Skinny Girls Roadshow LIVE from Mexico — To Eat or Be Eaten

Down here, south of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, where there are iguanas on the rooftops and butterflies in the house, where flowers and rubber trees grow from rock walls and rain gutters and cobblestone streets, where that chirping call you hear from the trees at night is not birds but geckos, where moths are the size of your hand and walls transitory, time takes on a drowsy quality and you get into the rhythm of the tropics and the realities that entails. Some of those realities, like the lush beauty and balmy waters, are lovely. Some, like the mosquitos, are not.

Baja from 30,000 feet

Baja from 30,000 feet

The last time I contemplated myself as meal on this blog was a post I did from Lake Tahoe reflecting on the Donner party. But after our first night of our now annual fall trip to Casa Tres Coronitas in which I received some 15 to 20 bites inside the mosquito netting that surrounded our bed (while my daughter, outside the netting, got that many on her face alone), I find myself considering it again. More

Let it Roll, Baby, Roll

It was Nat’s idea, and a good one at that.

“Let’s make lobster rolls on Sunday,” he said on Wednesday over margaritas at our house. “Let’s invite ourselves over to the Glynn’s house and go swimming and do it there.” This was my kind of spontaneous inspiration!

Nat would buy the lobsters, I would do the cooking, and they would host. (Coincidentally, as it turned out, our friends, “the Glynn’s” — Aaron and Britt — had been planning on inviting us all over that very day, so they were amenable to the announcement that they would be hosting a party.)

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Nat got online to order the crustaceans, and I leapt from my chair. “Hold on, hot dog!” I said, “That’ll cost you $75 in shipping! Have you tried the 99 Ranch Market?” More

Chopping Wood

Splitting axe with curious chickens

Splitting axe with curious chickens

It was a few weeks ago, I guess, that I first began to experience it — feelings of inadequacy as a man.

I was in the kitchen cooking some dainty little dish or other when my pal Ernie stopped by. We hugged and had just began to chat when my wife came out of the back.

“Ernie,” she said, “Can I ask you a couple things?” More

Jenn the Gadget Girl

I received a promotional email from Sur la Table. The subject line read, “Jenn’s Gadget Picks”. So I clicked on it, and there smiling at me was a picture of a cute girl that said, “Meet our very own Gadget Girl, Jenn!” And I thought to myself, “Oh no… you didn’t really just create a Jenn the Gadget girl for me to blog about, did you!???

Jenn.

Jenn.

It was like a gift from the heavens.

If you’ve been following my blog for any period of time, you’ve probably stumbled on one of my many “Good Gadget, Bad Gadget” posts. If not, let me suffice to say that I am a gadget skeptic. More

Giving Jon a Second Look

My friend Jon has long served as comic relief for my blog. If my cheffy friends are the Shakespearean thespians, he is Falstaff, the bumbling kitchen clown. I like to post shots of his attempts to make himself dinner, or stories about his inviting his visiting parents over to our house for a meal.

A few nights back, we were invited to dinner at our friends the Tehranis, and Jon would be joining us. He called me beforehand. He wanted to know if he made his specialty, Coke-and-Jack Daniels sausage, if I would feature him on my blog again.

Jon, like a proud papa, and his sausages

Jon, like a proud papa, with his sausages

“The first time is free,” I said. “After that, you have to pay to be on it.” More

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