Happy New Year!

I have officially not cooked anything since Christmas.

And I probably won't be cooking anything for a while, since as of Wednesday I'll be officially homeless and in the process of moving to Seattle.

But that's okay, because I'll have plenty of road adventures to write about. Friday I had a last lunch with a friend; it was my last chance to eat East Coast oysters, so I ate 37 of them (mostly Wellfleets), had two glasses of gruner veltliner, and finished off with a shot of Cynar. It was a good lunch.

Otherwise, I've been working all week. I'm working tonight, and all day tomorrow, and then Wednesday morning I'll get up and drive to DC. I'll spend the night there with friends, and continue on to my parents' house in Virginia on Thursday, where I'll be off the grid for a few days (no internet, no cell reception, no cable). I'll see my friends there, say goodbye to everyone, and then continue on to Missouri, where I'll finally be reunited with my husband.

So, in the meantime: Happy New Year! Eat some oysters.

Christmas 2012

...was bittersweet, compared to past Christmases. No family, no husband, no traveling to see either. Instead, I spent it with a few friends. I saw the new Quentin Tarantino movie (which was fun, actually, I'd never seen a movie on Christmas before), and cooked a small feast for some people. Good food, good wine, still not the same as being with my husband and family. I missed them way more than I thought I would (which was a lot).

But I'm on my last week of work, which means that this time next week, I'll be reunited with my cats in Virginia; a week or so after that, with my husband in Missouri; and a few days after that, we'll finally be on our way to Seattle!

I'm done

For the last month, I've been in a holding pattern. Done with packing, stuff is gone, but still working. Still not quite to the driving-across-country-and-looking-for-jobs part. For a while, that felt right. I can't explain it, except to say that somehow I needed a buffer zone. I was partially excited about the prospect of Seattle, but also partially stunned by the idea of leaving a perfectly good job, one that I enjoy and do well.

Well, now I'm done. I'm ready to go.

Sometime last night, I turned a mental corner while at work, and I stopped in the middle of what I was doing and thought, "Okay, I'm done. Time to get this show on the road." I want to see my husband and cats again, I want to see some Western scenery (preferably without snow on the roads), I want to be in our new city. I've been a little afraid of getting there, of not finding a job or an affordable apartment or breaking down in a snowstorm in Idaho and having to eat the cats to survive, but now the stasis is worse than the unknown.

And isn't that always the tipping point in my life? When the stasis becomes worse than the unknown?

So, Merry Christmas, everyone. All I want for Christmas is to see my husband and cats again, and then a road sign that says, "Welcome to Seattle!"

Giant beers, for the end of the world

The world didn't end yesterday. But is anyone surprised by that?

It made for a good excuse to drink a lot of beer, though. Thursday night, after work, my coworkers and I plowed through a collective 10 or 12 liters of fine Belgian beer. A six-liter bottle, a three-liter bottle, a magnum, and a few regular-size bottles.

Pouring an almost three-foot-tall bottle of beer is heavy, by the way.

Not much else to report. I continue to work all the time, and suffer from air-mattress-induced back pain. But I only have a week and a half left of both. A week from Wednesday, I'll be driving to Virginia, to officially kick off the moving part of this move. I miss my husband. I miss my cats. I worry about driving a Prius containing my husband and my cats across the Rockies in January. You know, the usual.

Pig head

The other night, I ate a pig head.

And it was one of the top 5 most delicious things I've ever put in my mouth.

A little backstory: Since I've got less than two weeks left there (eep!), I feel it's safe to disclose that I work at Craigie on Main, Boston's finest restaurant. One of their specialties is the pig head. Remember the pig head I had in Montreal? Naturally, I couldn't leave town without experiencing Craigie's fabled pig head.

I got some friends together and I went in on my night off. We got octopus, terrines, and pig tails to start; then the pig head and bone marrow; then the cheese plate and beignets for dessert. (We also had a lot of cocktails.)

Here's the thing about pig head: if you can get past the concept of digging your fork into a pig's face, it tastes amazing. It's fatty, meltingly tender, and the skin is super-crispy. Craigie serves it Peking duck-style, with pancakes, a boudin noir-hoisin sauce, and a spicy pumpkin sambal. The pancakes and sauces help cut the fat of the pork a little, which then means you can just shovel it into your face at a faster rate.

Here's the other thing about pig head: the whole thing is edible. The cheek, the eye, the snout, the ear. Everything. Cheek: fattiest part. Ear: like a great big pork rind. Eye: like a big gob of pork fat butter. I'm serious. I ate the eye and it was the best part of the whole thing. We stripped that thing down to the bone.

Not to discount the pig tails: like fattier ribs.

But I'm not used to eating so much rich, fatty food in one sitting, so yesterday I was suffering from a bit of a pork hangover (in addition to the regular kind of hangover). Which is why I didn't get around to blogging about it until today.

So, don't be scared. Eat the pig head. You'll be glad you did.

And feel free to use that as a metaphor for life, as well.

Updates

Not a lot going on these days. Working a lot, not cooking really at all, trying to work the kinks out of my back and neck from prolonged sleeping on an air mattress. I got my Christmas shopping done, though there wasn't much to begin with. I've also begun laying in a stockpile of bomb-ass wine from work, stuff that I fear will be difficult to find on the West Coast.

My temporary roommate and I are planning an Orphans' Christmas Day dinner, for people without familial obligations that day. It won't be a fancy dinner--I suspect it won't be any more complicated than roast chicken--but it will be a good excuse to drink some of that bomb-ass wine.

Hug your loved ones today. After yesterday's tragedy, compounded with the news that a very dear friend's marriage is on the rocks, I really really want to hug my hubby. He's very far away today.

Goodbye, NYC

I spent yesterday saying goodbye to my friends in NYC.

We ate a lot of food, drank a lot of drinks, and laughed a lot more. I also purchased a couple of hard-to-find food items, saw an Olafur Eliasson exhibit, and frittered away part of the afternoon at Pastis, drinking wine and eating pate (and reading a book).

I still love the bustle of NYC, even though I haven't lived there in over three years. But I'm sure exploring Seattle will be equally exciting.

Out with friends

Last night some friends and I went to a local charcuterie and cheese place. I realized about halfway through the evening that it would be a while before I'd get to enjoy that level of camaraderie again. All day yesterday, I had friends texting me--"Now that you're in the city, we can hang out!"--and eventually I overcame my day-off inertia and met them. When the restaurant found out we were all in the industry, they showered us with free food. We ate non-stop for four hours, plowed through three bottles of wine (between four people) and still only paid about $75 apiece for everything.

It was outstanding. The free food, of course, but also the company, the wine, the atmosphere. It will take a few weeks in Seattle to find a job and an apartment, to get settled, to make friends, to get to the point where I'll have people to go out with (and disposable income to spend), and even longer before other local restaurants start sending over freebies. Maybe this is the universe telling me, "Why are you staying at home this month, when you have no husband and are sleeping on an air mattress? Seize the day! Go out with your friends while you still can!"

And on Thursday, I'll get to do that in NYC. One last time.

First day off, sans husband and cats

Random observations from this first weekend and day off, without my husband, my cats, or my apartment/stuff:

1. Sleeping on an air mattress sucks. SUCKS. I put a twin air mattress on top of the queen, to see if that would be any better. It's like 11% better. Very slightly, but not enough for me to get any kind of quality sleep. I'm going to be all knotted up and totally bitchy by the end of the month.

2. It's lovely not having to drive an hour each way to work anymore. But then, I have nothing to come home to, really. And it's not like I can get additional sleep, on an air mattress. I may have to start pretending I'm in college again: sleeping on the floor, no furniture, going out with work friends until all hours.

3. I'll be working, a lot.

4. I'm spending this first day off since the move quietly. Cooking (a big batch of tomato sauce and a veal and potato soup), editing scripts, reading. I may meet up with some friends later. I may sit on my ass all day. I'm making it up as I go along.

5. I miss my hubby. I get home from work now at a reasonable hour, ready to talk and hang out (instead of just fall instantly asleep), but there's no one to do it with. I hope he's having fun with his family.