Vacation? What Vacation?

The divine Diane von Austin-berg left this morning after a much too short trip. It was more fun than a tub of porn stars, with grease.


High points of our annual visits are usually cooking together, along with the elaborately crafted grocery lists and trips to Whole Foods that entails, but this time we were only in the kitchen a few times. Of course, that includes the cauliflower gratin that got a tad seared. Well, blackened, actually, by my cranking up the broiler to brown the bread crumbs and then wandering off. It happens. We scraped off the burnt part and everyone was very sweet about it.


We also missed out on our usual rounds of the local thrift stores. We hit all our regulars, but ran out of time for the more obscure ones (The Church Mouse! Yay!) The brown brocade sport jacket she found for me still has a sun faded stripe down one sleeve; the tea stain solution worked only slightly, but I refuse to give up on it. R Man is concerned.



I had planned to wear it to dinner at Chez Panisse, but obviously that didn't pan out. Still, dinner there, with our friends Dan and John, or Dan and Jean as they're sometimes known, was swell. I love CP, it's seriously fabulous food without being fussy.



Mostly, we just hung out together, which is what I love about her. Such good company, so charming and sweet. Plus I kicked her ass at Boggle. Honest. I don't care what she claims.