Fancy-Pants Dining, Haircuts and Mr. President

Practically in my back yard is a large culinary college that is listed in the top five in the USA. Every year our senior hall has a popular event where they’ll bus 100 of us (25 at a time on four consecutive days) down to their 5-star style restaurant. This week was my third year going and I’ll keep going as long as I can still spoon food into the biggest orifice in my head. The ambience and food are to die-for and out of the norm for my dining experiences. We sat at tables of six and the conversation focused on the food, the dessert cart and the chefs that came out to answer questions about unidentifiable flavor profiles in the dishes and how they were prepared. I had the “Caribbean Adobo Braised Pork” with sofrito and pineapple sauce and for dessert I practically had an orgasm devouring the tiramisu cake in an eatable chocolate dish served with a scoop of coffee ice cream on the side. Each time we go, we tour a different part of the college and the bakery was on slate this week. After lunch we went on a mystery side trip that turned out to be a tour of the fire department and its regional-wide training center. They had a “house” with moveable walls that can be filled up with smoke so the firefighters can’t see where they’re going. I swear they must have picked the cutest guy in the department to do the talk and tour. Dimples and tiramisu in the same day? It doesn’t get much better than that. 

I got a new hair style this week---breezier and easier for a spring that includes more showers now that I’m going to the gym three to four times a week. It seems like the longer you go to the same stylist the more they get into auto-pilot-cutting your hair and then you end up with a helmet head. At least that happens to me. So I searched for a photo to bring with me and when I showed it to the stylist she said, “That’s not going to work.” I didn’t expect resistance. “Why not?” I asked. “Because It’s longer than the cut you have.” Say what? I couldn’t believe it but I wasn’t about to argue with a lady holding a pair of sharp scissors. “I’m not married to that photo,” I said. “What do you suggest?” Instead of answering she asked me what I was trying to achieve and I told her I wanted to get rid of the bulk on top and be able to towel dry my hair after a shower and be good to go. Boy short. “Well, that’s not going to happen,” she replied. “As thick as your hair is if you go that short it will all stick straight up and there’s not enough jell in the world to make it lay down.” “So what should I do,” I begged, “walk around with a helmet in my arms so it looks like I have a good reason for having helmet hair?” She talked and I lost interesting in listening. Finally I ended her monologue with, “Why don’t you just surprise me.” She did. She gave me a cut that to my untrained eye looks like the one in the photo I brought in! “Magic mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?” Well, I didn’t get the answer I wanted but my new cut is definitely ready for the sultry summer days.

A week or so ago a blogger friend, Bella Run, recommended signing up for The Word of the Day at Dictionary.com which I did and until yesterday I hadn’t received a word that I’d seen before or thought that I’d use in the future. Then an email came with this word: mumpsimus. “1) adherence to or persistence in an erroneous use of language, memorization, practice, belief, etc., out of habit or obstinacy, or 2) a person who persists in a mistaken expression or practice.” Who does that remind you of? Hint: He lives in a big white house. Oops, zip my mouth and slap me silly. My blog is in a controversy free zone. At least I’ve been trying to keep that way lately, but this past week has been a good week for those of us in The Resistance so I’m sticking my neck up like a periscope on a submarine. Feel free to take a potshot at me if you think the world is being unfair to Mr. Mumpsimus, if you don’t think Voltaire, the French philosopher of ye olden days, knew what he was talking about when he warned, “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

Speaking of The Resistance, I had lunch with my oldest niece over the weekend, an early birthday treat on her part. I love that woman! We talked about the Russian entanglements in the White House, the failed Trumpcare bill, the second Muslim ban that's been blocked by several district courts and I got caught up on all things family related. We each had to drive a half hour to meet in the middle and as I drove home after lunch I couldn’t help feeling wistful that we can’t do it more often. I miss having people around who’ve known me longer than a minute and a half---who knew me when my brain and my tongue worked at the same speed and who can fill in when my memory fails me. Magic mirror on the wall, why can’t I age like smooth-as-silk Jamaica Rum instead of Hire’s Root Beer that’s gone flat? ©

The haircut

My dessert

A hard choice that came in second