Bitter Critter

Saturday night a gang of eight gathered for dinner at B Restaurant in old Oakland. The downtown restaurant scene is thriving and I wanted to tick off another restaurant from my list. John made a rare appearance which made the evening special.

The restaurant had received good Yelp reviews so I was feeling optimistic. Here's what they didn't say on Yelp: they have one oven for pizza in which they can fit only three at a time. So what happens when you have a table of eight who want four different pizzas? What they didn't do is tell us that up front so we could order something different, instead we had our table set for four pizzas and then one came out. Then we waited. And waited. And waited. Finally they brought out steak (on the house) because we had been waiting for so long. About a half hour later two more pizzas came out, and then finally, the third. Thankfully conversation flowed, but the food delay was frustrating.

The pizzas were delicious though, thin crust, interesting toppings. We ordered the olive pizza which had artichoke hearts and other goodies, the potato pizza, the margharita pizza and one other, plus two orders of truffled fries. But first we started with their delicious cocktails. I had an updated margarita made with grapefruit juice. Dale and Sue had a "Love" cocktail with raspberries, Kaya and John had a gin and cucumber refreshers, and Kate had a lemony-snickett, an updated mojito. The drinks were fabulous. We topped off the night with three desserts: pound cake, pot du creme, and peach cobbler.Each dessert was fantastic.



But the food was overshadowed by the company when conversation switched from golf (john and tom) to John's new studio. The discussion turned to the name. What were we going to call the new studio? Options: Studio 589, Studio 294.5 (it's half the size of the house), or, Bitter Critter? Bitter Critter named after one of Sue's songs. The restaurant was smart to sequester us in the back because at the mere mention of Bitter Critter, Sue and Pete began rapping the lyrics. After that, there was no stopping the entire table from chanting, "bitter, critter, read about her on twitter" which carried us out to the street as we said our good byes.



Alas, birth-week is nearly over. Just one-or two more events and that will be it until next year.

Birthweek begins

Birthday, schmirthday. I believe in an entire week of celebration. I think it may even extend to a 10 day period. Why celebrate a day, when you can take a week?

I started with a warm-up on Friday night, joining Robyn, Susan, Lady & Carol for a nice meal at Robyn and Susan's house. Saturday I rested, and then Sunday, I took myself on a shopping spree. All of the pent-up shopping frustration, known as DSB (dangerous shopping build-up) was released with the flip of a credit card and a Half-Yearly Sale at Nordstrom. Finally, finally, even after a full-day shopping Marathon in Las Vegas, did I feel sated. I came home, spent - literally.

Knowing that I couldn't bear to bring myself to go out to dinner, nor could I "cook", I hollered (by way of text) over to my own personal "Kramer" and asked him to join us for a cocktail in our back-yard. Kramer skidded onto our patio and I poured a modified "Wendylicious-tini", popped a Viccolo's corn meal crust pizza in the oven, and then sat back and enjoyed the warm nearly-summer night (with heat-lamp).

So as to not let the birthweek celebration grind to a halt, we joined friends Lance and Chris for a delicious brunch at their house: eggs benny, veggie strata - aka Eric eStrada, fried potatoes and scones - YUM! And because John will be working all week, I made sure we went out for a nice dinner on College Ave at Sommerset.

Vive Le Birthweek!

Gearing Up

I've discovered that objects in the mirror are closer than they appear and apparently I appear taller than I am. I found this out while spending two hous in the bike shop getting fitted for a bicycle. The first guy I worked with kept trying to put me on small bikes telling me that I just had to lean the bike over to get on and off. Frankly that's exactly what kept me off a bike for the last 20 years. Finally Glenda, the owner stepped in and found a hybrid (all the rage) for me- extra small.

I rode around the block and then Clay, the other owner chimed in and got a different seat for the bike. I rode around the block again feeling the wind on my face, like a dog with his head out of the car window. It felt pretty good. We then started talking acoutrements: rack, lock, grocery bag, bell (anything else? Oh, a rack for the car) and then I did the math in my head and freaked out. I bought a bike map and told Glenda and Clay I was going to "process", and went home (with my new bike map proudly in hand).

I talked about it with Todd & Mike (neighbors) and with John, and then with my mom. Knowing hat my birthday is around the corner with a potential contribution to the "cause" took a little of the stress away (we had just taken a vacation and I've got two more trips coming up). So I slept on it.


-- Post From My iPhone

Location:Broadway,Oakland,United States

Spontaneous Coffee

My riding partner Dale and I ventured out on trail today after this week's spate of rain. I was apprehensive, as I expected terrible trail conditions (deep muck), but was pleasantly surprised. We headed out in sunshine and arrived back at the barn as the first rain drops started falling (it wasn't supposed to rain today). After putting our trusty steeds back in their respective stalls, I had a wild urge for a latte at Cafe Trieste on Piedmont Ave.

Dale had no plans so we headed down the hill. We arrived just before the flood (of people and rain). Just after grabbing two open seats a line went from the register to the back of the cafe! Where had all of these people come from and where did the rain come from. Clearly, spontaneous coffee was all the rage, or we were trend setters.

The food and coffee were both quite yummy. Cafe Trieste on Piedmont Ave is a sister to its older siblings in Sausalito and San Francisco. It may not have the charm of its North Beach elder, but it suits the needs of the community just fine as a meeting place and lovely food establishment.

Life Changing: 1 (nope)

Fun: 4 (fun)

Easy to implement: 1 (easy)

Worthy of repetition:4 (indeed)

Try This: 5 (spontaneous is fun)

Cost: 1 (coffee and a sandwich won't break the bank)