deborahjross | Play day

I went into work yesterday, filling in for the records clerk (her daughter, who is about to make her a grandmother for the second time, is in town and near due). Happily put together Monday's charts (it's a little like arts'n'crafts stuff), including tracking down missing test results. Then Denise Lee arrived and off we went to Santa Cruz and an adventure.

Ladies' Day Out.

Thai food -- it was 2 pm and we were both too hungry to think what to do afterwards until we'd filled out tummies. Thai food is an indulgence-with-friends. Dave, for all he is an exemplary husband in many other ways, does not care for Thai food. It has too many of the tastes he loathes, chili and cilantro at the top of the list. So whenever a friend suggests lunch out, it's Thai or Mexican or sometimes Indian, if we're in a city with a good Indian restaurant. Then everyone is happy. So I had that coconut/lemon grass soup.

Decided on a movie, at a theater off the Pacific Avenue Mall, so we went early to window shop. The Mall was mostly rebuilt after the Loma Pieta earthquake (which I missed, as I was still in LA), a wide airy space with a single lane of traffic in the middle, but feels very much like a pedestrian mall. Lots of boutiques and insanely overpriced other stories, but offering neat stuff it's hard to find elsewhere. Like the Sock Shop with its amazing collection of adornments for the feet. We tried on those new cushy sandals that feel like they weigh almost nothing. They were, I believe, designed for gardeners but sell heavily to nurses and other people who are on their feet all day. I want a pair, but not this day.

At my suggestion, we saw HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE. I'd seen in with Rose when it first opened and it was just as much fun. The bits that touched me the first time worked even better, and I found new moments too. I'm on the list to get one on DVD. Denise enjoyed it too, and we went off to a falafel place to discuss movie vs book. Note to self: re-read book while movie is still fresh in mind.

At home, I almost didn't go inside the house. House environments are predictable, but this evening was startlingly, breathtakingly beautiful. There remained a hint of light in the sky and the air was still, filled with perfume of earth, trees and flowers, and the perfect temperature. No mosquitos, either.

Dave, it turned out, had driven all the way to where the Schutzhund club meets (an hour away), since he and Oka hadn't gone in a long time, only to find no one there, probably away at a show or seminar. He'd just gotten back and was in the process of preparing comfort food -- sticky white rice. So we sat and talked and I made a rice pudding with raisins, milk and cinnamon.

And got up this morning to find an unhappy message from the bathroom scale. Ah well, off to pick blackberries and then get lots of good exercise