display in the interior portion of the center.  Marisa and I were sad because we only had a limited amount of time to check it out. 

Final Destination!! The show took place at the Murat Theatre in downtown Indianapolis, which seems like a pretty cool city actually. I have traveled through Indianapolis about a bazillion times but never been downtown.  We ate dinner at a little Mediterranean place nearby.  It was very tasty.  Our initial plan to stop and eat at The Steer In ( of Diners, Drive ins and Dives fame) was foiled.  On Mondays, Steer In closes at 3pm.  Bummer!  Anyway, The Murat Theatre is located in Old National Centre.  This place was very cool.  This is a shot of the opening band The Rosebuds, who were great by the way!! 

Bon Iver.  My favorite band. Traveling with nine  musicians: two drummers, a whole bunch of horns, a percussionist, two synthesizers, violins, and normal rock gear of guitar and bass.  Let's just say it was an explosion of sound.  Absolutely amazing live show!!  Never mind the fact that it was so hot in there with the doors shut that you felt like you were going to melt.  So if you don't know them, check them out!

A tower on top of Old National Centre.  This shot was taken after the show when walking outside in the heat of the night was a much needed because it was so damn hot in the theater.  We are thankful that neither of us passed out during the show.  It was touch and go for a bit!

On the way home, after the obligatory stop at a gas station to stock up on late night road trip junk food, we rolled into Vandalia, Oh.  During Marisa's research, she discovered that road trippers consider this donut shop a must.  Conveniently, Jim's Donut Shop is open 24 hours.  But at 1am on a Tuesday morning, all they had left were cake donuts.  But I stocked up with a unusual flavors: Oreo and red velvet just to name a few.  They were tasty. And I am not a huge fan of the donut.         

Princess Doom and Gloom Exceeds 160 Characters

   The other day during my drive home from work, I saw a woman crying in the car behind me.  I had just happened to glance in my rear view mirror while stopped at a red light.  At first I was a little alarmed and not quite sure what to do or how to react.  I mean, there was a woman sobbing not more than twenty feet away from me.  In the end, I treated this occurrence like I have been socialized to treat nose-picking or other crazy behavior I happen to inadvertently see.  I ignored it completely.
   But it's been a couple of weeks and I am still thinking about it.  In fact, it popped into my head again about a week ago when I almost began to cry in my car on my drive home.  It had been a particularly difficult week and I was struggling to keep myself together.  It made me think of this woman, driving, trying to hold herself together and not succeeding. She was me. She was everyone.
  I have been concerned for a while now about the growing disconnection that I think many of us are experiencing.  Yes, we have many, many ways to communicate with each other ie: mobile phones, texting, email, facebook, twitter, online chat etc.  Yes, we can get a hold of practically anyone at anytime. We can tell the whole world what we are feeling and why we are feeling it. But it had better be under 160 characters.  Because our brains are no longer programed to understand anything longer than that. 
   Do we even know how to just talk on the phone anymore? Or, wait for it, get together with someone and talk to that someone in person?  And when you are, or you see or hear a person in distress, what do we do? Just ignore it. Act like it never happened.  Or talk about it online or via email or text cause then we are removed from the situation. We are safe from really feeling anything.
   Now I freely admit, that I do use all of these communication devices.  And they certainly serve a purpose.  But I still talk on the phone with my family and my best friends. I still attempt to get together with people I care about just to hang out, just to spend time with real humans.  I am lucky to have such interesting people in my life.
    I do not want to become the person texting another person sitting in the same room as me.  I do not want to become the person that has no idea that his roommate is suffering distress because he chosen to ignore the signs, because he chooses not to ask. I try to be present. I try to pay attention.  I certainly think a lot. And I try to be a good listener. 
   Whether we live alone, with friends or family, or with significant others, I think many of us are suffering from this feeling of disconnection. Our lives are full (maybe too full). There is stress. We are in a hurry. We push our thoughts into the far recesses of our minds. We simplify everything and try to fit our thoughts into 160 characters. It's exhausting. It's overwhelming.  We end up crying in the car on the way home from work.  And we don't know why.
    In an attempt to counteract my own feelings of disconnection, I began hosting a Sunday Supper Club. Basically, it's just a venue for people to cook, eat and talk to one another.  Just a casual time for friends to hang out, maybe meet some new people.  Time to actually talk with one another.  It has been a good time thus far.  Even when there have only been a few it's been lovely.  Everyone eats. Might as well enjoy a meal with others. 
   No one wants to end up crying in the car while chomping on fast food fries and texting a message that will surely be misunderstood. We all need to slow down. Take some time. Experience the world around us and communicate in full sentences. 

  

More Poetry!!

This Is Just To Say
by William Carlos Williams
I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold

Mixing it up - Poetry on Saturday!!

Just Walking Around
By John Ashbery

What name do I have for you?
Certainly there is no name for you
In the sense that the stars have names
That somehow fit them. Just walking around,

An object of curiosity to some,
But you are too preoccupied
By the secret smudge in the back of your soul
To say much and wander around,

Smiling to yourself and others.
It gets to be kind of lonely
But at the same time off-putting.
Counterproductive, as you realize once again

That the longest way is the most efficient way,
The one that looped among islands, and
You always seemed to be traveling in a circle.
And now that the end is near

The segments of the trip swing open like an orange.
There is light in there and mystery and food.
Come see it.
Come not for me but it.
But if I am still there, grant that we may see each other

Fourth of July, Revisted.

   Pie. Pie for a Summer meal. Pie is the perfect dessert for July 4th.  And the pies to the left were made for such a celebration.  The "monster" pie in the photograph is an apple pie. The other pie is a blackberry/red raspberry pie.  Both turned out well, although it was touch and go there for a bit.
   Some of you may be aware of this already, but I'm giving it to you anyway... The humidity effects the properties of pie dough.  On Saturday, when I was preparing the pie dough for the pies, it was very humid.  I always begin with 2 and 1/2 cups flour, two sticks of unsalted butter, 1 tsp salt, and 1/2 cup of ice water.  The water always varies.  There is always some left over.  But on this particular day, I felt like I barely added any water at all.  And that was too much.  The pie dough was supremely tender and very hard to handle.  When I was maneuvering it into the pie plates all I could think about was that show "Cake Wrecks".  Here I was, put in charge of pie by the best cook I know (my stepmother) and what did I create.... PIE WRECKS.  Or at least, that I what I was envisioning as I patched the pie dough in the pie plate.  But they turned out just fine, thank goodness.  In fact, the apple pie was the prettiest one that I have ever made.  Helped along by the addition of a red Emile Henry pie plate.  So silly, but I had been coveting that pie plate for a while at Williams-Sonoma.  I finally convinced myself that I must have it for the celebration.  Not only is it beautiful, but it bakes quite nicely and the fluted edge makes it very easy to create a lovely pie. The blackberry pie oozed all over the crust. But that is the way of blackberry pies (at least in my experience) so it was all good.
   The pies finished a fantastic meal of barbecue beef sandwiches with homemade coleslaw on top (yum! and the coleslaw was made with grilled cabbage - which makes a difference), red potato salad,  and baked beans in a mole sauce.  Of course there was homemade vanilla ice cream to go with the pie, guacamole and hummus to start the meal and champagne.  Champagne throughout the afternoon which is lovely.
   Champagne also helped soften the blow of losing at bocce ball AGAIN!  Bocce ball is played at all of the outdoor celebrations at the parental home in Yellow Springs.  And somehow, I am always on the losing team.  It could be me, although in my defense I played rather well on this particular occasion.  I believe, that it has more to do with my grandmother.  She is an excellent bocce ball player.  She may be almost 90 and beginning to lose her mind but she can still kick some serious ass on the bocce ball court (which is actually a narrow portion of the yard located between the deck and the garden).  And she is never on my team for some reason.  I am going to have to look into that next time.  Just to make sure that the games aren't being rigged.  My dad is usually the official.  He could be rigging it. I wouldn't put anything past him!
   Even with the shattering bocce ball loss, it was quite a lovely long weekend.  It ended with a beautiful afternoon sailing on the lake where my father's sailboat has a home.  I was very thankful for such distraction after a difficult week.  We may have our own share of issues in this country but on a warm, breezy, sun filled afternoon on a sailboat life doesn't look to bad.