Steak is my Friend

I was told tonight that I shouldn't be at the restaurant, after one of the servers learned about my professional experience.

She was in serious disbelief at my experience and then told me that I didn't belong there! That my "credentials" have me way out of the restaurant's league. That is just silly. It's not as if I abandoned my career to sling steak. What is it that people don't get about the fact that I can make good money and still work/write during the day??! It's not as if I signed on to be a manager. Of course, there is nothing wrong with being a career manager there but that is not me, would never fulfill me. I don't plan to stay forever but at the same time, I am all about being there for as long as it works with my schedule; it's great money for a few hours of work. I just have to smile at these comments as I'm counting my cash and heading for the door.

Picture / Liar

It's nice to remember my last time there (after the month of July) with a pleasant photo. Nice but not terribly honest. At least I know that I was honest during it all. Honest and responsible. As AA said, you can't have buyer's remorse at the 11th hour. (try the NNth time over a span of 3 years... at your place of business to boot). But alas, pictures always make things seem different. In this case, just tells a very small part of the story. It is the book cover. Enticing title but who really knows what's in those pages... I have all of the juicy reality and absurdity in my head, and therefore in my writing. I can smile wryly at this image. Smile and know that I gave fair warning about igniting the telling of stories and becoming fodder, er creative material. He laughed about my proposed name change for him. I think he knew I was serious - he knows I am a writer by birth - and yet laughter. Probably nervous laughter. The place itself needs ambiguity for the circumstances it was witness to.

One of the managers at this new location has never called me by my name, only "Bella." I am starting to feel like the place has no female servers- it is a deserted island of only men. Every time I go into the kitchen all of the porters, chefs, etc. stop and stare. There are never any women around. I am meeting the GM for the first time in a few days. I hope he is unattractive, does not call me Bella, and does not flirt with me. For everyone involved this time I need someone who is all about business. I mean really all about business. The restaurant's business and not mine.

Yes! Could Not have said it better.

He remains the master of the art of beauty in exactitude. Unexpected yet precise words are connected in his writing like the fine, unbreakable links of a silver necklace. Lesser writers settle for second best; he never does. He finds the right word, however unexpected. Any sampling of his work shows this; take a random sentence from the beginning of the story “Cloud, Castle, Lake”:

The locomotive, working rapidly with its elbows, hurried through a pine forest, then—with relief— among fields.

Whenever I reread this story I share anew the hardworking locomotive’s unexpected relief. And in Speak, Memory, that glowing memoir, we find an echo of Shakespeare (except for the pure Nabokovian parenthesis):

How small the cosmos (a kangaroo’s pouch would hold it), how paltry and puny in comparison to human consciousness, to a single individual recollection, and its expression in words!

Dana: "oh vladimir."

Dumber in English

http://www.signandsight.com/features/1438.html
Excerpt:

Biophysicist and author Stefan Klein wants to ensure the future of German as a language of science. Our academic language is on the verge of atrophy, he says...

An Old Guy Wouldn't Have Beaten Me

Once again, I would be nowhere without a keen sense of humor. [And a refusal to accept defeat]. I laugh (usually in private) when people seem agitated by an age difference of say 7 years, with my age as a base. 10 even. I won't go any further but needless to say I was well beyond that as long ago as college. I think it's funny. Decades older has always been my thing. I am an old soul.

Save a beating, there is an alternate set of problems that accompany the drastic age gaps I'm used to. But from my experience it's the "young" ones who are more inclined to hit. Not that I have had more than this one violent experience. Once is all - more than enough for a lifetime. Scoff all you want at the grey haired gentlemen that have been by my side, but never once has one broken my nose or blackened my eye.

In fairness and with respect to speaking with a moderate tone, plently of young guys haven't either - of course. I just feel like I have to defend my [pre] geriatric pattern with more zeal given my lapse of judgement with C. This is meant to address him in a way. He always gave me a very hard time (if you can imagine) about previous older men. I think he was just so intimidated when he met the ex-bossman that he had nothing to do but rib out of insecurity.

"Is that your father's?"

No. It's my philips head. I guess it's hard to believe (based on the facial expression I observed today) that I have my own stocked tool box, can fix many things on my own, and am actually discerning about the brands I buy to populate said tool box. I probably would've moved to Wyoming back in "the day." (Suffrage rights in WY 50 years ahead of the rest of the nation). Despite my gravitation to the seasoned gentlemen it certainly isn't to take care of "things" for me. Nice double entendre with the "father's" - in my world it usually goes something like, "is that your father?"

Grass is Greener (my first Cary Grant film)

I don't want to be one of those people who is always longing for what they don't have, perpetually wanting what is on the other side of the fence and never happy when they get it. Not that I am there but certain people make me want to alter time and location to fix things. I have some fantastic stories to tell from the last few years, particulary from my last few months in DC. I wasn't kidding when I told him that names would be changed to protect the guilty. He is a walking question mark, paranoia and guilt clouds loom over him. I am certain they still do even though I am gone. This time it was clear that he did not have the cool head or calm judgement necessary to handle his own actions. It is beautiful to be away.