Winding Down 2023

Hi.

I used to do this thing where I spent the month of December winding down the year, writing little bits each day, using a particular dram of whisky as a prompt.

If you missed those, or would like to revisit them, you can find links at the bottom of this post.

I won’t be doing exactly that this year, but I will be writing some stuff, possibly each day, through the end of the year. Will whisky find its way into my musings? Come back tomorrow to find out.

<dramatic pause?>

This is the first new post here in two years.

I wasn’t going to mention that — you can read the dates on my latest posts just as well as I can — but I figured I should, since I usually do. And yes, I rather dislike having to acknowledge that this has happened often enough that I can use the phrase “I usually do.”

Ugh.

I’m not going to dwell on it. As usual, stuff happened, mostly within the walls of my head, that kept me away awhile. 

Not to worry. Life is good, and I feel like writing a bit. See you tomorrow.

Note: Within each category below the posts are sorted newest first, so if you want to read them in order, you’ll need to do some scrolling. Sorry. It occurs to me now that it would have been a good idea to include forward/backward links in each post to ease the reading experience, but I didn’t think of that at the time. Maybe I’ll go back and add some, but if you’re reading this I haven’t yet.

Whisky Wind-down 2016

Whisky Wind-down 2017

Whisky Wind-down 2019

Following Al: Weird by Northwest

(Note: This concludes my “Following Al” trilogy of posts. If you missed them — which is totally understandable given I started this two years ago — here are part one and part two. For the curious, it was this announcement that got me off my duff to finish this post.)

What’s wilder than driving 550 miles over three days so as to see three “Weird Al” Yankovic concerts in one weekend?

Waking up that Monday, tired, but wanting more.

That feeling led to me looking at the remainder of the tour schedule to determine a) where in the world “Weird Al” would be wandering, and b) whether I might want to wander there, too.

Turns out, Al had a few shows coming up in the Pacific Northwest.

I love the Pacific Northwest. I don’t think I’ve taken the time to write about that love, but it’s a passionate long-distance relationship we have. I try to get out there at least every couple of years, and since Al’s tour was taking the band there about two years since my last trip the whole thing seemed kismet.

All I had to do was convince The Empress of Whisky that it was not unreasonable to spend a week of vacation and a lump of my savings on such an adventure.

It wasn’t a hard sell.

She is a huge Phish fan, and we have regularly planned travel around that band, so she very much understood where I was coming from.

Thus began a week-long trek during which I followed Al across two states, taking trains, planes, and automobiles, whilst interspersing visits to friends and conducting other fun activities with  The Empress.

We landed in Portland (PDX), hopped in our rental car, and headed west for the coast, stopping only for cheese and ice cream in Tillamook — yum.

We spent a night in a small beach town, enjoying seafood, local beer, and some dune hiking.

Next day we headed down the coastal highway, leisurely making our way through that beautiful landscape for a couple of hours before making a sharp turn east and setting our sights on Eugene, Oregon, where a small theater played host to Al and the band that night.

I’ll say this about Eugene — it’s flat. The city-part between the mountains, I mean. Not much in the way of trees. Not much in the way of buildings taller than three stories. But it’s a lovely town, with a great  pizzeria right next to the theater — perfect for a slice and a pint after the show — and a wonderful little cafe that is the first place I ever had a stroopwafel. (They’re delicious.)

Next morning, we turned our rented auto north to Portland, where we would spend a couple of nights in a wackily-decorated micro-hotel, visit friends, see the truly awesome Portland Japanese Garden, browse several nifty local shops, drink some fine local beers — and a whisky! — to fill all the hours that weren’t spent watching two shows in an old high school gymnasium-turned-music venue. Oh, Portland.

After Portland, The Empress and I parted ways with a kiss and plans to see each back home. She stuck around to go on a hiking adventure with local friends, and I continued to follow Al.

His next show was in Spokane.

Getting there from Portland was fun. I walked to a light rail station, hopped aboard  a very clean train (using the pass that came with our hotel room) and rode that down to PDX, which, by the way, is a helluva nice airport. It’s open and airy, and it has things like free wine tastings inside. Also? There is a small (20 seats or so) theater that shows short films all day.

All of which is to say I had some fun things to occupy my time while waiting on my flight.

When it came time to fly, I had an experience approaching “old time” air travel. First, I had to actually walk onto the tarmac to board the plane via a set of steps hanging out the side. Compared to the gates and walkways used to board modern commercial aircraft, that was a little strange.

Of course, my first flight was aboard a World War II era Czechoslovakian spy plane,* so I’m not fazed by much.

*(Note to self: Tell story of my first flight.)

Anyway, the plane was a small, 50-seat propeller-driven relic. Once aboard, it was like being in first class, as there were few of us, and the seats were old-timey large.

I tried not to think too much about what this said about the plane’s age, or its odds of making it over the Cascade Mountains.

Really, I just thought of what they’d say if I died in a crash.

“He was following ‘Weird Al’ around.”

“Oh, that makes sense.”

Others nod along.

“Pass the whisky,” someone would say, as this whole daydream takes place at a funeral that is more like a good bar party.

Anyway, the plane landed — with an authentic tiny-plane bump on the runway — and I was soon headed to my hotel room for a nap before the show, which was held in another quaint small-town theater. No cool pizzerias or diners here, but I did find a dive bar for a burger and beer before bed.

I didn’t get to spend too much time in bed, as I had to be up stupid early — I think it was 3 a.m. or so — to walk over to the train station where I would catch my ride over to Seattle.

I love riding the rails, and it was beautiful to doze a bit before waking to the sun coming up over the Cascades, through which we were traveling. If the occasion presents itself, I highly recommend that Tacoma-to-Seattle excursion.

Upon arriving to Seattle, I had a free day and night, so I spent them prowling old book stores, eating way too much good local food, and winding up watching Solo: A Star Wars Story, thus making me a perfect (at the time) 10-for-10 on seeing Star Wars films during their initial release weekend.

Next day I did some more city wandering — Seattle is awesome for just walking around and seeing neat stuff — before catching up with a local friend to visit her neighborhood brewery before seeing the fifth and final show of my weird week in the Pacific Northwest.

Next day it was back to life, back to reality, which in my case meant wondering whether I could extend my vacation, change my flight back, and maybe squeeze in the next show, which was, wait, in Calgary.

Maybe if it had been in Vancouver …

In the Kitchen: Coconut Chicken

Do you like coconut, and coconut-flavored things? If not, move along.

So, The Empress of Whisky does like coconut and coconut-flavored things. She usually wants a coconut cake at her birthday, and she is known to, for example, indulge in the occasional stout with added coconut.

Anyway, on a whim — most of my kitchen adventures start with a whim — I once pan-fried some chicken cutlets in a little virgin coconut oil.

–> Brief aside: Virgin coconut oil maintains the lovely aroma and flavor of coconut. It’s the one you want, if coconut flavor is your goal. Processed coconut oil, on the other hand, loses most of the aroma and flavor, whilst still maintaining the other properties of coconut oil.

I also spritzed a bit of lime in there, and threw in some Jamaican jerk seasoning. Turned out fairly lovely, I thought. As we were eating, I asked how the coconut was to The Empress. Fine, she said, but a little too subtle for her tastes.

A little too subtle.

Well, friends that sounded like a challenge.

There’s this thing I do with pork loin cutlets — I picked it up from an America’s Test Kitchen episode — wherein the the cutlets are first tossed in corn starch, then dipped in buttermilk, then lastly coated in bread crumbs. Rest, then pan-fry in oil. It’s lovely.

Taking that concept as my base, I took chicken cutlets, tossed them in coconut flour, then dipped them in coconut milk, then lastly coated them in sweetened coconut flakes. Finally, I pan-fried the suckers in virgin coconut oil.

Presented with this dish — which, if you’re curious, I paired with orange rice and Brussels sprouts — The Empress agreed that, yes, indeed, the level of coconut was sufficient.

This dish is now in the repertoire. The only tweak I’m working on is making the damned coconut flakes stick a bit better. Maybe more resting time? We’ll see.

Stirring the Grief Pot

Been awhile.

I can’t even say I’ve really been trying, either. My trips to the keyboard have been few and far between since April.

April was rough.

I just reread that, for the first time since I published it, and all I accomplished was to break myself up again.

Fuck.

Is it lame to cry at your own writing?

It isn’t the writing, though. It’s the subject.

The subject to which I subject myself right now.

A lot of you came here and read those words.

Dunno how many of you will be back for this, though the stats show a few of you have returned, just to be met with nothing new on the main page.

Sorry about that.

You should know I have a history of disappearing for sometimes long intervals.

Usually there’s a good reason.

Historically it’s been a variation on: “Jon’s brain is broken.”

I fight depression and anxiety, and I don’t always break through.

But I always come back.

Often, it’s on or around November 11.

There’s a reason for that.

Grief is interesting.

It ebbs and flows, across days and years, but it never really ends. Sometimes it takes us under, like the swell of an angry sea, whilst other times we float as if upon a gentle pond, barely aware of the deep, dark pain that lurks beneath.

I’ve been thinking a lot about grief, since April 24. Sometimes you don’t realize just how much of rock-solid presence someone is in your life until they are gone, and you are set adrift.

So it is with Deb.

It doesn’t help that I’m typing these words on her old MacBook Pro — a bequest.

I sit, typing my little thoughts, and I can’t help but think of all the times her fingers danced across these very keys, how many times she stared at this very screen, interacting online, using it as her entryway to our role-playing games during the pandemic, seeing my words when she read them.

I’ve been thinking a lot about grief, since June 14, 2020. Sometimes you don’t realize how bad the worst can be until it happens — the death of a parent.

So it is with my father-in-law, Norm.

The man was such a presence! Never was a room with Norm in it a quiet room. Never was he there and you didn’t know it. He loomed so large in life that his absence is a giant, echoing hole, hole, hole …

I’ve been thinking a lot about grief, since May 28, 2019. Sometimes you know exactly how important a single person is to the course of your life.

So it is with my friend Ray.

Because I knew him, I accepted his invite to finish a card game, and because he knew me, the future Empress of Whisky accepted me enough to talk, and from there, love bloomed.

I’ve been thinking a lot about grief, for what feels like most of my life. Sometimes you don’t know how much death will be a part of your life until you start living it.

So it was with my great-grandmother, who died in 1980, when I was five.

Since then, it’s been a stream of departures, some expected, many not. And every one is different, and every one matters, and every one I remember.

Even though today is marked for one particular death, I am beginning to consider this Grief Day, and tonight, when I make the Memorial Meal, I will be thinking, of course, of the one it was initiated to honor, but the names and memories of so many others will be there with me, too.

In Memoriam, D.A.A.

I met her indirectly, via a letter to the editor.

Letters, I should say.

She was somewhat prolific — enough so the managing editor (to whom letters to the editor were nominally addressed) once said to me, exasperated, “I wish we had more people as enthusiastic as her. Run this one today, and the next one tomorrow.”

I was the news editor — the night guy, responsible for laying out the paper, among other things — so it fell to me to actually place these letters on the page.

I wasn’t compelled to read them, yet I read them and was compelled.

And so, when I finally met her directly, introduced by mutual friends at my hometown pub, I couldn’t help but exclaim, “Oh, you’re Deb Aziz!”

To which she gave me the furrowed brow that I would come to know so well over the years, the one that said, “Yes, and your point is?”

At which point I explained how I knew her name, and that her letters always brightened my night.

And she smiled, and we were friends.

—

I was but recently back in my hometown after a few years away, whereas she had in the interim moved to town and befriended people I knew.

I would thus come to know her well, mostly through sitting around pub tables drinking, playing cards, and shooting the shit.

I learned that she lived with rheumatoid arthritis since the age of nine, and it had damaged many of her joints but not her spirit.

I can still see her, crunching open pistachios on the table, using the bottom of an empty beer mug, as she lacked the finger dexterity to open them manually.

She loved those things, and would regularly feed a few dollars worth of quarters into the candy machine that dispensed them.

I can still hear her yelling “Cripple deal!” when it was her turn to deal and she had to pass the cards to the next person, owing to that same lack of finger dexterity.

She loved playing cards, and once they were dealt and in her hands, she was nails at whatever game was up.

I can still see her face, perking up when a woman with a low bustline walked by.

She loved women, and was not shy about it, and in that small town where we lived for those years, that would get her called brave, but she wouldn’t claim that. It wasn’t bravery to her — it was who she was, and fuck anyone who had a problem with it.

“I’m a crippled lesbian,” she would begin, laying the label out as a bona fide before opening an argument.

—

She moved to the city before I did, relocated by her job. By that time, I was dating the future Empress of Whisky and would soon face the choice to move to the city as she, too, relocated for work.

(I chose well.)

Through the years that followed we would meet more friends, go on vacations, have so many dinners and game nights, watch sports, celebrate a slew of birthdays and weddings, mourn together at our oldest mutual friend’s funeral.

—

When she was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis she was not expected to live past 30.

Well, fuck that, she said, and proceeded to live another 21 years past that mark.

Which made her 51 when she died last night.

—

I … want to have something profound to say here.

All there is is longing, and despair, and missing my friend.

And a regret, too.

Deb was amused whenever I referred to a friend by an alias, which I am prone to do here.

She particularly loved The Empress of Whisky.

I told her I’d come up with something for her, but I never got around to it.

So now I ponder what that might have been.

It could have been My Friend The Letter Writer.

(Shortly after moving to the city, she got a letter to the editor placed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, which delighted her. “I made the big-time, bitches!” is how she announced it.)

It could have been My Friend The Ethical Cheater.

(Long story. It involves cards and blatant, obvious table talk.)

It could have been My Friend The Former DJ.

(She was a disc jockey in college and had a lifelong love and enthusiasm for music. Once — and this is a long story, too, but fuck it — I made a playlist for The Empress of Whisky. It was for a big milestone birthday, so I made a list of the top 100 songs released the year she was born. It was meant just to be a fun playlist for the car ride up to the cabin where we were celebrating, but we turned it into a game — how many of these songs can you identify?

(None of the four of us in the car were great at it, but by the time we arrived we had made it through about a third of the list, and our scores were in the 10-20 range. We decided to keep playing until others arrived, but when Deb got there, she wanted to join. Despite the late start, she absolutely killed it, scoring something like 60 out of the remaining 65 songs and beating us despite our head start.

(She enjoyed the game so much, she asked that I do the same for her 50th birthday. I did, and, of course, she wiped the floor with us.)

There are so many options.

My Friend The Historian.

My Friend The Trivia Whiz.

My Friend Who Shares My Love Of Babylon 5.

My Friend The Philly Sports Fan.

My Friend Who Knows Way More About Comics Than I Do.

…

Good night, my dear and true friend.