Reading and Eating

Today for lunch we had tomato soup, grilled cheese sandwiches (with sharp cheddar and horseradish), curried tempeh salad, and Pink Lady apple slices.  And red wine.  The day started out cool and gray, but by lunchtime the sun had come out and we were able to sit on the balcony.

Here is Kam sitting in the sun outside the bookstore door.

What we're reading.

My new books [aquired from Pistil, of course] include Boswell’s Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, In the Shadow of Vesuvius, about the artistic repercussions of the excavation of Pompeii’s ruins in the 18th century, and a collection of the complete song lyrics of John Dryden. All appealed because of their arcane qualities.  The Dryden is so arcane that although it was published in 1932, the pages had not yet been cut.
---Kam

Today I started another Rachel Cusk novel, Transit.   When I find a writer I like, I usually go on a binge, reading all their books one after the other.  This one I ordered online from a megalister and it turned out to be an ex-library book, but I don't care since I just want to read it.   I started it at the bus stop today, but could only read a few pages before the bus arrived because reading in transit gives me a headache.
--Amy

A Spring Lunch

Last week we did not have Pistil Lunch because Sean and I were on a little trip to Portland,OR and then to the ocean on the Long Beach peninsula for one night.  Kam held down the fort and took care of the bookstore while we were gone.

Today's lunch was attended by Amy, Sean, Troy, Kam, and Sue Perry, a friend and painter.  When we operated our brick and mortar retail store we always had art shows in our book shop, and Sue was the first artist whose work we displayed when we opened in 1993.  Recently she has been working on a series of Seattle paintings that have shown the changes to our neighborhood.  The painting below shows the street at the end of our alley a couple of years ago -- a house had been knocked down to make room for some ugly box-like condos.  The church in the painting has since been knocked down for the same reason.

Man Carrying Thing (oil on canvas, 32" x 48") Sue Perry

 For lunch today we had Salad Nicoise, baguette and goat cheese, and cider.  The Salade Nicoise was deconstructed  with the different ingredients served in separate dishes so we could each put what we liked onto our plates.

Kam's plate.

What we're reading.... to be continued in the next entry.

Food for Thought

Today at lunch Kam and I were joined by local artist Jon Strongbow who came by to pick up a book he ordered.  Kam and Jon have only met each other a couple of times, but they must be fashion soul mates as this photo taken outside our front gate attests:

The day was bright and sunny and we were able to sit on the balcony.  For lunch today we had a salad with romaine lettuce, red cabbage, yellow carrots, cherry tomatoes, and toasted pumpkin seeds; served with this we had roasted golden beets, grilled onions and sweet peppers, olives, pepperoncini, hummus, Bulgarian feta cheese, and pita bread.  Kam and I split a can of dry cider, and for dessert we had a bit of dark chocolate with cinnamon, cayenne, and cherries, spicy!

What we're reading:

My sister loaned me a graphic novel she loved:  Stiches:  A Memoir by David Small.  It's the dark story of the author's 1950's childhood in an unhappy and uncommunicative family and his experience of having what he thought was a minor operation that was really to treat thyroid cancer he was not told about, and which he got after being exposed to radiation to treat sinus issues by his doctor father.  The drawings are haunting and beautiful.
--Amy

This week I am reading Edmund White’s collection of essays called Our Paris. Also a book on the home life of William Morris. And the Journal of Eugene Delacroix.  Our Paris is like a more serious David Sedaris, and Delacroix is something of a harbinger of Proust.
--Kam

"I am reading a trilogy by a guy named Barry Hughart and it’s pretty awesome.  The first one is called Bridge of Birds and it’s basically about Chinese history and Chinese mythology and he extrapolates from that. the story is about a China that never existed but should’ve existed and it’s really beautiful. The dialogue is hilarious; of course it’s bloody like a mythology story, but there’s magic in it in a tragic kind of Chinese way."
--Jon Strongbow

Lunch and Books

On Wednesdays, we have "Pistil lunch" for whomever happens to be working that day and sometimes guests.  After a rainy spring, we've had a gloriously sunny week here in Seattle.  Consequently, our lunch moved today from the round table in front of the gas fireplace to the red Formica table in the nook off the kitchen, which has a door opening onto our sunny balcony.  Our meal was only slightly marred by the yappy little white dog in the yard across the alley...

Today it was just Kam and Amy and we had fried rice (with carrots, celery, onions, peppers, shitake mushrooms, garlic, cabbage, and tofu, garnished with green onions, cilantro, and black sesame seeds) and homemade kimchi on the side.  We drank red wine, and had chocolate for dessert.

What we're reading:

I am in the middle of  Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932, a novel by Francine Prose that I picked up from the free shelf at a coffee shop.  It is narrated by various characters (photographers, writers, dancers) associated with the Chameleon Club where cross-dressers of all genders create surrealistic performances on the eve of fascism.  I've also just finished a novel by Rachel Cusk, Saving Agnes, the third novel I've read by this wonderful writer.  And I also just read a back issue of Granta from 2016 on the theme of Ireland.
---Amy

Just finished Designed by Travilla, compendium of Marilyn Monroe‘s most famous on-screen dresses designed by Bill Travilla. For balance I am reading Samuel Beckett’s monograph on Proust. One furnishes a guilty pleasure, the other a sort of pleasurable guiltiness.
--Kam

I am reading White Slaves of Maquinna:  John R. Jewitt's Narrative of Capture and Confinement at Nootka. Trade paperback, 186 pp. Illustrated with black and white photos and drawings. The book was originally published under another (similar) title in 1815. It recounts the author's capture with another crew member from an American trading ship playing the waters of the Northwest coast and his adventures over the next few years living with the tribe that enslaved him. He is a metalworker and so has real value to the tribe, and he tells them his shipmate is his father. He slowly learns their language and becomes acclimated to their ways, eventually marrying, though it is short-lived. It's quite an interesting tale, full of detail as the author kept a journal through his stay. American Indians are either worshiped or reviled in such stories. In this one, though the author considers them "savages" he is also quite fair-minded and reveals a people who are both noble and ingenious and full of superstition and bad temper, just like most humans. Interesting! 
--Sean