Inspiration: Walking and Stopping

Shoe store window

Men's shelter window

Stopping for this blue cup

Golden Cadillac serves '70s-inspired food here, like Steak Diane

Inspiration: Heavy Metal Still Life

This little tart had carmelized onions, carmelized Brussels sprouts and squash.  This is my first time with this little tart at this cafe, which usually has almost nothing one could use for a small dinner.

Although I'm told there will be more.

That cap there I wear all the time, especially in this weather.   The hat's not from here.  The Heavy Metal Shop is in Salt Lake City.  It's owned by a good person.  You should shop there.

What I've been doing with my days and some of my nights in this downtime between semesters is working on stories--working towards a couple of fun-to-consider deadlines.  I'm not ashamed to say that heavy metal is important in many of my stories, especially today's story, which was written in 2012--it's still a toddler!--and pulled it out and have been revising for weeks.  I think tonight I figured this story out.

Not sure.

Inspiration: Good literature/Good litter

Well, I wrote my first book review of 2014. For some reason, I take my Goodreads account very seriously: The Unnamed by Joshua Ferris
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Out of the blue, Tim Farnsworth is forced by his body to walk. This compulsion comes and goes over the arc of his life, but mostly comes, stays, and upends everything--Tim's successful trial lawyer gig, his family, his body, and his mind. Tim's decline and eventual demise becomes a metaphor for the rapidly decaying world, too. This bummer of a book is deftly told, elegaic, so I'm throwing it an extra star. I loved Ferris' first novel, Then We Came to An End. This second book takes more circuitous routes to get there.

View all my reviews

My favorite city litter are these Greek diner cups. They've been the staple coffee server in NY Greek diners since the city was bankrupt and even before, probably. This one I found impaled on a fence, old school Medieval style. All my images seem to be coffee related lately. Hmmm.

Inspiration: Eight Degrees

I'm not anti-polar vortex.

The weather today reminded me that my grandmother, a few years before she died, knit me this tremendous neck cuff (kind of an Elizabethan neck ruff) at my request.  She used the finest wool in all of Utah County.

I've been spending a lot of time in this corner, my laptop wedged on a ledge not built for laptops. Go elsewhere with your new fangled writing machine, the ledge says.

I'm here because no internet.

The year is one week old.

Inspiration: Dirty Coffee Cup and Work

El Rey on El Dia de los Reyes

I actually alternated between two beverages.  Two identical coffee cups.

It had been a hard morning.

Working helps.  Working good.  Good place.  Hot things to drink.  And an apple turnover.

Hemingway, do you have to be so on?:  
"It was only that and light was all it needed and a certain cleanness and order. Some lived init and never felt it but he knew it all was nada y pues nada y nada y pues nada. 
[. . .]
'No, thank you,' said the waiter and went out. He disliked bars and bodegas. A clean, well-lighted cafe was a very different thing."

Inspiration: Tiny Objects for the Table

The smallest vase.  Little flowers in January.  Lipgloss in the distance.

A hand pinched salt cellar holding its own against the table's vastness

I am done eating for awhile.

Inspiration: Radishes

French breakfast radishes and chunks of parmesan to greet you at the table instead of a basket of bread.  Hello, radishes!

Think about how delightful it would be to have these frisbeed in front of you.  I exclaimed with joy.

Or are you a bread person?

Already the year is looking a little street snow dirty.  It happens so fast.