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Gwen Stefani released a new album this week, her first (non-Christmas album) in eight years. Prior to that, it had been 10 years: 2006 was her second album; her first solo release was in 2004. Maybe she has a thing for only releasing original music while Republican shitbags are president.
Anyway. In my opinion, her 2016 album
This Is What the Truth Feels Like is by far her best—honestly, better than all the others combined. Still, this new one,
Bouquet, which I downloaded this morning, is a pretty definitive letdown. It's a pop album but very country-tinged, in a way her music has never been; it's a pretty sharp turn in her sound. And: it's okay, but also forgettable. I'm glad I didn't pay specifically for it. This is why, although it's definitively bad for the artist, music streaming subscriptions are better for consumers.
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I finished
Dune Messiah yesterday, and
I loved it, even though I do think the first book is definitively better. This one feels more like an extension of it than a stand-alone story. As I noted in my Goodreads review, though, I just love being in that universe.
I also need to get better at managing my library holds so I have another book ready to check out when I finish the previous one. I'm most eager to read a recent biography of Fleetwood Mac, the announcement for which has had me listening to their vast, entire catalog over the past few weeks, but I'm still hold #4 on three copies. Dammit!
Dune Messiah was just over two weeks overdue, which had my account suspended. Not a big deal; I just needed to be sure it was returned before it was a month overdue, as only then will the library charge you—at that point they charge you the value of the book, effectively forcing you to buy it outright. I hoped that by some miracle there would be something ready to pick up even though my account was not yet indicating there was. I also browsed the science fiction racks to see if anything I knew to be good jumped out at me. No such luck in either case.
We had some pretty heavy rain during my commute home yesterday. I walked from the office to the Central Library, and most of that walk there was no rain. It did start raining lightly within a couple of blocks of the library, but since I was so close I didn't bother opening my umbrella.
My plan was to take the RapidRide G line up Madison from the library. This would have been perfect had the bus actually come when the supposedly real-time arrival information actually been correct. First there was one coming in four minutes. The time came and went, then the sign said it was coming in five minutes. And then that time came and went.
At this point, there was a downpour. Without that, I might have just hung it up and walked the rest of the way home. But even with an umbrella, I didn't feel like it. A #2 bus came by in between the two times a G bus did not materialize, and I should have just gotten on that. "RapidRide" is a bit of a contradiction in terms of two regular buses pass by before
any RapidRide bus comes by—and indeed, a second #2 came by.
I knew it was entirely possible the G would come right after, in which case I'd get home faster on that, as it has fewer stops. But, by this point, with the Gs so much delayed, a huge number of people were crowding under the bus shelter with me, most of them obviously waiting for the RapidRide. I envisioned an uncomfortably packed bus, and I didn't want to deal with that either. So I got on that second #2 that came by, and walked the few blocks home from its stop on 13th & Union.
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Shobhit had a Theater Puget Sound virtual board meeting between 6 and 8 last night. We still haven't had an opportunity to go grocery shopping so, at his suggestion, I made the box of gnocchi I'd brought home from work that had been in the freezer a while. It did not make for very large portions but Shobhit made a quesadilla for us to share later.
I killed time after I finished making dinner by updating my budget. We spent a total $814.14 on the
trip to Phoenix—a pretty good deal, actually, for a three-night trip that includes both airfare and hotel (granted, only one night at a hotel; we had a free place to stay at Scott's house the other two nights). This was a very rare trip in which we actually ate out for every meal, so the overall spending we did while on the trip amounted to $406.13, although that includes $48 for a box of Fran's Chocolates Shobhit bought to bring as a gift (Linda was particularly thrilled by this).
All but $4 of that was for food (including the chocolates). Shobhit said this was the same amount we spent on food in Australia last year. I just went through the itemized list of spending from the Australia 2023 trip, though, and the combined food and drinks cost $690.12. That includes honey we bought at Cliffords Honey Farm on Kangaroo Island. So Shobhit wasn't
quite accurate there, although to be fair, the Australia trip was 17 days, so that averages out to $40.59 per day, and that includes several instances of getting cocktails, etc. The per-day average spending on food and drinks for this four-day trip to Phoenix was . . . $100.53.
I will say this: the longer the trip, the smarter it is to get a hotel with a functional kitchen and to eat many meals there. That was our strategy in Australia (and is most places we go; the same was the case in Toronto last June—okay I'll calculate the per-day food and drink average there too: $65.62, over five days; that includes the hefty $200+ we spent in one go at Afternoon Tea at the Shangri-La Toronto Hotel).
I got the sense that Scott and Linda eat out or order takeout a lot. I never asked them specifically, but they never suggested eating in. Shobhit thus assumed that they never cook, but I doubt that to be the case: we also brought them a pound of chanterelle mushrooms from PCC, and Scott actually told me on Tuesday that he'll have to figure out how to eat them that night or else Linda would eat them while he was on his trip. Obviously they would have to cook them into something; they're not going to just eat those straight.
Speaking of eating out, something I still haven't mentioned about our lunch at Cress on Oak Creek at L'Auberge de Sedona, which I found no need to mention in the travelogue: our server, a young-ish man (early thirties, maybe?), called me "madam" more than once, even after I spoke.
My default reaction to this is always just to ignore it. I changed all my socials to "any pronouns," after all. If someone wants to call me "madam," I'll let them and I won't correct them.
I think Scott felt he needed to come in with an assist. When the server returned with our drinks, Scott said, "Matthew you had the juice, right?" It was only slightly pointed, but the server got the hint. (The juice was very expensive, at $15, but it was spectacular.)
Shobhit said later he found the food there to be average. I disagreed; I thought it was very good. Whether it's truly worth the price is debatable, I suppose. You also pay, to a degree, for that amazing view of Oak Creek. Still, Shobhit went out of his way to spring for the bill (which ultimately meant that I paid for it; I Zelled him the total cost of these expenses last night). Shobhit just can't stomach accepting generosity like getting a free place to stay without finding some way to give back. Between the Fran's Chocolates, the chanterelle mushrooms, and this lunch, I think we did more than enough to give back. I'd have never gone that far on my own, but that's because I have no shame.
To be fair, the prices were much more reasonable at both Velvet Taco in Scottsdale and Céntrico Cocina Mexicano in downtown Phoenix (which was relatively pricy in its own right), especially for how good the food was. We even messaged Scott and Linda that we highly recommended Céntrico.
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[posted 12:43 pm]
