Old Faithful

Since Allyn was in town less than 24 hours, I thought it might be nice to take her to lunch today before dropping her off at Dulles for her flight to Amsterdam. She follows a gluten-free diet, but that isn't really a big deal around here. Even so, I invited her to Carlyle, a neighborhood staple with excellent gluten-free options.

At 12:30 on a Thursday, the place was full, and the hostess told us it would be a 15 to 25-minute wait. I deferred to my guest, and she opted to stay, so we took a seat on the banquette by the plate glass windows beneath the stairs and waited in companionable silence. Unlike many of my fellow patrons, I did not take out my phone as I sat. Instead, I people-watched, observed the busy restaurant at work, and considered how lucky it is to have such a dependable place within walking distance of home. 

Carlyle has been open for nearly 40 years, but I remember when it was new and called Carlyle Grand. The tasteful Art Deco decor has held up well; vintage-inspired then, it is classic now. The menu seems to have changed very little over the years, too, but I know that's not true. A rather tepid 1987 review by Phyllis Richmond praises the polenta, pan-fried veal dumplings, and noodle cake appetizers, which are dishes that vanished decades ago.

At any rate, I can honestly say I've never had a bad meal at Carlyle. Over the years, it's been a reliable go-to for brunch (donut holes and smoked trout with eggs!) and dinner. I've taken countless out-of-town guests there and celebrated many last days of school with a lobster roll for lunch. Their fries are nearly always perfect, and they have one of the best burgers in town.

Today, it was worth the wait. We were seated upstairs within 20 minutes, surrounded by six tops of what seemed to be office holiday revelers. The vibe was festive, and the service was friendly and efficient. Allyn loved her burger, and my grilled chicken sandwich was tender and juicy, served on crispy grilled bread with a tangy smear of mustard.

And the fries were perfect.

Fun and Not Fun

In advance of an overnight visit from Allyn, our 24-year-old goddaughter, I ordered a new game. Even though she spent lots of time here as a kid, it's been years since Allyn's last visit-- especially since she moved out to Oregon a few years ago-- now most of her East Coast time is spoken for by her parents and grandparents.

But she is in transit tonight. Her parents will meet her at the airport tomorrow, and the three of them will fly to Germany to spend Christmas with her younger sister, who is doing her junior year of college abroad. When the girls stayed with us when they were little, we always played games after dinner, and yesterday, when I saw an ad for Cat in a Box, I thought it might be a good fit to carry on the tradition. 

First of all, the title refers to Schrodinger's theoretical cat-- the one he hypothesized could be both dead and alive at the same time in his famous thought experiment concerning quantum physics. Allyn's dad is a high school science teacher, and they actually have a miniature schnauzer named Schrodinger (or Odie, as he is fondly known). I knew Allyn had suggested his name, too.

Secondly, it is a bidding and tricks game, and Heidi and I were recently at a teacher happy hour where folks were playing spades. Watching the game made us remember how much we like cards, and we agreed to look for more opportunities to play.

Cat in a Box ended up being a complicated version of Spades. The cards had numbers, but no suits;  each player has to declare the suit of their card when they play it. There are guidelines and trackers, because while any card can be both a red six and a green six when it's in your hand, once played, there can only be one red six per game. There is also bidding, and of course paradoxes arise, which is only fitting for a game inspired by Schrodinger.

As it turned out, Allyn had never played a plain bidding game, so these clever twists were lost on her. But, after watching an instructional video, we were able to play through the three hands required for a complete game. After the firs round, I checked in with Allyn. "How's it going?" I asked. "Do you get it?"

"Well," she answered drily, "I understand it better than quantum physics."

What Happened?

Spread over a half mile of our route to school this morning were vast swaths of wet and flattened cardboard boxes in the middle of streets.  It was difficult to imagine such an event happening without the perpetrator being aware, and yet there was no evidence of where they had come from. Nor was there any effort to clean them up, so some cars swerved around them while other vehicles ran right over, grinding them to slick piles of pulp.

Rush hour loomed, backups were forming around some of the larger mounds, drivers were getting testy, and it was hard to see how everything would work out. 

But I guess it did, because everything was clear, not even a trace of cardboard, by 3 when I picked Heidi up.

A First Noel

It was a little later than usual when I took Lucy for a walk this evening, but I was happy to get a chance to look at even more holiday lights as we strolled in the December dark. And there were many to see, twinkling and blinking outside and shining warmly through the windows as we passed. Near the end of our loop, I spotted a plain, fluffy white wreath on someone's door and thought how much better it might look bedecked with colored lights. 

Before I could scold myself for being so judgy, a memory gently nudged my brain, and I was transported back to Christmas 1975. Our family had arrived in Saudi Arabia less than 2 months before, and our household shipment had not yet been delivered. We didn't mind too much because, until a week before Christmas, we didn't even have a house. We lived first in an adjoining pair of hotel rooms and then in the house of a family my mother had befriended and who were spending the holiday in their native Australia.

But a couple of days before Christmas, a house opened up for us, and we moved to our own place. It was furnished by my dad's company, but we had nothing except our suitcases and the items we had accrued since we got there in late October. We were able to rescue our dog from the kennel where she had been staying, though, and we rejoiced that our entire family was reunited at last. 

My mother was perhaps one of the most resourceful people I have ever known, and in the absence of any decorations and none available to buy in that Muslim kingdom, she bent together several coat hangers and, using tissues and twist ties, created a huge white wreath that she hung in the front picture window. Where she acquired the string of colored lights, I don't know, but as it shone in the darkness, that wreath was one of the most beautiful things I'd ever seen.

Our gifts were placed beneath it, and when the sun rose over the desert on the other side of the wall around our house, we opened them. The day was balmy and not at all the Christmas weather we had come to expect growing up in the northeastern US, but my mom pointed out that it was probably pretty similar to the weather on the first Christmas, which was satisfying enough. We had all that we needed, and it was a very merry Christmas indeed.

Only So Many

Even as we decorate our home for Christmas, I've found my plan to downsize is still in action. Today I crawled to the back corner of the attic and slid out a bin that hasn't been opened for a couple of years. Why not now? asked the retired me, even as I remembered how overwhelming the holidays are for someone who works full-time. In it, I found several cookie tins and a teacher's career's worth of Christmas coffee mugs of all sizes. And I smiled in gratitude for the thoughtful gesture that each one represented as I moved it to the giveaway box.

Getting the Dander Up

I generally don't mind cleaning house, and it was my idea to cut our housekeeper's visits to once a month when I retired. Even so, in the early weeks of my new responsibility, I found vacuuming particularly onerous. Just the thought of hauling the expensive upright we purchased a decade ago up and down the stairs made it difficult to get motivated for any chore. 

Our house might have quickly declined into slovenliness if it had not occurred to me to do a little research on those new, lightweight stick vacuums. And lucky me! I found one with excellent reviews on sale for only 75 bucks. 

I was still a little skeptical when it arrived, and it languished in its box for a few days while I let other things take priority over our floors. But with two long-haired cats and a dog who tracks in all manner of soil, not to mention that I am less than conscientious about crumbs when cooking, the place needed to be vacuumed. How delighted was I when the new gadget was super-efficient, lightweight, and easy to use? Not only did I no longer dread vacuuming, but I looked for vacuuming opportunities almost every day.

The only drawback was that the battery life was just this side of 45 minutes, and it took several hours to recharge. The other day, though, when that amazing machine cleaned up all the needles our tree had dropped as I put the lights on, it occurred to me that we could get a second battery. 

And so I did. (Fair warning to you, dust and dirt: my cleaning capacity has doubled!)

Dear Prospective Juror

I recognized the envelope right away.

But today, when I received my summons to jury duty, gone was that knee-jerk anxiety, the worry that I would be seated or not, and either way, I would have to make sub plans on the fly for days or even weeks,  modifying and amending my lessons so that they might work whether I was there or not, because I wouldn't know until 5 PM the night before if I would be available to teach.

My only concern, today? We don't have a 2025 calendar hanging in the kitchen yet, so I can circle January 28, and write Jury Duty.