Melyssa-with-a-Y

This afternoon, Rebeka and I went to a baby shower for our friends Juan and Letty . Letty has another six weeks to go, but she looks like she's about to pop! It was a nice, small shower, with couples and kids. Of course, I was happy to go to the shower, and I made the world's quickest duckie - started last night at 9:30am, finished in the car on the way to the party! But the biggest draw for me was that it was being hosted by one of my favorite bloggers, Stephanie Klein (and her husband Phil). I've been reading Stephanie's blog for at least a couple of years, since she published her first book, Straight Up and Dirty , moved to Austin (shortly before I did, I think), had her twins in December '06... It was great to actually meet her! The "beans" are a little over 2 now and talking. They're SO cute. And Phil is just the nicest guy in the world. Our illustrious hosts made finger sandwiches, complete with the crusts cut off -- cucumber, salmon, egg sal...

Sorry, I've been busy! Here's some fun stuff to tide you over til I can post properly about what the quack in the White House -- sorry, I mean the Lame Duck President -- is doing in his last 30 days. Let's start with last Saturday's supper club. Every year we cook dinner for the Ronald McDonald house, on the same night that we have our December supper club event. This year, we decided to make a Mexican-themed meal for RMcD. I tried to make Mole' Brownies , from a recipe from Texas Monthly. They just didn't cook. I ended up with a rather tasty, spicy-cinnamony-chocolate mush. (Which tasted very good with vanilla ice cream... but wasn't what I was looking for.) On to plan B. Purchase 2 boxes of brownie mix -- add cinnamon and ancho chile powder to one of them, to simulate Mole' -- and two disposable brownie pans. Much better results. The challenge was that I was also making SK's homemade hostess cake , and Rachael Ray's chicken-feta meatballs ...

Monday is antique day at Covent Garden. We got up early and bundled up, and went to see the wares. I bought two pashminas for 5 pounds. We went to the Whittard's store again, but since it's before Xmas, the stuff that was all on sale last time was not quite so cheap. I bought some "hangover cure" tea and coffee... not sure when I'll need it, or who'll get it as a gift, but it seemed like it might be useful. :) I had wanted to go to the London Transport Museum to see the poster exhibit, but the museum entry wasn't cheap -- 10 pounds -- and it turned out that my friend Ben was on his way into London earlier in the day than I had expected. So we went to the shop and the cafe at the Transport Museum, and waited. I don't think I've seen Ben since the last Council HPC-AC me eting that I did, in April of '06. We had such a blast! He doesn't much like the tube, so we walked... and walked... and walked. First, we headed for the Ye Olde Watling ...

Starting with dinner last night: Indian food at Bengal Clipper near Betty's apartment. The food was tremendous, but the service was crap. (Betty did warn us that this was the case.) I hadn't seen Betty since she was in DC visiting, right before I moved to Texas. She hasn't changed! :) We took the tube to Tower Hill and walked across Tower Bridge. (Photos of this part of the evening did not come out well, because of my inability to hold 100% still when taking a photo at night. Oh well. You've all seen Tower Bridge before! Instead, I give you a photo of Big Ben that I took on the way back yesterday evening.) The food was very good, and we were part of a group of 13 -- Betty's oldest friend from high school and her husband were visiting from the DC area for Thanksgiving. Both of their sons live in London, too. And apparently the girlfriend of one of the sons went to Bryan's high school for a while, but was a year ahead of him. (did you follow that trail?) ...

Finally, one of my friends from DC made it down to Austin to visit*! Giselle showed up on Friday afternoon, and walked straight into a whirlwind schedule of eating, drinking, dancing, and football. First, we had to go to happy hour, to say farewell (for now) to Aaron, who is moving with his wife (Erin) to India. She won a Fulbright scholarship to go study art! He'll be "telecommuting" til next June. But we couldn't stay at happy hour for long, because we had dinner reservations. We went back to my house to change and wait for Atesha, and then we were off to Ranch 616 . It was crowded, but the food was SO good. We all ordered steak - three different specials. Mine had crabmeat, Giselle's had a little quail on the side, and Atesha got a mesquite grilled steak as big as her head! And the biscuits - we were so glad Aubrey told us to make sure we got biscuits! :) Once we were completely stuffed, we moved on to Momo's to see Skyrocket . The first set was int...

All in one night! Ah, the contrasts of Austin. :) Saturday was "get your groove on" night. While we do absolutely loooove seeing Skyrocket or the Spazmatics at Cedar Street, sometimes it's nice to go hear music someplace where you won't sweat to death within 60 seconds (i.e. indoors). So on Saturday we decided to go to the famous Broken Spoke . Cowboy boots required! (well, not officially, but strongly encouraged!) We had to have dinner first, of course, so El Sol y La Luna was destination #1. Yummmm. A carpool of four turned into dinner for five - no, six! - and then a table for seven at the Spoke. The singer -- Dale Watson -- looked a good deal like Billy Bob Thornton, though with more hair (and a little more meat on his bones). The dance floor was packed most of the night. The people-watching was amazing - everyone from long-time-practically-pro-dancer couples, to little kids being held up by their (grand)parents as they spun around the room, to a sudden ...

Gretchen Rubin posted this on HuffPo , and I have to say, I definitely needed a little cheering up -- and it worked! [well, apart from the "good blazing fires" bit -- it's only 95-degrees here today...] These are pointers on how to cheer up from 1820. Many of them still apply. (and if you need some more, Gretchen posted her own tips for cheering up on her blog.) 1st. Live as well as you dare. 2nd. Go into the shower-bath with a small quantity of water at a temperature low enough to give you a slight sensation of cold, 75 or 80 degrees. 3rd. Amusing books. 4th. Short views of human life--not further than dinner or tea. 5th. Be as busy as you can. 6th. See as much as you can of those friends who respect and like you. 7th. And of those acquaintances who amuse you. 8th. Make no secret of low spirits to you friends, but talk of them freely--they are always worse for dignified concealment. 9th. Attend to the effects tea and coffee produce upon you. 10th. Compare your lot with...

Whew, four days of vacation in Napa/Sonoma/Calistoga is just exhausting. Oh, right, and Yenta #3 got married! Yay! Thursday we flew to Oakland and drove up to St. Helena (that's Hel-EEH-nah), where we were staying with family friends (N&S) in their rented villa. (It really is a villa -- the house has 4 bedrooms with full baths, and an extra apartment over the garage... a huge kitchen, big living room, and a pool... and is surrounded by grape vines!) The weather was beautiful - average mid-80's during the day, and down below 60 at night. brrr! What we did not know was that our illustrious lame duck President was attending a fundraiser in St. Helena on Thursday evening! We were treated to a line of California Highway Patrol cars up and down Route 29. We later learned that the wealthy Republicans who paid up to $7500 per person were forced to eat sandwiches, because giving them cutlery might have posed a danger to Dubya. Honestly, when you can't even trust your big...

After much fun and debauchery at Dani's birthday, I had another birthday party to attend the following night. Here's the story: Dani and Giselle are two of my best friends in the world, and yet I have never been able to get them in the same room! I have plenty of friends that have met both of them... but they've never met each other! It's weird. And, their birthdays are a day apart! So, on Friday, Dani turned 36, and on Saturday, Gigi turned 40! She invited people from near and far to a soiree at her apartment. She made West Indian meat pies, spanakopita, ham and egg cups (muffin-sized), brownies, chocolate cake, cranberry chutney, apple crumble... and I'm sure I'm forgetting something. Oh! and Grand Marnier-Pomegranate-Champagne punch. YUM! It was all SO tasty. (I think she started cooking a month ago!) We watched the Giants-Patriots game, as Gigi is herself a New Yorker, and had invited some other NYers and a few Bostonians. The perfect season, indeed. The par...

If it's between Xmas and New Year's, it must be time for Dani's birthday! Last night we started with dinner at Rockland's . They don't do the babyback ribs so much in Austin, so I was craving them, and Rocklands' ribs are excellent! ( There was a minor delay when I started to drive to the wrong location, not realizing that Rockland's had moved... but fortunately Dani didn't let me get too far off course. ) :) After Elizabeth made a mess with the ribs, we went to Carpool to meet up with the rest of the crew. We even managed to get 4/5 of " Clueless in Clarendon " back together -- we missed you, Joanie! -- and did some excellent drunken singalongs. The bar had one tv tuned to NBC's " Singing Bee, " and once that ended, they played a nice selection of our favorite 80's songs. (Don't Stop Believin'!) Here's how Dani felt about the fact that we were celebrating her birthday: But this mood was lightened considera...