Classic Liz (Revised).

I always do this, especially after a transitional summer, which this certainly was. Oh fuck, jesus christ, oh this summer.
oh oh oh oh
I did it here, after the ridiculous circus that was summer 2006.

So here goes,
My favorite memories of summer 2009.
(rewritten because I just accidentally deleted my original post while doing some major cross blog restructuring, so apologies if I forgot anything this time around).

*(probably the BEST one) Tim randomly showing up in town & Tim & Rin & I making that incredible dinner out of the nothing in my fridge & taking that late night walk & laying in the street & me calling out of work the next morning & us three having breakfast at the Green Bean.
*DnDnD2k09, pretty much the whole freaking thing, especially all the laughing & silliness in the car, our first night in Asheville, singing the Magnetic Fields' "Washington DC" as we drove into guess where, the beautiful highway into New Orleans through the Gulf Coast, the shrimp boil at the R Bar in the Marigny, the Bourbon Mile, the second day driving through the mountains in Virginia & dying of beauty & Foamhenge & car sandwiches. & again, so much laughter & adventure.
*my moving day into 133, the whole thing, from the toasted coconut cream iced coffees to the sandwiches from State Street & Ballantines in my old back yard to the mussels & beer sampler trays at at the Noho Brewery & A Dead Hipster Or A Stove Boat.
*so very much excellent dancing, at the Basement, the 11's, & Bishop's, thanks to all Noho's awesome djs for all those great nights.
*of course all my very late night walks home from dancing, just me & my ipod & the sky & my cute dresses, even when it was raining, which it always was.
*the night in June I randomly met Mark at the 11's on the velvet couch & we had that great conversation.
*visiting with gramma in Brewster & margaritas & white wine & scallops at Clancy's then Job Lot & Marshall's & Curious by Britney Spears & fierce new sneakers.
*at the Spoke the night it was WAY to cold for August
*late night adventures involving rooftop views & 7-11 snacks & parks in the pouring rain.
*the night Karen & I saw rabbit rabbit at the Brass Cat & then drove to the Basement for Woolly Bully blasting Nas & arrived exactly at the door at 12:59.
*the last Amazing Love where I danced with Jono.
* all those DnD Thursdays at Hugo's & Sierra especially the going away party for the road trip where we actually had a big party of people out making art together in a bar.
*Cirque du Filet.
*the night Jed & I dragged the kitchen chairs onto the front lawn on King Street & the road trip was born & then we went on that late night adventure to amherst & the top of that hill & drove around listening to hip hop.
* the dinner party Karen & I had had 273 with the rose petals.
*fourth of july & chicken apple sausages & jalapeno chips at Melissa's party & then dancing at Danielle's & Lisette making my dress much much shorter with scissors & Jed & I falling asleep awkwardly on the floor.
* that day Jono randomly made me lunch & we sat on his porch all day & enjoyed the garden & the rare sunshine.
* that trip Melissa & I took to Cape Cod for swimming & laying in the sun & thriftstoring & good food.
*the times at work where Amy, Cait, Hillary, Thomas & Faye really made me laugh so hard I cried.
*rewatching Twin Peaks in my living room with my roommates.
*remembering how much I love cooking for my friends, & doing something about that.
* that day in early summer where Rin & I began planting the garden & drank the first iced tea of the season with lavender ice cubes
*Isaac's fabulous bacon party plus the night before when my bacon lasagna was born at Hugo's (where all good ideas are born).
*the first meal cooked at 133, dinner party with Melissa & Jed where Jed drew us unpacking my books in short skirts.
*the beginning of DnDnE dinners with Beth. (hopefully many more to come).
*learning how to draw & paint again. & remembering why I care to do so.
& I guess ending on my birthday, the first day of fall, beginning with a perfect night dancing at the Basement, a perfect day of smoked salmon bagels & thriftstoring with my lovely stylish friends, a delicious dinner party with people I love & an unexpected gift the next morning.

Rereading the old post from 2006 to link to it, I'm kind of amazed & awed at the similarities.
I look forward to fall 2009. I really do.
I really think it's gonna be alright.
Some things broke this summer, but some things were fixed, too.

first dinner with friends at 133.

first dinner party at my new home. with jed & melissa, pesto (my basil) & linguine & heirloom cherry tomatoes & a side of sauted chicken apple sausage & shallots & swiss chard.

what I picked from my porch garden for this meal.

oh, & cape cod blueberries picked by my family as dessert. served over coconut milk ice cream.

I should have taken more pictures of the food, but I was having too much fun, here's to more gorgeous dinner parties in this new house.

two symbolic meals

first, my first meal cooked in my new apartment, the first new home I've felt really good about in a long time. patty pan squash, vidalia onions, my thai basil, local baby arugula, wild yam buckwheat soba noodles. Simple, but your first meal eaten in a new kitchen is a test. & this kitchen is beautiful. with flowers from ali & katie. 

Second, leftovers at mum's house in brewster after driving here tonight. interesting day, accomplished a lot of practical things (new goal: not hide under the covers when faced with practical tasks) drank pbr with jed in the late afternoon at his house discussing album covers while mark slept in my bed at home, went to whole foods because for some reason I decided I couldn't manage the drive with sushi (sushi/road trip emergency) & realized that rin is my only real friend left in that whole store. weird, cause the store was once my whole life. anyway, cold macaroni, peas, mashed potatoes & roasted veggies at mum's, after a very contemplative drive, considering life & death & love & friendship. 

I really miss my gorgeous new apartment & can't wait to unpack, but it's kind of nice to take the night off from noho. 

last night, 273 south

moving for reals tomorrow. still not ready, but yet still posting on my various blogs.

why why why

I'm currently eating this sandwich. cuz it's almost 1am & I've moved four times in less than six months because my life is insane. damn, have to fix that. later. (back burner, large stove, ali). anyway, the sandwich was sriracha, swiss cheese, mayonaise, & roasted red pepper hummous. a feel good classic. with jalapeno kettle chips.

what my desk looks like, roughly eight hours before moving, not good.

& my dresser. oh dear lord, help.

dustry rose tries to help.

but isn't really helping.
although still adorable.

well, here's to to my life being more stable at the end of tomorrow. & let's hope jed & jono have some patience with the chaos of my objects.

It finally feels like summer, so I'm using the oven.

What happens when I'm really broke, moving AGAIN in three days & I haven't really packed, & it suddenly becomes really & delightfully hot out. & I'M HUNGRY.

free sunflowers from work are cool. I should so totally pack that vase, but whatever. beauty means something too. also cool is a shit ton of free summer squash. roasted in my beloved le cresuet baking dish with free shitake mushrooms, & thai basil & banana peppers & thyme from my garden. in olive oil & garlic & salt & pepper, of course.

dr taking advantage of the now empty record shelf. yeah I'm packing a little between drinking & cooking & blogging, etc.

even though having the oven on at 400 degrees was insane right now, it all smelled really good roasting & if DnD is really taking a road trip to new orleans in late august, I need to work on my heat tolerance. So far, after crap freezing rainy summer 2009, I'm really liking being sweaty & drinking chilled white wine in short shorts. over angel hair pasta. I think inspired by this post.

me, cooking & sweating & packing, july 2009.

dusty rose is also hot.

anyway, I think it's neat to cook yourself a really nice dinner in the middle of chaos. & last night I didn't pack at all but had an awesome time with a really good friend. & I'm about to embark on a road trip that I totally can't afford just for AWESOMENESS SAKE. & I'm going dancing right this minute.
Balance it's all about balance. & cooking & painting & adventure. That's it. oh, & dancing & friends & not killing yourself.

eating "exotic" squash & ignoring sadness

First, & most importantly, here's DR, helping me pack. thank jesus for kittens.



Yup, another late night dinner. this time "exotic" squash free from work (no idea why it's so exotic, it appears to be a round version of zucchini) & onions (also free from work) & avocado & thai basil & a banana pepper from my garden & whole grain udon noodles. no time to be doing this, this cooking meals & then contemplating them. really need to pack. but something else besides the general life chaos of me/financial crisis/moving/uncetainty about housemates/ thing that's been going on with me lately also happened & so there an undercurrent of sadness to everything I do. A very dear & trusted friend told me, "just give it some time & don't think about it for a couple of days" & that's right. but now it's been more than a couple of days & I find I still can't think about it or deal with it. it still hurts too much. & so now I find myself not packing but at least I am cooking mjyself a beautiful dinner & not sit on the floor crying. & I packed one box of vintage juice glasses & fabulous shot glasses that's gonna have to be enough for now.

noodles plus green things.

& then eaten over the rest of yesterday's lettuce. for freshness. five different green tastes: squash in butter (warm), avocado (meaty), lettuce (crisp), thai basil (sharp), banana pepper (hot).

I dealt with a lot of practical shit this week while ignoring my current emotional landscape. I'm doing the best I can. I still believe that people should try to communicate better, but they never ever do. Still I really learned this week that even though I feel kind of out of place a lot of the time, I do have some real true friends, even here, & they all came from unlikely places.

So I'm just gonna eat my green things & noodles & drink more wine at 1am & keep listening to all of the silver jews albums mixed on itunes shuffle & maybe pack another box or two. doing the best I can. that's all I've got. & if my heart is breaking under the surface, well, I find that it matters less & less.

& I'm gonna end on one of my favorite lyric quotes ever, "& if cars could run on teardrops I'd be long long gone. " thanks david berman. also, Drinking & Drawing road trip 09 to the deep south in august to look forward to. If we don't die, it will be awesome.

3am Dinners?

One element of the weird lifestyle I've been living lately is that my meal schedule (& my sleep schedule) are way way off. For instance, yesterday I worked, ate these things, went to the 11's for a night of "official" Drinking & Drawing, went to hugo's for more drinks & more drawing, & then we all went to the 11's to dance our asses off. Then I walked home all sweaty & realized I was starving & despite the late hour needed some real food. this has been my pattern lately, coming home from the bar to an extremely late night dinner, & finding myself really inspired to take pictures from my sketchbook & blog rather than sleep. Many of my finest blog posts are completed 2am or later, usually while I'm eating dinner.

last night I reheated cold ravioli from the previous night with tons of hot sauce & tomato sauce (I like food really spicy late at night).

& I had this beautiful head of lettuce that I brought home free from work hanging out in my fridge next to the banana peppers.

so I ate this, near dawn, while writing. that's goddess dressing on the lettuce.

then based on some late night text messages I left the house again, got to sleep as the sun was rising & the birds were going crazy (damn those birds), slept until around noon, got up in time to aquire my large iced coffee at the haymarket & some 3/$10 cds (stereolab, pavement, the smiths) at turn it up (my shopping contribution to the incredibly annoying noho tag sale), & head to work, where I just left, to come home, drink some wine, listen to the silver jews, & write on more blogs. & possible go out again to a party. & all I've had to eat all day is a bowl of soup at work, & I brought home a ton of free squash, so probably there's a late night dinner in my future. a typical day for me lately.
I worry that I'm turning into my dad with all my strange habits, I really do. He did, still does, the late night meal thing. I know this isn't normal, dinner at 3am, sleep at 5am, work at 1:30pm, I don't know.
I'm just so happy lately hanging out by myself, eating these crazy meals, & writing on the internet. although right now I REALLY need to be packing, since I am moving once again in six days. Having reasonable priorities has never been my strong point.