Girly-Blog

First of all, I want to apologize to my little friends, Sierra (age 4), Elise (age 3) and Cici (sorry if I spelled your name wrong) (age 8) whom I promised a little spin in Sprinty the Van last night. I didn't know that packing up was going to go so late, so we ended up not having the time and I know y'all were really disappointed. But I hope that didn't take away from all the fun we had after the show, talking and hanging out in the green room and chasing balloons!
And thank you, Covington, for coming out in droves and giving us the warmest Louisiana welcome. Girlyman has always thrived by word of mouth introductions, and Martha and Jeff, you really put your hearts into spreading the word. It was truly a memorable night!

So the other night around midnight, I dropped a frying pan on my big toe. It was like an All-Clad frying pan (read: heavy like a cast iron skillet) and hurt like a pain from the depths of Hell. Ever stub your toe or drop anything else on your foot? Imagine that happening 50 times in a row and you might come CLOSE to what I went through. Fortunately, I was wearing purple nail polish, so I couldn't really see what the true damage was. But I knew I was a goner when, after 10 minutes had elapsed, I was still in shock; freezing cold, hyperventilating, sweating all at once. Come on D, you can get through this, I said to myself, as I placed a bag of frozen gorgonzola and walnut tortellini from Trader Joe's on my foot (my refrigerator didn't come with ice cube trays for some reason) to try and numb the pain. I laid back on my bed, my foot elevated on a half a dozen pillows, but every throb of blood in my toe was like a hammer to my head. I even tried to distract myself by reading my copy of the teenage trash novel called Heaven, by V.C. Andrews, (you know, the one about poor girl in West Virginia whose father sells her and her brothers and sisters to rich people and she ends up sleeping with her adoptive father?) which inexplicably made its way to my apartment in Brooklyn from my childhood home in NJ into a box that made its way here, to Atlanta, GA! Even the dramatic shlock wasn't sufficient enough to keep my mind off the pain, which was increasing by the minute. By the time I realized I wasn't going to bed any time soon, it was 5:30am.
I called up Nate, who answered in a panicked, What's-Going-On!? kind of voice and said calmly, "I need you to go on the internet and figure out how to burn a hole through my nail with a paperclip to relieve the pressure from the blood in my toe. I'm coming over soon." Now, what is she talking about, you might ask, but it is indeed a tried and true method that was once performed on my middle finger when I had a similar pain after I slammed it in Ty's mom's car in high school. "Okay. Got it," he said, soberly. I removed the nail polish from my toe and saw it was a lot worse than I expected--purplish black under the entire nail, which meant that it was a major nail injury. My stomach turned. But I managed to drive over to his place and stumble in, at which point, Nate informed me I had a subungual hematoma (um, thanks, Nate) and led me to the kitchen. With a pair of pliers, he held a straightened out paper clip over the flame of the stove until it got red hot. Then, he melted the tip straight through my nail at its base (oy, I can't hardly write about it without my toes curling!) until blood came, well, spurting out like a river. Oh okay, it wasn't that dramatic, but let's just say that a goodly amount was collected. The relief was instantaneous. All the color came back to my face and suddenly I could breathe normally again. I was amazed at how calm and professional Nate was, as if he had been providing Subungual Hematoma Relief for victims since the dawn of time. It's three days later and I can walk without limping, which is kind of a miracle.

Today Turtle and I commenced on day 2 of driving the Sprinter back to Atlanta from Seattle. I fell asleep in the passenger seat after a satisfying breakfast in Bozeman, MT and was woken up by my disgruntled road manager who was like, "D, I've been behind this cavalcade of tour buses and cars for the past 20 minutes and I can't pass them! I'm so frustrated because they keep slowing down and speeding up." The cavalcade was in the right lane and there were cop cars in front and in back driving in the left lane, so you weren't permitted to pass. And, as you know, time and speed are of the essence when you are trying to get somewhere. Turtle was getting really irritated and finally was like, "Who do they think they are, the President?! I don't care if it's the Pope!" And then we suddenly realized that Obama was scheduled to speak in Bozeman that night and that we were literally driving behind him! (He did a town hall meeting in Billings, where we were headed.) We laughed our asses off--what are the chances?

We're up here in Bellingham, WA, about to head to Seattle for the last show of the tour, and last night I had this dream that I was looking at the cosmos, out into vast space, the light years upon light years of distances in the star-filled galaxy, and I thought, 'this is not what we think it is...we will realize that what we've seen as untravelable, inconceivable distances were never physical distances of any kind..." But rather, psychological and psychic distances, completely accessible, right here. Like something we've been able to touch all along, but we've been framing it in the wrong terms, as outer instead of inner space. That maybe these unreachable places are frontiers of our own, barely touched-upon, inner realities.
I woke up thinking, 'well, we can only perceive through our senses but we all intuit metaphor and an aliveness beyond the apparent solidity of things...so maybe it's possible or even likely that the universe is not at all what we think it is.'

then i read in the ny times (my guilty pleasure) that a letter of einstein's about god and science just sold for $404,000. the article says:

Trying to distinguish between a personal God and a more cosmic force, Einstein described himself as an “agnostic” and “not an atheist"...

Einstein said, “[Atheists] are creatures who — in their grudge against the traditional ‘opium for the people’ — cannot bear the music of the spheres..."

"[It] is too vast for our limited minds.”

First of all, they're not really that slippery. Second of all, slapstick is just so universally funny--anyone can understand the hilarity of a botched motion. And third of all, it's because no one makes me laugh as much as Ty, and when there's an added bonus of her being goofy and gesticulating wildly, forget it, I'm a goner! It's like it awakens the kid in me that remembers thinking she was the funniest person I had ever met (in second grade) and then it triggers every funny thing we've ever laughed about from childhood to now. Like the time we got in trouble (um, in college) for passing funny notes to each other and trying to stifle our giggles in Electronic Music class. The professor pulled us aside afterwards and was like, "What is wrong with you two? You act like you're in high school!" Which made us giggle even harder because that's exactly what we we did in high school.

We just got home from a 3-week tour that completely rocked our socks off. With your help, we sold out the Barns at Wolf Trap, Joe's Pub, Club Passim, the Iron Horse, and the Old Town School of Folk Music--with near-capacity crowds everywhere else--and we were thrilled by the spontaneous creation of a different show every night. I want to send out huge thanks to everyone who came out to these shows and offered up their big energy! What a blast. (Our road manager Turtle, who takes lots of pictures on tour, said that in nearly every picture she took of us, we're cracking up about something.)

We've also gotten tons of great feedback from you about the new live CD, which really warms our hearts because the CD is such a home-grown, bare-bones project, just straight from us to you--and we're all excited to keep on in that spirit. The rawness of it seems to have buoyed us to a new place creatively, and we're already starting to get jazzed for whatever the next project will be...

Thanks, y'all!

OK, so, we just got back from the Iron Horse show and there's this box of kumquats that Nate bought yesterday at Trader Joe's, sitting on the table. And I have to say, I get it! I understand! I cannot stop eating kumquats, all of a sudden! They are, we all decided yesterday, nature's Sour Patch Kids. A burst of sour, then a burst of sweet! Perfect!

Some of you may remember that many months ago, I was mystified by Nate's obsession with this odd fruit. But it takes one to know one, or something, because I am now converted, sold, transformed. I love kumquats!

I'm sitting in the van right now, as we drive over the Kosciusko Bridge on the BQE, and I'm reminded of the ode to NYC roadways we sang Sunday night at Joe's Pub ("Start spreading the [crash!], I'm leaving to-[bump! bump! bump!]" ).

Yesterday, we had a day off that I spent in Brooklyn. I got to do one of my absolute favorite things - cook a feast. The three of us, our manager Genevieve, and couple other friends all came together for the meal. Living on my own in Atlanta, I've been cooking a lot, but it's so much more fun to cook for a big group. I made a wild boar ragu (based on a Mario Batali recipe), Spanish-style garlic shrimp (Cook's Illustrated, December '07), broccoli rabe, and roasted potatoes. The boar was very exciting - I was searching through the meat section at the elite, members-only Park Slope Food Coop (my friend Kate let me in a as a "guest" ), and I came across a D'Artagnan wild boar loin roast. It was too good not to try. Kate asked me not to tell anyone it was boar until they'd already tried it, which I did, although I think it's a little silly. It's just a hairy, tusked pig, really. It gets a little more exercise than most pigs, so it has a richer flavor (it was free-range, too).

Keeping on the meat theme, I went into Manhattan this morning to Faicco's Pork Store in Greenwich village to get my favorite sandwich in the world - a hero with prosciutto, hot sopressata, and mozzarella cheese (with mayonnaise). I placed my order, turned around, and found myself staring at Mario Batali, himself placing an order at the other counter. I am often rendered star-struck by chefs, particularly celebrity ones whose food moves me (when introduced to Scott Peacock in Atlanta, I found myself stuttering incoherently). As Mario bragged to the man helping him about the success of his father's meat shop in Seattle (Salumi), I debated whether or not to say something.

But what? "Holy crap, it's you!" (a little weird). "I've always been a fan!" (a little boring). "I made your boar ragu last night, but I used a loin roast instead of the called-for boar shoulder, does that make a difference?" (I already know the answer - boar shoulder has more fat and connective tissue, and will render a more tender and flavorful ragu).

So I said nothing, and he left on his vespa, wearing his trademark orange Crocs. As I thought about it, I wanted to say, "I made your boar ragu last night, and it was wonderful. Thank you for all the energy you've put into showing the world new ways of cooking food. It's been a fulfilling part of my life that's given me a creative outlet, as well as a healthy dose of self-confidence. Thank you, sir." I didn't say it then, so I'll say it now. Thanks, Mario. Thanks, New York.

Well, while my dear counterparts were experiencing tornadic turmoil down south, (boy am I glad everyone's ok!) I was up north in Jersey celebrating my grandmother's 100th birthday. A hundred years is a damn long time, so I decided to ask her some questions (with translation help from my mom) to see what her secret was. I know you're all dying to know, too.
Apparently it boils down to 2 very surprising things: McDonald's cheeseburgers and America. I was shocked. She basically said that coming to America at the age of 57, was the best thing she ever did. She lived an incredibly hard life in Japan, and after WWII had to sell everything she owned, including all her fancy kimonos in exchange for food for her family. Existence was hand to mouth, more suffering than I can ever imagine. However, when she got here, in 1965, she got assistance from the government and has had nothing but gratitude for this country. She is, ironically, probably the most patriotic person I know, considering that most of my family has tremendously mixed feelings about the bombs and Pearl Harbor.
When I asked her about her dietary habits and what her favorite food was, she shouted (as only the hard-of-hearing can do) "CHEEZU-BAH-GAHHH!!" The hilarity ensued when she got on a roll and started chanting over and over again, "AMERICA GOOD! I LAH-VU AMERICA! I LAH-VU CHEEZU-BAH-GAHHH!" I had tears rolling down my cheeks as I heard my dad, who was watching tv in the other room, mutter in japanese, "What is going on?? What is she talking about?!"
She's happy to be alive, that's all.

As Nate said in his post, we are all ok and I am incredibly grateful for that. I kind of can't believe how lucky we got--all we lost was our dogwood tree. But many of my neighbors here in Cabbagetown weren't as lucky. I spent the day outside, picking up debris and helping to clear roads of roof shingles, tree limbs, etc.

Since I just moved here in September, I guess you could say this is an interesting way to meet my neighbors, even if it's not exactly what I would have chosen.

I don't know if any of you saw the news, but first off, it's very rare for a tornado to hit Atlanta. I'm pretty sure this is the first time the city has taken a direct hit like this. Yet, I had this weird feeling that it would happen. Starting about a month ago, I started dreaming about tornadoes a lot, and and wondering if it had been a good idea to buy a house that doesn't have a basement. I was advised by friends that tornadoes really don't like metropolitan areas. But this one did.

Second, I'm in that state where I keep thinking that I'll wake up and everything will be normal again. But right now, a block away, many of my neighbors' houses have been smashed in half by gigantic trees, live oaks that have been here for probably hundreds of years. Their huge and complex root systems tore out of the ground, pushing up sidewalks and fences. The city is waiting for help from GEMA (Georgia's version of FEMA) and FEMA itself, but apparently it's very slow going. So, as so many neighborhoods in comparable situations have done, my neighborhood has come together to take care of itself. I'm amazed by how much we got done in one day.