So long, and thanks for all the views!

Sweeping out the attic, mopping up the basement, clearing out the garage. Everything not of value must go.


Messages from people I haven't heard from in 5 years. Confirmation of orders from Amazon.com that I have received, used and probably thrown away. Promotional offers that I have never taken advantage of. Things that should have been marked as being spam, but lazily never were. Facebook notifications. Yes - someone commented on my blog post. No - sorry, you did not get the job.


Yes, after six years and sixteen thousand messages, I finally went through my GMail account and gave it a much-needed cleaning out. It took a while, and after a bit (the first twenty pages), I got pretty lazy, and, where before I was making surgically precise deletions with the finely honed scalpel of my own human intellect, I ended up trusting the machine and clear-cutting through the forest of emails with nothing less than the Napalm that is Google's filtering mechanism.


*sigh*


Much remains; letters from friends and family, mostly. And of course, every word that Carrie has ever tossed to me from across the transom that separates one DNS server from another has been lovingly saved and preserved and cherished, or will be on my hard drive (which prompted me to clean out the account in the first place - ever try to download sixteen thousand messages including several gigabytes of attachements? Not fun!).


But that is just the beginning. My Yahoo email account, my very first one ever, which I signed up for back in 1997, is no more. Neither is the Flickr account that I dumped in favor of Picassa. No longer am I documenting ad tedium about my Java Programming or ad nauseum about my the routes that I run. Pretty soon, I'll no longer be issuing ad infinitum massive missives about all things "just Charlie (or Tony, or C.A.)". Yes, folks, sadly, this will be my final post here on the (soon to be gone) "Caffeine - Nation, baby!".


I am taking a good hard look at the relations that I have on the overcrowded (and increasingly more trite) warrens of Facebook , and go about building the relations that I want. I am slimming down and straightening up, re-asserting the priorities that I had once held dear, and re-focusing my sights on the things that are truly important to me. Which doesn't include blogging, but (in what could be a rather paradoxical twist) blogging about the things that are important to me does give me relief of a sort; call it catharsis, I guess. It also give me pleasure; call it self-indulgence. But, rather than electing to speak solely in an ego-centric forum (which is what "Caffeine - Nation" really is), I will be speaking more and more within the context of the wonderful family that I am truly fortunate to belong to: the one that has Carrie, Charlie, Gabriel, Oliver and Axia at its core. Having said such, I invite you to read about our continuing travels, travails and "just the normal pace of life stuff" at C.C. and the Beans.


Of course, instead of focusing on three diversions, I shall be keeping notes of my one allowed dalliance, writing (which is one of the things that I am planing on focusing a bit more on) at Charlie's Cafe. You can join me there as well, if you'd like.


See you - there :)


- Tony / C.A. / Charlie




-update( September 11, 2010)


It has been a while since I originally wrote this post and saved  it as a draft. Several things have changed since then, which has caused me to rewrite it slightly. I am planning on starting up a programming-centric blog, but (hopefully) it won't be as tech and code heavy as the last one. But I will always put my blogging efforts first and foremost into C.C. and the Beans.


-update ( October 8, 2010)


I really should just push  this out there, shouldn't I? I've ported most of my Blogger posts to my Wordpress account, so hopefully things won't seem too strange there.

Is it over?

The heat wave (for us, anyway) lasted into last weekend, with things finally cooling down a few days ago with high temps in the 60's. The forecast for the next few days seems to be tolorable, with temps in the mid to high seventies. 


Having grown up in Maryland, I am used to much hotter summers than these, and I don't really mind being outside during the middle of a hot and muggy summer; however, growing up in Maryland, I was also used to this little thing called "Air Conditioning", something which is sorely lacking here in Seattle.  So, I'll continue to be glad (and hopeful) for lower temperatures for the rest of the summer.

Life is too short...

...for mediocre espresso shots.


In the mornings (and sometimes in the afternoon), my drink of choice is usually a quad vanilla espresso. I used to get very dry quad vanilla cappucinos, but few and far between was the barista who could either pull the shots correctly, or (more often) get what the 'very dry' part of my drink order meant.


These days, however, I am finding that fewer and fewer baristas are even attempting to pull the 4 shots needed for my quad vanilla espresso correctly. There seems to be this popularly held misconception that pulling a shot of espresso means filling a shot glass to the line with espresso; it does not. A good shot will be about two-thirds crema and one third coffee:

Usually, though, I prefer my shots to be pulled short, that is, stopped well before the crema forms, meaning that I should only be getting about an ounce. Too many places pull the shots long, and don't pack thier coffee sufficiently - or they use the wrong beans - so that no crema forms.


There are places that I frequent that "get it", and others that don't. In the former group:

• Trabant (I go to their downtown location)
• Victrola (Beacon Hill)
• Empire Espresso
• Vivace (Both the one in Capitol Hill and the one in Cascade)
• Caffe Bella

Maybes:

• The Station (Louis makes a good quad vanilla cappucino)
• Columbia City Bakery (I can get a good quad vanilla espresso from them, but only a fair quad shot)

And, finally, the ones who don't:

• Starbucks (No surprise there)
• Cherry Street Espresso (The one barista who pulled decent shots at the Mueseum location no longer works there)
• Motore (They used to pull good shots, but the last few times that I've been there I've noticed a definite downhill slide in shot quality)

Heat Wave 2010 - day deux (The Caffine-Nation edition)

The second day found Seattle in the grips of yet another day in the 90's,. It also found Casa Gaboli in the grips of being in a relatively enclosed space without the benefits of either decent natural circulation or air conditioning. For my part, I decided to do what I could to help my body deal with the heat:

There you go - Charlie Burrell's Shaved Head. If only I could get a band to name itself after the occasion ;) At least it makes running a cooler affair!

Some of you may think that it's a bit trite of me to kvetch about us having a few days of temperatures in the 80's and 90's. But you have to remember that, if you are one of those people, chances are that you at least have a nicely Air Conditioned space to retreat to at the end of  the day. At the very least, you probably have a place that has decent ventilation. Here in Seattle, the former is a rarity for residential establishments, and the latter is a luxury that is dependent upon location, and therefore priced accordingly. Our place lies on the downslope of Beacon Hill, and abuts neighboring houses on three sides  that are less than twenty yards away. We simply don't get any sort of decent ventilation in our place. But we're working on alternatives.

Heat Wave 2010 - day one

With the advent of temperatures above 80, I think that I will declare this to be the beginning of Heat Wave 2010. The situation is a bit different this year; we are not using our ghetto AC in the kids' room, we have 2 kids in that room, and we have an extra person in the household. We had a representative from a local HVAC place come out to our house to give us an estimate, but I have yet to receive the proposals. Grrrr....


So, I trekked down to Lowes last night in search of fans.  Just as I thought, there were rather slim pickings - a rotating model set atop an ugly iron frame for $160, and a smaller portable model for $20. I grabbed two of the latter and  then made my way home.  They make a little bit of difference, but not as much of one as would, say, a centralized air conditioning system installed by the same folks who came by our house to give us an estimate. Just sayin'.

Emerald City Fish and Chips

During their stay with us, Carrie's parents developed a hankering for fish and chips. Not wanting to waste time and  effort assembling the troops to make the arduous trek downtown for the ever-touristy Ivars, and following up on a personal recommend made by a friend, we opted to go with a local place, Emerald City Fish and chips. My father- and sister-in law flew.


I wasn't impressed at all. I got Catfish and my wife got Halibut. Both portions were less than a quarter-inch thick, the breading was soggy, and the fillets themselves were dry and rubbery. The chips were limp and tasteless. The tartar sauce, which had the right amount of tanginess, was the best thing about the entire affair

They came, they saw - grandkids, they went

My parents-in-law breezed into town from Utah for the 4th of July weekend. I had plans to do some major yardwork on that Friday and Saturday, but, instead, I spent those days hanging out for the most part; Friday,preparing my kick-ass pulled pork by liberally appying a sweet and spicy rub and letting it sit overnight, and Saturday, getting the 7-1/2 pounds of Boston Butt out and cooking it.


About that...


I really need to pay attention to recipies. The pulled pork recipe, which was originally written for charcoal grills, had the following steps:

1. Rubdown pork
2. Let sit overnight
3. Take out allow to come up to room temperature
4. Preheat grill
5. Grill uncovered in a aluminum roasting pan for 3 hours at 275
6. Preheat oven
7. Bake covered with aluminum foil for 2 hours
8. Allow to rest covered in a paper bag for an hour

Guess which step I conviniently forgot? Yep. I forgot that that pig had to spend an additional 2 hours in the oven. This would not have been so bad, except for the fact that we had invited our good friends Alex, Refugiuo and Brad over for dinner. Hurredly we prepared a quick grilled pulled chicken tenderloin recipe alongside the homemade classic and North Carolina barbecue sauces and called it good. The pulled pork, which came out of the paper bag two hours after company left, was a delicious treat for all.

Happy (first) Father's Day

My very first Father's Day weekend was a pretty nice one. After getting up early on Saturday to watch two World Cup matches at Empire Espress (which is my new favorite espresso place in Columbia City), I pretty much lazed around back home and wathed los gemalos while Carrie went out shopping for my Father's Day dinner. Sunday we got up and had breakfast at Cafe Campange, one of the two French-style eateries in the Marketplace; Cafe Campange is more of a resturant while the seocond place, Le Pichet, is more of a cafe where food just happens to be served.


While we were in the area, we decided to head to Sur la Table in order to get a new nonstick griddle for eggs and pancakes and a wire mesh splatter guard. Carrie did want to get a nice wire mesh strainer, but I talked her out of it, reasoning that we would hardly ever use it. However, when we had gotten home, on the spur of the moment I decided to make Dulce de Leche (following Alton Brown's recipe). In making Dulce de Leche from scratch, guess what the final stage in the process is? And guess what I found myself heading downn to the Target in West Seattle to get?


Dinner was a real treat- home made Chicken Tikka Missala, a nice dark beer, and homemamde brownies and ice cream with my DDL sauce on top. For my Father's Day gifts, I recieved some primo e-Shave shaving lube and cream, and a mandollin slicer that will help me out a lot when it comes to food prep. But the best gifts that I recived can be found here!


Links:

• Empire Espresso
• Cafe Campange
• Alton Brown's Dulce de Leche redipe

Something I saw the other day

I found this old sign while walking home from the Beacon Hill light rail station a few days ago:

From Blogger Pictures

I had to do a double take. Someone in 20th century Seattle actually thought  that this was a clever name for a cafe?

Kid 1: "Hey guys, I"m bored. Where do you want to go?"

Kid 2: "I know - let's go hang out at the K.K.K!"

Ughh.

Fortunately, the Triple-K no longer exists (that I can discern, anyway). There is a bakery-flower shop at the site, and adjacent to it is the Seattle Supermarket. Which really isn't, but that's a discussion for another day. Maybe.

Just another weekend

Things are definitely better when I'm able to mow the lawn once a week. I was able to cut my previous times by a full hour due to the facts that (1) I didn't  have to mow the entire lawn twice, and (2) I didn't have to rake up a ton of grass.


Taking advantage of the fact that we have someone who is living with us who doesn't mind looking after the kids, Carrie and I went down to Georgetown on Saturday to eat at Calamity Jane's, a new American eatery. We found the food there to be pretty good - not stellar fare, but tasty nonetheless. We both opted to have half-pound burgers - which we both finished ;) I had the Calamity Jane while Carrie had the Wild Bill Hickock. We both liked the toppings and the burgers were cooked perfectly. The food snobs in us suspected that they were using pre-formed patties that may or may not have been previously frozen (verssus hand-formed patties which would more definitely be fresh), but I personally don't think that detracted from from the experience.


Sunday, I tried my hand at making a drink that I had first experienced last week at Toulouse Petit, called a "Breakfast Flip". Here is the recipe that I used in my first attempt:

• 1 cracked raw egg
• 1 shot vodka
• 1 shot maple syrup
• 1-1/2 shot Cafe Boheme
• Sprinkled cinnamon on top of the shaken mixture

My first attempt came out a little strong and sweet. I alleviated the former by adding crushed ice into the mix. I suspect that the latter could also be remedied by my using Baileys instead of Cafe Boheme; both are cream-based liqueurs, but Boheme has more of a sweetened coffee flavor  to it. To cut down on the sweetness, I may just cut out a bit of the syrup and up the vodka content. Next weekend, maybe ;)


Links:
Calamity Jane's
Toulouse Petit

Memorial Day weekend

Aside from running, mowing the lawn, watching over kids and the like, not much went on over Memorial Day weekend. The weather prevented us from really being able to get out and do too much until Monday rolled around.


On Monday, Carrie and I took a trip to lower Queen Anne to eat breakfast at Toulouse Petit, an eatery that does for Cajun Cusine what The Kingfish Cafe does for Creole. We went there for breakfast during  their happy hour. We were in line for a twenty+ minute wait, but when two spots opened at the bar, the hostess asked us if we would like to skip the line for seats and eat our breakfast at the bar, which we did.

The bartender was fairly prompt and very friendly. I started off with a Breakfast Flip, and my wife had a Breakfast Martini. Both drinks were excellent and generous. To eat, we had the Cajun Meatloaf and eggs and the Pork Cheek confit. Both dishes were very tasty and delivered to us pretty quickly, considering that the place was at the time packed for the breakfast happy hour, during which all of the dishes were $6. My only minor complaint is that our order of beignets arrived late, after our entrees, but that just meant that we had a desert course!

After that, we went to Lowes to pick up some supplies so that we could get started on our herb garden this year. We planted cilantro, basil, thyme, parsley and chives in pots, and put them on the bench on our porch so that they'd get plenty of sun. 

Aside from the herbs, we had to buy the pots, potting soil, peat moss and vermiculite. We have so much of the soil-related matter left over  that we should be able to plant a fairly full garden with it, and we'll always have plenty of compost for our efforts, since I started composting at least three pounds a week on average since we moved onto Beacon Hill almost a year ago.

Friday, May 14th and closing

It was a strange mix of hubris, exasperation and desperation that led Carrie and me to believe that we could make the trip from Salt Lake City to Seattle in one day without an overnight stay in Le Grande, OR, as we had originally planned.

We had started out that morning with the best of intentions; Carrie, Carla, Gaboli and I ate at the Olympian Greek restaurant in Salt Lake City - excellent breakfast, wonderful Greek Coffee - and planned on meeting up in Boise later on. Carla and Axia took off in one car, and Carrie, the twins and I in another. After the first stop things were going fine, but when we had to stop due to a crying child less than an hour later, we decided to tough it out and push through the night.

Bad idea - but then again, in retrospect, so was the entire endeavor of driving three month old twins and an eleven year old Yorkshire Terrier across a thousand miles and over a mile in elevation to Utah.  If driving all night to hit Seattle a full sixteen hours earlier than we would have otherwise was a mistake, it was certainly the right one to make.

I am certainly glad that Carrie's extended family got the chance to see the twins, as well as the fact that Carla followed us from the small town confines of Richfield, Utah to the big city of Seattle, Washington so that she could have a chance at a new life, as well as helping Carrie and I out with the twins for a few months.  But neither Carrie nor I are particularly keen on making any more trips with the kids that takes any longer than  the drive from our house to their pediatricians on First Hill in Seattle, at least not for a couple of years or so.

Babies are tough creatures at heart - muh tougher than we as adults give them credit for - but Gabriel and Oliver are still recovering, emotionally and physically, from the ordeal; Gabriel in particular seems to have picked up a sore throat that is most likely the symptomatic manifestation of an unknown something that had been transmitted to him by the many pairs of unwashed hands that had handled him. His cries are currently rather raspy shadows of their former selves; being such, his short throaty peals are especially dolorous. Note to selves and others: no handling of our twins with unsanitzed hands for the next few months.

----

Yesterday, I awoke to a lawn  that had been sorely neglected by human hands  - but taken care of to extreme abundance by the wonderfully bountiful Pacific Northwest spring rains - for three weeks. So long was the grass that I had to essentially cut it twice with our little manual push mower. Seeing as how we had returned home a scant seven hours prior, after three hours of labor, I was pretty much ready to pack it in. Making a trip through the chaotic, crowded aisles of Costco with two crying babies, who were surely freshly traumatized from their recent ordeal, in tow didn't help things any. This morning, I did a reset by running around Green Lake and stopping off at Peets for Coffee. Then  things seemed to be much better.

Welcome home.

Thursday, May 13th

It was pretty much all over for us in Richfield, except for the crying. Rus and I went back to The Cove for coffees this morning, and made one last trip (this time around) to Katie' Cup. I then started to pack the car as Carrie and Carla bid their farewells to their family.


Carrie and Carla...?


Yep – that's right. Carla, Carrie's sister, is coming to Seattle to live with us for a few months as she looks for a new job and new life. In the process, she'll be giving Carrie some much needed help with the kids. Both Carrie and I (and Axia) are very happy to have her with us and our house is now officially hers for as long as she's here.


After mahy tearful farewells, we, in two cars (Carla took Axia, which was a huge load off of Carrie and I) made our way to my brother in law's house. Even during the (relatively) short drive from Richfield to Salt Lake City, Carrie and I still needed to stop one time to take care of the kids.


Rodney had just recently brought a new house in the Sugarhouse district of Salt Lake City, and this was the first time that Carrie and I had seen it. It's about the same size as our place in Seattle, but it has a full size basement and sits on about twice the amount of land as ours does – all for half the price. You gotta love variability between housing markets!


We ended up eating pizza, watching DVD's, and spending the night at Rod's place. We'd need plenty of rest for the next day's journey.

Wednesday, May 12th

A sweet pungent odor filled my my nostrils as I stepped into the cramped confines that was “The Cove” coffee shop on the outskirts of Richfield. I was pleasantly greeted by the barista, a young amiable man wearing a flannel shirt and a baseball cap who wore the air of one who was as comfortable reigning in steers as he was pulling shots. Smiling, he explained to me the menu; espresso drinks- here. Juice menu – here. Same with sandwiches and wraps. Pull your own soft serve yogurt, and here are your toppings. What will you have?


I inquired as to the possibility of getting a decaf latte; Carrie is still breastfeeding, and we've seen the consequences of giving the kids breastmilk with traces of caffeine. 


I didn't tell him that last part.


Oh – I'm sorry, we can't do that.


I smile and nod. I'll just have a cappuccino with four shots.


Four shots? Whoa – you like it strong.


You betchya. And some vanilla syrup.


Syrup? You mean flavoring.


Yeah.


He prepares the drink. Another man looks at me. This one could be the Bishop in charge of the Ward were he not standing here with me in a café. He still could be – I haven't actually seen him partake of any caffeinated beverages, just oversee the sale of such to the gentiles. Which technically I'm not.


I digress.


He asks me where I'm from. I say Seattle. No – wait. I say Maryland. I live in Seattle. He says Richfield is a small town. Nothing wrong with that. That's my contribution. I'm visiting my in-laws. That's also my contribution. Some more stuff is said, but it's all inconsequential. Small talk to fill a large void in time.


My drink is ready. I pay the man. I leave the ample change as a tip for the guy. I like this place. But I have to go back to Katie's Cup for the Latte. For today, The Cove is not a one stop shop.


After I drop off drinks, I spend a few hours with the family before I go to pick up some lunch. I drop off the lunch and then head to the Family History Center to do some research into my maternal grandfather's side of the family. I find a 1930 Madison Parish census record that indicates that he was raised in a house headed by a single mother alongside eight other siblings, two of them twins. I reach a dead end here because I can't find his birth certificate. But I do find out that he enlisted in the Army in 1941, rose to the rank of Staff Sergeant, and was buried in a national cemetery.


An older Elder, fulfilling his calling, is helping me. He asks me if I am a member.


I fess up. I am inactive, though.


He cheerfully encourages me to continue to do research so that I can do some temple work. In his mind, at least ten additional people with the last name of Skinner have just been posthumously baptized and are awaiting their bounty in the Terrestrial Kingdom. I don't dissuade him of the fantasy.


We - Carrie, Gaboli, my mother, father and sister in law, and both of Carrie's grandparents, go to the local Wingers, where we get decent enough food delivered by inadequate service. Both Bev and Carla want the all-you-can eat wings and fingers special. Bev gets only fingers; Carla gets only wings. I get nothing, and Carrie gets soft chicken tacos with barely enough pico de gallo to call a smear.


Carrie and I both order refills on our iced teas; I request vanilla syrup. The waitress returns with two iced teas, both with vanilla.


Carrie orders water to drink. She never receives it.


To close out the night, we, with the sole exception of Carrie's paternal grandmother, go to her maternal grandmother's house to play Tripoli. I win one poker hand and three kittys. It's past ten when we finally get home and retire. The kids are grumpy; Gabe is only taking his food straight from the source, and Ollie is extra hungry, thrashing about until I prepare an extra bottle for him and almost force an ounce down him. He then calms down enough so that he can sleep in the bed with the rest of the family.


Tomorrow, we'll be heading to SLC. The day after, we begin the long trek home. Great.

Tuesday May 11th

Today I had my first “real” cup of coffee. Almost.


I should have prepended that statement by saying that while I am not enough of a coffee-snob to totally dismiss the utilitarian benefits of ease contained within a brewed pot of Folgers or Maxwell House, both international travel and living in the self-proclaimed café capitol of the United States has definitely broadened my palette to the point to which I now regard the drink that is produced by extracting the essence of the grounds from mass-marketed tin drums through a Black and Decker coffee maker is, at best, a rather watery substitute for that which is garnered from micro-roasted beans finely ground, and then steam-pushed through a bail.


So, having said the above, I now rejoin the narrative in progress. In Richfield there are (to my surprise) two establishments which serve what I consider to be “café quality” coffee. The first is an actual stand called Katie's Cup that is located in the parking lot of a local appliances store. On each of my two previous visits to Utah, Carrie and I had stopped off here in the hopes of getting a drink that more closely approximated the ones that we were accustomed to getting back in Seattle. While both the quality of beans and technique used in constructing the drinks both left a bit to be desired, at the very least the desire to go above and beyond was there, and we did end up getting drinks that one could at least label as being a “Latte” and a “Cappuccino” (The second is a place called “The Cove” that I will review tomorrow). Plus, in their defense, Coffee culture is not quite as ingrained in Utah – especially in small town Utah – as it is in Seattle. So the fact that there are such places there is to be applauded, even if there could be improvements to be made.


But I, once again, digress. On Sunday both shops were closed, which is probably to be expected. However, yesterday, on Monday, both shops were again closed, which was more than a little bit of a downer, since I had gone without “real” coffee for the past two days. Today, however, I finally was able to sit back and sip my quad espresso with vanilla, and even though the shots were pulled a bit too long and there was a tad too much vanilla flavoring in it, I still proclaimed the entire affair “good.”

Monday, May 10th

Today was pretty uneventful. We took the kids to Carrie's maternal grandmother's place so that one of their many great-aunts would have a chance to say goodbye to them before she left town. We then dropped the kids back off at the grandparents' place so that we could go shopping together and get something to eat - just the two of us, something that we haven't had the opportunity to do for months now.


After we had finished shopping, Carrie and I were standing in line at a local restaurant, and I had gone up towards the front to take a look at a couple of items. On my way back to Carrie, one woman looked at me, then immediately turned to see if she could find Carrie; upon doing so, she practically beamed “I recognized you from the photos!” It turns out that this person had known Carrie ever since she (Carrie) was a teenager. The proud grandmother had either shown pictures to or sent links to the kids' photo gallery to just about everyone in Sevier and Wayne county who would have them, and this woman had recognized me as being “Carrie's husband.”


The night went pretty well. The kids, still recovering from the events of the day before, took a little while to go to sleep, but once they did, it seemed as if Gabe slept for three hours and Ollie close to five; he would have probably slept longer had Carrie not had to wake him up so that she could feed the two of them at the same time.


We are impressed at how quickly it seems that the twins are progressing. Both Gabe and Ollie are smiling back at people, and it seems that Ollie is actually grinning even more and being very conversant; he is also rolling over more and more, and entertaining himself. Gabe, for his part, is reaching out to objects and grabbing hold of them.


The days of dual-feeding are coming to a close, it seems. Gabe is definitely too long for the special U-shaped pillow that Carrie uses to feed the twins, and Ollie is not too far behind.

Sunday, May 9th

Carrie's parents had arranged for their siblings (and their children) to stop by to see the newest additions to the family. When all was said and done, the kids had been passed, handled, cuddled, kissed, viewed and touched by upwards of five dozen individuals. Three hours, three feedings, and four changings later, both the kids and the mama were pretty bushed, and took the opportunity for a much-needed nap. But even with the respite, the kids still showed the signs of overstimulation a few hours later; Carrie and her mother left the kids in the capable hands of Grandpa Rus, Uncle Rod and myself, and even though Gabe, was content to sleep off the nervousness caused by the day's events (he actually slept through much of the handling and being passed around), Ollie was still cranky enough to have a pretty major meltdown, and it seemed that only the tender ministrations of Aunt Carla could save the day.

Saturday, May 8th

We started out this morning at about the same time as last; we left the Shiloh Inn Riverside in Boise around 8:30, and headed on the road out of Idaho. Carrie took the first driving shift, and we made it about 100 miles before we had to stop off and take care of the kids. After that, I drove for the next 300 miles or so until we hit Ogden, Utah while Carrie rode in the back seat with the kids. After Ogden, Carrie drove us to Nephi then Richfield.


We pulled into Richfield around 6:30 that evening. While the mother, kids and dog settled in, my father in law, Rus, and I went out briefly to get food for everyone, then we all settled in for the evening. The children's maternal-maternal great grandmother and great-aunt stopped by for a sneak peak at the children; around 9 that evening, Carrie, the kids and I went to bed for some much overdue sleep.

Friday, May 7th

We had packed the kids, dog, and ourselves into our trusty blue Prius and set off to Columbia City Bakery in order to get some breakfast and coffees. I had packed Axia into her Sherpa brand soft dog carrier and left her in the car, which was in a shady spot and had its window cracked open. We spent about twenty minutes in the cafe; when we came back out, we discovered that Axia, in her zeal to be totally unfettered or uncaged, ha chewed a hold into the nylon mesh at the front of the carrier. Big sigh – that carrier had seen her transported from Hawaii to Washington state, and from Bremerton to Silverdale to Seattle. Now its time is at an end. Services at eleven.

Moving on. Or, not moving on. At least not quickly or far. We had barely made our way to the eastside when our Gaboli's hunger started to manifest itself in the well-known litany of grunts, arm-waving, half-screams and, finally, crying that no amount of talking or replacing of pacifiers in mouth could assuage. We pulled off at a gas station in Snolqulamie so that the kids could be fed and the Anderson – Burrell twin show could once again hit the road. Which it did for about another hour or so, when Gaboli's primitive needs of food and mom broke through the more moderns appeasements of pacifiers, music and vehicular motion. We went through another couple of cycles of this before an accommodation was made; the mother would sit in the cramped space between the two car seat, holding hand, making bottles and replacing ejected pacifiers, while the father would drive. In this fashion, we were able to make our way with relative quickness through the rest of Washington state, Oregon and into Idaho.

We stayed for the night at the Shiloh Inn Riverside in Boise, which is an okay enough place. The front desk service was excellent, the room was clean but needed some major updating / refurbishment, and the continental breakfast was decent enough for the purposes of calorie provision. They charged us $25 extra for Axia, but they took off almost that much due to the fact that we were first time guests.

We ordered food from Flying Pie Pizza. We had the Stromboli Pizza which was okay. The toppings weren't really anything to talk about and the dough was average. They were cool enough to deliver beer to the room for us – we had a six pack of Alaskan Amber.

After the first day, we came to the conclusion that the five hours of discomfort that we would have gone through had we flown would have been greatly preferable to the twenty-four that we would have to eventually endure driving to Utah. We also decided to un-invite Axia to any future outings; we love the dog dearly, but she clearly was ill-suited to long drives.

Making our way to the land of Bountiful Beehives

Carrie, Gabe, Ollie, Axia and I are making the drive down to Utah to spend Mother's Day with her family.Not only will this be our first road trip together, but it will be the first time that the Gaboli show has hit the road. Personally, this will be the first time that I will have had the opportunity to visit the great state of Idaho.


When we come back, our household will have an additional member :) Stay tuned!

Watery concoctions that have lost their souls

This weekend, in the process of getting things back in order after my parents visit combined with making preperations for our upcoming journey to Utah, I got the chance to go to a spot that I used to frequent when I lived in Belltown, El Diablo Cafe in in Upper Queen Anne. I used to love heading up there on Sunday mornings for thier authentically brewed Cuban Coffee. Before heading into the store, however, I noticed a new (to me) establishment, Wink Cupcakes. They were closing up, so I bought Carrie a Peanut Butter cupcake and a Vanilla one for myself (Carrie proclaimed hers to be "the best cupcake that (she) ever had!"). I went into El Diablo to get my drink - a Cuban Coffee, and was a bit disappointed; whereas their Cuban Coffees used to be a rich, frothy brew full of flavor, this one was a watery concoction that seemed to have lost its soul.

Speaking of watery concoctions that have lost their souls...

I went driving around Queen Anne and, in the course, of such, got the chance to think a bit. It seems that neighborhoods here in Seattle have become clones of each other. Slowly but surely, older apartment buildings are being replaced with the brick, glass and brushed concrete of condominiums, neighborhood-specific shops are closing down, and chains, both local and national, are moving in, and the population that served to lend a genuine color to the local scenes are being replaced with haughty, bleached out yuppies, soccer moms and older professionals. My old haunts of Ballard, Greenwood, Fremont, Greenlake, Wallingford, Belltown and Capitol Hill have fallen by the wayside; Columbia City and the Central District are in the process of becomming agresssively getrified themselves, and I'm sure that someone has thier eye on Georgetown and Beacon Hill. Or not. I can only hope that the latter two communities are able to retain thier working class and (in the case of Georgetown) industrial flair for a few more generations. Or years, even.




Finally....


I've started a new blog that is dedicated to my somewhat varied (as in quality) writings. Please be warned that there is rough language on this site. Without further ado, I give to you C.A.'s Cafe!!!

Excuse Me!!!

Saturday morning, I went to the bakery to pick up coffee and treats for Carrie and myself. If you've ever been to Columbia City Bakery, you'll know that after 9 or so on the weekends the place is packed. The line for coffee and treats was almost going out the door, and all of the tables were full.


So, you would think that people, being cognizant of the fact that space was at a premium, would behave accordingly and not expect the sea of people to automagically part at their merest approach, wouldn't you?


Into the pictrure comes stereotypical passive-aggressive bearded slacker Seattle guy. He's taking his order of coffee and scones to the high-top where his generously smiling girlfriend is waiting for him. He is about to pass in front of the couple who are in line ahead of me. Does he utter those magical words that have served as the sociospatial lubricant for generations - "Excuse me"? NO! He simply waves his food in the general direction of the table, and, not even looking at the people that he's pushing his way past, proceeds to - push his way past the people whose mere existence he can't be bothered to acknowledge.


Time passes. The couple ahead of me is served. My order is taken. I stand to the side to wait for coffee. Meanwhile, Mr.Stereotypical passive-aggressive bearded slacker Seattle guy, along with his girlfriend, Ms. I'm obviously the better socially adjusted of the two of us, finish their meal. He, avoiding my gaze, pushes his way past me and seems genuinely puzzled as to both why he is tripping over my unmoving size 13 foot and why he needs to exert something other than a cursory amount of force to make his way past my mostly unyielding elbow. She, for her part, smiles as if to say “Yes, I am with him, please don’t hold it too much against me”, gives me a quick and quiet “Excuse me” as she works her way by, and I gladly stand back to accommodate her passing. He glares at me, as if mad that I dare to accede to her spoken request whilst not doing the same for his unspoken one.


So - they leave. But if you think that’s the end of the story- fear not! For here comes Ms. Stereotypical passive-aggressive I live in a trendy gentrified neighborhood and you are just a visitor here Seattle older woman! C’mon – didn’t you know that there’s a table open, and this gal has to eat? Sure, I may be 6’0 and 230 pounds, but be sure that she will make sure that all 5’6, 140 lbs of her will somehow find a way to attempt to violate the first law of physics with your self before she even thinks about giving you a dirty look.


*Sigh*


Since when did saying “Excuse me” become passé? Is it because saying those two little words could be considered being tantamount to admitting that you are not in total control of the space around you,? Or have people just become that damn lazy and inconsiderate? Okay, okay – I’ll not tar all of humanity with the same brush – it just seemed to me, on that day in Columbia City, that certain individuals were going out of their way to be rude.


At least that didn’t color my entire weekend. Since Carrie wanted to clean the house in preparation for my parents’ visit, I elected to take los Gemelos out for a ride. When I came back two hours later, the house was sparkling clean, and the mama was beaming, happy with her progress. Sunday, I went for a run around Green Lake (2.8 miles in 27 minutes 6 seconds), and then, meeting a friend for the Top Pot 5k, walked for 3.1 miles around the same body of water. I came home, tired, but feeling otherwise pretty good, and spent the rest of the day as a pretty quiet day with Carrie and the kids.


Two more days to go!

Yesterday...

Yesterday was one hell of a day.

I stayed at home so that I could watch over the kids for part of the night (allowing Carrie to get more than 4 hours of straight sleep), and had planned on working from home the rest of the day after a brief nap. So, as planned, I took over Gaboli duty (Gaboli being the portmanteau that Carrie and I came up with to refer to the twins collectively) at three in the morning, and proceeded to stay up with them until around five, at which point they calmed down enough so that I could get a couple more hours of sleep. When I woke up around seven, they were stirring a bit, so I took them to Carrie so that she could feed them.

At this point, I had planned on taking a quick nap for a few hours, and then getting up so that I could do some work. So, I crawled into bed and was about to doze off when I received a call from Sarah’s (my ex wife) stepfather, Sonny. It seems that she had opened an account at a credit union and listed me as a co-owner. When she had passed away, full control had reverted to me. So as not to disturb Carrie and the kids, I took the call outside of the bedroom. While I was talking to Sonny, I decided to pull up the bank accounts on my Mac and confirm that I had primary control. Seeing that I did, I then went about talking to both Sonny and the bank to see what needed to be done so that Sarah’s husband could get the money out of the account.

Upon hanging up, I noticed that my computer was acting strangely. Despite clicking around the desktop, I was unable to access any applications, and there was no response to my keystrokes. With a sinking feeling – I had seen this before – I hard-rebooted my computer, only to get the dreaded Mac OSX Question Mark of Death.

For the second time since I had bought the machine, my hard drive had crashed. Damn.

Luckily, I had my work computer with me, so I was still able to get some work done and make an appointment at the Apple store in Tukwila so that I could get my computer fixed. But replacing the internal hard drive on a Macintosh is not an inexpensive proposition – I ballparked the estimate at $300. But it had to be done. Needless to say, the culmination of events left me more than a little upset. I had to jump through some hoops to help Sarah’s husband get the money that he was rightfully due, my hard drive had crashed, I would have to drive twenty miles to get it fixed, I would have to spend money, and a good deal of my music and photographs were gone. 

So, I did what any self-respecting man would do to deal with all of this.I went for a run. 

I ended up doing two miles in slightly under twenty minutes, and I found myself at my favorite spot nearby, Columbia City Bakery. I treated myself to my usual quad shot of espresso, chilled for a bit in the cool, sunny outside area, and walked back home, having gained a bit of perspective.

The rest of the day went pretty well. I got some work done, helped out with the kids, and took my computer in to get fixed. Pleasant surprise: since there have been so many issues with the hard drives on Macbooks, they replaced mine free of charge. Even better surprise: since the smallest hard drive they had on hand was a 160Gig model, they slapped that one in there for me. Sweet!

The end of an era (almost)

Pretty soon after we moved into our new house here in Beacon Hill, Carrie and I bought a spiffy espresso machine (a Rancilio Silvia):

From Blogger Pictures

...and a rather run of the mill (no pun intended) Cuisinart grinder:

From Blogger Pictures

Carrie and I are both avid coffee drinkers  - we even had our first date at a local cafe; after moving in together and combining our resources, however, we quickly realized that, between the two of us, we were spending a lot of money on our one-off  trips to the cafe. We had hoped that by investing money in decent equipment up front, we could make our own coffee drinks and save money in the long run.

Problem was, we didn't have all the pieces in play. We had a pretty kick-ass machine in the Silvia, and can always get good beans, but, as Alton Brown would put it, we didnt have all of the elements of good espressso; we had the Macchina Espresso, the Mano dell’operatore could be obtained with time, the Miscela with money, and the Manutenzione kept up on, but our 15-setting  Cuisinart was incapable of delivering the Macinadosatore! We just could not get a fine enough grind of coffee that would produce a decently pulled shot.


So, we splurged yet again, and got this little beauty:

From Blogger Pictures

This Maestro is a smaller, home version of the same grinder that some of the smaller chains and one-off cafes around here use. It has 40 settings, and, sure enough, it does produce a very fine powder that allows us to pull the perfect shot of espresso.


So - why the end of an era (almost)? Well, for both Carrie and I, going out to a cafe is much more than just an opportunity to get coffee. It's a social event - a chance to get out of  the office, away from the home, and see other individuals in a nice, third place setting. We won't be giving that up completely- but we will have to adjust and make this change in our lives.

Sarah Tokas: 1966 - 2010

From Blogger Pictures

(France, 2005)


Yesterday morning, after a fight with pulmonary hypertension, my ex-wife, Sarah Tokas, passed away. She was 43, and is survived by her husband and daughter, Luis and Kathleen.


I first met her back in 1995 in Spain. We were both stationed on the USS Simon Lake at the time, and I just happened to be sitting next to her in our indoctrination class when she turned to me, slapped me on  the shoulder, and playfully demanded to know "what my story was". We struck up a friendship, hanging out in several ports of call before we started going out  a few months later while in our home port of La Maddelena, Italy. We were married in May of 1997 in Palau, Italy, and spent our honeymoon in the provincial capitol of Sassari. After I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and discharged from the Navy in 1997, I followed Sarah as she was transferred to Jacksonville, Florida; Honolulu, Hawaii; and finally Bremerton, Washington.


A combination of factors led to us getting separated and finally divorced, but even after we had made the decision to no longer be a couple, there were no bad feelings between us, and we were always friends; the door of communication was never fully closed between the two of us. Even though we had gone our own separate ways, there was a special place in my heart for her. To me, Sarah was a good, kind, generous person with a magnifiance of spirit and a wonderfully gregarious nature. She lived, laughed and loved with equal ease, and I'm happy to have been a part of her life - and to have had her as a part of mine. Knowing that she is not in this world makes it a slightly darker one for me.


I'd like to share a song that the two of us liked: "You make me feel like peace and love and happiness", by A:Xus. I introduced it to her back in 1999, and she would occasionally ask that  I play it for her on her mellower days.



Goodbye, Sarah

No more c-a-fe.ca

I logged onto my Wordpress installation at c-a-fe.ca this morning, just to discovered that it had been hacked into.  The hack was pretty ineligant at its core - basically, some bot went through all of  my index.html / php files and replaced them all with pages that displayed some crazy faux-pro-Muslim message, along with a pointer to an image being hosted by imageshack, which shows me the truly low caliber of individual that we are dealing with. I managed to fix 95% of the damage, but there were still a few ghost files that I could not suss out. Long story short, I decided that this was an oportune time for me to make a change, and switch my wordpress blog from my private hosting on RoutHost to a sponsored host at wordpress.com. So, I backed up all of my posts, pages, and comments to a new site at http://ccbeans.wordpress.com/. Sadly, I had to leave my beloved CoffeeSpot theme behind, but I kinda like the new layout. I had wanted to use Blogger, but, for some reason, Pages just were not cooperating with me.

My site at c-a-fe.ca expires around the 15th of this month; coincidentally, this is all happening right around the time during which I'd have to renew both my domain name and services anyway, so I get to save some money in the process!

Lottie's Lounge

Our favorite hangout, Geraldine's, was closed, so Carrie and I decided to take our her parents and take a chance on Lotties Lounge.  The food itself was excellent - I  had the Italian Sausage grinder, Carrie had Ham, Swiss and Arugula, and while I forget what her parents had, no one had anything but good things to say about their sandwiches, They also serve an excellent chili soup and clam chowder as well. Carrie's clam chowder came out cold, though, and we had to send it back.

The reason I marked them down from four stars was the service. The woman tending bar had her back turned to us for much of our visit while she was busy futzing about with her bar tabs. It took her five minutes to get around to giving us our menus, and another ten to get around to giving us our check (plus five to get her attention so that she could get my wife's clam chowder warmed up).  The music was way too loud as well. As good as the food is, I won't be going back,

View Larger Map

All good things...

Now that the kids are here in the world, I am stepping away a bit from the me-centric Caffeine Nation and devoting more time to C.C and the Beans, a more family-centered blog that is devoted to Gabe, Ollie, Carrie and I - and even Axia! I'm hoping that you'll see some content from Carrie there, as well. 


I decided to move away from Blogger for this one because, as much as I like Blogger, Wordpress is the better tool for blogging, I think. There are far more templates, and I have found one that fits the likes of both Carrie and I just fine. Plus, as much as I value comments, I really don't like anonymous commentary...


Here are all of the blogs  that I currently maintain:

• CC and the Beans - Family Stuff
• This Blog - runs, restaurant reviews, general musings
• The Caffeine-nation of Charlie - Java Programming stuff

You are more than welcome to follow one, two, or all three of my blogs! Of course, comments are always welcome!

Baby Pics!

I've started a new gallery just for the kids. Here is a sampling of the pics inside. 
Gabe:

From The Kids

From The Kids

And Ollie:

From The Kids

From The Kids

The Babies are here! The Babies are here!

Carrie Ann Anderson and Charles Anthony Burrell, III would like to announce with much happiness the birth of their two beautiful baby boys, Gabriel Anthony and Oliver Russell Burrell. Both were born on February 10th, 2010 at Swedish Hospital, First Hill, Seattle.

Gabriel was born at 5:25 am weighing 5 pounds, 3 ounces.
Oliver was born at 5:27 am weighing 4 pounds, 14 ounces

The boys will become grandsons to Russell and Beverly Anderson of Richfield, Utah, and Charles (II) and Carolyn Burrell of Frederick Maryland. They will also be proud nephews to Carter Burrell, Rodney Anderson and Carla Anderson. Lastly (but certainly not least), they will be great-grandsons to Dolores Burrell, Charles Burrell (I),Dorothy Skinner, Corene Anderson and Nea Ramsay. We look forward to having all of their family in their lives.

Almost 34

One day passes and we're closer to 34 weeks. At this point, we're thinking that each day that passes with the kids in the womb means perhaps 2-3 days that they won't have to spend in the NICU of they are born before 38 weeks. Of course, if they make it that far, then we might not have to worry about the NICU thing - and be able to take both of our beautiful boys home with us.

Yeah, that's us being greedy :)

Of course, Carrie is going through a lot of stress right now. Her blood pressure is yo-yo'ing like crazy, she has headaches, and the physical pressures of having two human beings in her can be too much to bear at some point. We both realize that, in seeing the benefits to her health, the decision to induce could be made and enacted sooner than later.

Still, we can hope. We both have faith that our sons will come out and be just fine in the end.

I stayed with Carrie again last night at the hospital. Before making my way home, I went on my longest run / walk ever. I'll not say how long this took me. On the other hand - maybe I will. 66.5 minutes really isn't too bad for this distance, seeing as how I actually ran up all the hills and walked four times after each of those sprints.

View Larger Map

This run took me from First Hill to Capitol Hill to Belltown (skirting along lower Queen Anne in the process) to Pioneer Square to Downtown Seattle to Cascade. I tripped once and ruined my running gloves catching myself. But I made it in the end :)

Goodbye, Downtown Cups

When I first started working at my Varolii, my daily commute took me past a wonderful coffee ship called Downtown Cups. I would walk past that establishment on my way to the Exchange Building and stop in just about every day. After about a couple of weeks of seeing my face, the owner (Michelle) and the baristas would memorize my poison of choice, and start working on it as I stepped into the doorway. Over the years, I developed a genuine rapport with Michelle and some of the baristas, and my visits became less about me just stopping in to get coffee, and more about just seeing what was up and how everyone was doing. When I moved across the sound from Kitsap County to Seattle’s Belltown area, I stopped in less often, since it was no longer directly on my way, but I still made it a point to stop by at least three or four times a month and see how everyone was doing.

Today, I stopped by to get a cuppa, and found the doors closed. After four –plus years of serving the downtown area and commuters, Downtown Cups is no more.

Very sad. DTC filled a pretty significant place in my workday life, and now will do so no more. I truly wish Michelle (the former owner) all the best in all of her future endeavors.

33 going on 34 (hopefully)

There was the possibility that Carrie would be induced today, but her blood pressure results have come back as being relatively unchanged, so (for now) we are focusing on a new goal: 34 weeks :) Neither one of us thinks that the pregnancy will last much past that point, even if it reaches that point.

We are so looking forward to seeing our two boys! We've had the names picked out for the two of them ever since before we found out what the genders were. Our place is (mostly) ready, and we are awaiting the arrival of our two beautiful baby boys!

Here's hoping for 33!

There was a scare n Friday morning concerning both the length of time between and duration / severity of Carrie’s contractions. Things had gotten to the point to where the doctors put her on the drug of last resort –Magnesium Sulfate. The side effects were tolerable for a little while, but after a few hours, she started to really notice her own wooziness and lightheadedness, and experienced some shortness of breath during the night.

Right now, we are thinking that it’s a matter of days, not weeks. We’re hoping to make it one more day to her 33 week mark; it would be really great if she could make it to 34 weeks. But that’s really out of our hands, at this point.

I’ve been staying at the hospital during the nights; poor Axia has had to pretty much fend for herself these days. I’m really grateful to our friends and neighbors for pitching in and helping us out.

Day by Day

Because of recent developments,  we might not be looking at having the twins in the 3-6 week timeframe - as we had last thought - but rather, sometime within the next couple of weeks. We would be extremely lucky – and grateful – if our boys made it to 34 weeks. Regardless of when they come, though, it’s inevitable that they will need to spend some time in the NICU.

We won’t be able to take our kids home with us. Carrie might not even be able to hold them after they are born. What’s worse is that I would have to follow the first kid to the NICU, leaving my wife alone in the operating room to give birth and recover. As mentally ready as we might be for these possible eventualities, there really aren’t any words of consolation that can be said, no comfort that can be offered, that makes up for the enormity of what is to come.

For right now, we are treating each and every day that our sons are in the womb as a gift to both us, and to them; perhaps that will be one less day that they spend in the NICU, one day less that they spend away from the place that their loving parents call home, one day less that we, their loving parents, won’t have their kicking, cooing, cuddling, crying selves safe with us in our happy abode.