July 20, 2005
Good Lord It Is Hot
It is stinky, steamy, soupy hot. My hair is sticking to my head. Every cold drink I take out of the fridge develops a lake of condensation at its base within minutes. I feel bad about opening the fridge because all the cold air escapes and it has to run for five hours to bring the temperature down again. I just got an ice pop out of the freezer and it melted by the time I found the scissors to open it.
It's so hot I really don't feel like blogging or maintaining my Flickr obsession (that is saying something). And I can't bear the thought of eating anything hot. We went to Sette on 7th Avenue tonight (totally unplanned, impulsive, irresponsible, expensive extravagance) and although the fritto misto and pasta dishes were good, warm food on a night like tonight -- no matter how good -- just doesn't seem right. I hadn't really felt like dinner, but I've been very stressed out lately and the idea of a snack with some wine sounded like a good idea. Once inside, Derek realized he was famished, so we got a regular dinner. I could barely walk home after we finished.
For wine, we ordered a "quarto" (little mini carafe) of rosetto (rosé) to get something cold on the table. Either the waitstaff was confused or the host decided to choose a wine for us, because a quarto of white arrived. Whatever, it was cold, so we drank it and got it on the house to boot (they said it was free because we had changed tables earlier to make room for a group). The rosé, when it finally arrived, was fantastic. I have no idea what kind of rosé it was -- meant to write it down but forgot. Regardless, rosé is a good summer evening wine. As for food, the gnocchi was good (not quite up to par with Al di La), and the tagliatelle was wonderfully thin, but I kept feeling like I would rather have been in a pool. A pool with some ice in it. For dessert (I know, why????) we ordered the custard with fresh fruit and got the ricotta cake delivered to us instead. We tried out the ricotta cake while we were trying to flag down the waiter (just in case, you know, it was actually the custard is some strange form) and it wasn't that good. The custard was very nice, though.
I'm trying to figure out what exactly is stressing me out so much lately -- enough to feel a need for wine, or coffee, or anything that might change my mood. I wonder if this is seasonal or related to the various stress-inducing pressures -- my work situation, the move, uncertainty about summer plans, a very long to-do list, etc. Whatever it is, the heat is exasperating it (incidentally, if you're reading the new Harry Potter, could this be the effect of countless dementors breeding in our midst?). We have air conditioning in our bedroom, but for some reason any air conditioning, if it's actively blowing in my direction, drives me crazy when I'm trying to get to sleep. So maybe lack of sleep is making me crabby. Which means I should probably get to bed.
On the unpacking front, there is great progress. Somehow, over the weekend, I managed to get rid of all of my boxes. Derek has also found some used (and nice, Cindy-approved) bookshelves to buy so he'll be box-free, soon, too. The kitchen looks fantastic -- the counters are clear, the cookbooks have a home, and I'm loving the multitudes of cabinets and drawers. The living room doesn't quite feel right, yet, but it's too hot to spend any time in there anyway so I'm not worried. My bookshelf, which is made of unfinished wood, got a rub down with orange oil and looks very happy about that. It found a home in the little room with my desk and is full of books.
In general, it's coming together, but I occasionally feel detached from the whole process and from the new place. Our stuff is here, and we're here, but it doesn't feel like home yet. It's a nice place and the extra space is great, but it all feels a bit surreal. It's like one of those dreams where things are almost normal but not quite -- last night I dreamt we had a new cat (I'm not a cat person) and I knew I had to get kitty litter and do something but the whole thing was off. Familiar details, like our old bathroom, were in the dream, but we lived on a different street and I felt like an impostor. I'm feeling a little of that displacement, like it's not permanent or real. Wish I could explain it a little better.
In less depressing news, we saw the Brooklyn Philharmonic perform at the Prospect Park bandshell on Saturday with some friends. It was a nice night (no rain), and the program included Tchaikovsky, Dvoräk, Offenbach, and Gershwin. The Gershwin piece was "An American in Paris" -- a great, uplifting piece of music for a warm summer night. On Sunday, we went to Applewood for brunch with the family, but I think we must have waited a full hour to get seated (understandable for a party of 5 at a great, small, place but ARGH). Each time the wait was extended we considered something else but decided against it simply because of the applewood smoked bacon. And the biscuits. And the grits and coffee. All fantastic at Applewood (next to Rosewater, our favorite brunch place). The brioche french toast was good but not phenomenal. Comments from the lobster-omlette eaters were that each ingredient was superb but that the whole package didn't really come together well. Dad says the bloody mary was bloody good. THE BEST. He could have been swayed by finally getting one after an hour of forced 7th Ave shopping (while we were waiting), but it looked pretty good to me. (Note: We hear that the best bloody marys are at Superfine in Dumbo so we'll have to go try those before giving out any prizes.)
Posted by csageday at July 20, 2005 01:00 AM