— पाँच हजार सात सौ चौंतीस —
First, I'll tell you why there was no DLU (Daily Lunch Update) yesterday: we had an all-day, all-Merchandising meeting. They provided lunch, from
Homegrown, and I chose the
Za'atar Smashed Chickpea sandwich. I was very responsible and saved half the sandwich to eat later for dinner during the movie I went to see with Laney, but the lunch box also came with a Cougar Mountain chocolate chip cookie
and a bag of Kettle potato chips. I had the cookie with lunch and I had the potato chips with dinner.
I was still up yet another pound this morning. Annoying. I was doing so well for a couple of days there, but as I knew would be the case, Action Movie Night on Wednesday night was a real challenge. I ate way too much, as is the way with potlucks. In any case, I had no time to post about that yesterday so I'm doing it now.
There was an stonishing number of people in attendance this week. 13! Had Shobhit not been in India and been able to join, we would have filled the 14-seat theater to capacity. (The Community Kitchen also has four or five folding chairs which could be used if any more people had shown up; that has yet to happen since Shobhit and I have been going.)
There at least three people this week who I didn't even know. But let's go through the regulars first: Tony, Jake, Ryan, Chris G, Chris B, Derek, Tom, Daniel, and myself. Among the others, there was a guy with long red hair named Greg, who I've seen at least once before; Nico, a new resident who popped in after reading about the biweekly night on the flyer in the elevator—where I met him on our way down from the East building; a new guy apparently invited by Tony from work who I overheard being introduced to someone else as Santiago; and yet one other I don't recall ever having seen before and I have no clue what his name is. Most of us are on a Gmail group list which Tony always emails on Sunday or Monday to check in on who all is in this week, but these new guests this week would not have been on that.
It was Tony's turn to choose a movie this week. A lot of times, after this group's
12-year history (only two and a half of which have Shobhit and I been a part of), a movie gets chosen that no one can believe has never been chosen already. Such was the case with Tony's pick this week:
Pulp Fiction. And, although I found an old blog post from 2004 saying I was fairly certain I had seen it about four times, I can find no record of having seen it since sometime before 2002. It had been a
long time since I saw this movie.
The movie choices in this group are always a crapshoot, though; tastes really vary, and sometimes people lean into the trashy or what they think of as "fun-bad." I don't tend to like those so much, with rare exceptions. Ditto the other frequent genre that comes up: horror. Sometimes, though, people choose excellent and/or classic movies, and
Pulp Fiction definitely qualifies. I really enjoyed watching it, even though a lot of it moves at a surprisingly slow pace, really contributing to its 154-minute runtime.
Now I have to mention, yet again, the one guy that has become a regular but I don't think is super popular in the group. This guy regularly goes back to get a whole new plate of food, after having already eaten, to bring into the theater with him. Last time, he had to head toward a new seat when he started toward one and a guy in the adjacent seat said, "I'd prefer you not eat sitting next to me." (So, he sat two seats away in my row. Thankfully, I didn't really hear him eating.) This week, in the middle of the movie he got up, then asked a guy in the middle row if he could hand him the bag of parmesan pretzel crisps—something he had not brought himself, mind you. He took a few out of the bag and when he tried to give it back the guy in the seat said, "You can keep it." When the first guy went out into the kitchen, there were definitely some murmurings about what an odd thing to do that was. And then, when he returned, Jake was rather loud when he said, "Shut the curtain whoever just came in!" He had left the curtain slightly open so some light was coming into the room.
This guy is only part of the group now because another resident, who only ever comes to Action Movie Night once or twice a year, was allowing him to stay with her for a brief period, due to circumstances I can't really remember. Knowing he's a huge movie buff (much I used to do back in the day but see no real reason for anymore now that I have an AMC membership and am not deeply invested in seeing movies in advance, he finds ways to go to a lot of sneak previews and advanced screenings), she told him about Action Movie Night, and brought him with her once, sometime early last year I think. He's been coming back ever since, even though he's no longer staying with her; he's on the gmail group list. To be perfectly honest, I have varying opinions of the other longtime regulars, but this guy is the first I have noticed eliciting varying vibes from everyone else in the group.
Such is the nature of a growing social group, I suppose. Tony used to do this as a private regular movie night with only his friends, back in the early days, but had to stop when other residents complained about people tying up certain days with theater reservations at a regular cadence. For years now, there are official rules about not reserving the theater "daily, weekly, or monthly." Tony only managed to keep his biweekly movie night intact by getting elected to the board (which he left a few years ago), and managing to get this on the calendar biweekly by opening it up to the entire condo complex. This is how so many people who are
not longtime friends of Tony's, including Shobhit and myself—Tony told me about Action Movie Night at a rooftop barbecue in the summer of 2022—have wound up becoming regulars. As I have already noted many times, the Gmail group is still called "MMWedList" because in the beginning they used the regressive group name "Man Movie Wednesday." I'm sure they changed it to "Action Movie Night" once they had to open it to the Braeburn community. Even now, rarely do women join, and probably 19 out of 20 Action Movie Nights the group is all men—and Shobhit and I being the only gay ones has alone slightly altered the vibe, although to be fair the group has always been only welcoming and friendly. They're even friendly to the awkward guy, because they are generally decent people. I'm the only one over here really talking shit about him.
I think it would take a lot to offend that guy anyway. He's the kind of clueless type.
Anyway! I made a simple but delicious dish from a recipe Ivan shared with me all the way back in 2014, something he used to make a lot and always smelled delicious so I asked him for the recipe:
pasta with pesto cream sauce. I long ago had transferred the recipe over to my Notes app, but when I sent Ivan a photo of the bowl of pasta I made, he asked me to re-send it to him, and I noticed a couple of ingredients missing from the version in my Notes app: fresh basil, and 1/3 cup olive oil. Mind you, in 2014 Shobhit was still living in Los Angeles and would for another two years, so I wasn't nearly as accostomed to all the handily available spices and seasonings that exist in our home now due to Shobhit's cooking. I likely kept those two out of the list deliberately at the time, having discovered there was no need for the oil (still true) and feeling no need to buy fresh basil for this one dish. But guess what? Shobhit has a pot of live basil on our windowsill! I had already made the pasta when I noticed this on the old website link, though, so I'll just have to add that back in my Notes app.
I rather deliberately chose this for when Shobhit is out of town, because he never wants a simple recipe with few ingredients. He always, always wants to weigh any dish down with a ton of different vegetables, as a means of increasing volume without increasing calories. Sometimes simple is better, though, and outside of the noodles and pesto cream sauce (granted, a very high-calorie element), the only things added are fresh chopped tomato and pine nuts—and, ideally, basil. I felt like I added a lot of salt and pepper to the sauce but it clearly needed more after I was done making it. Still, the basil alone adds a lot of flavor and people seemed to like it. The leftovers I brought home should cover my dinners both tonight and tomorrow night.
— पाँच हजार सात सौ चौंतीस —
— पाँच हजार सात सौ चौंतीस —
As for last night, I walked straight to Pacific Place to meet up with Laney at 5:00. Okay, about 2/3 of the way there I managed to hop on a RapidRide D bus going down 3rd and that saved me a few minutes; I got to the theater at about 4:55.
We saw a very entertaining, but also imperfect and very weird Robbie Williams musical biopic called
Better Man. Ultimately I thought it was a fine, solid-B movie; I could tell Laney rather enjoyed it more than I did. She cried multiple times, and to be fair, even I cried a little once. And this is a movie in which Robbie Williams is rendered as a CGI chimpanzee.
This gave us lots to talk about as we walked home after the movie. And then, I actually rather enjoyed writing my review.
For a little while after that, I got on FaceTime with Shobhit in Delhi. Side note: when it's morning here, it's evening there, and vice versa. The entire country of India is in one time zone, which is why they offset it there by another half an hour. If it's 9:00 in the evening here, then it's 10:30 in the morning there, the next date on the calendar. If it's 9:00 in the
morning here, then it's 10:30 pm there on the same date of the calendar. So, when I talked to Shobhit last night, it was this morning there. So to speak.
We spent a fair amount of time researching the local U.S. price of a Zara jacket he wants, to figure out whether it's cheaper for him to buy it there. It looks like it is. And then I went to bed.
— पाँच हजार सात सौ चौंतीस —
I could tell you about that all-day meeting, I suppose.
This would be the last meeting in which Pricing and Promotions is represented as only Gabby, Amy and me. The overall meeting lasted from 9 a.m. to just before 3 p.m., leaving very little time for getting work done otherwise. Somewhat miraculously, it was a very slow day for communications from store POS staff, although I did check my email a few times and did take care of a few things throughout the day. But that was very little of it.
With the exceptions of the lunch break and some breakout times for open discussions about a few other things, most of those six hours were spent with "Team Shareouts," each with their own one or two slides on a projected PowerPoint. There were twelve such presentations: Grocery (Frank and Noah); Deli Prepared (Benny and Diana); Ecommerce, Demos and Special Projects (Brandy); Category Management (Kevin and Beth); Fresh Analysis and Support (Leon); Private Label (Adrienne); Pricing and Promotions (Gabby, Amy and me); Deli Retail (Tristan and Robin); Meat & Seafood (Erik and Jeff); Beer, Wine and Spirits (Peter and Stephen); HBC (Steven); and Produce (Elliott, Tyler and John).
I only listed the people who actually got up to be part of their team's presentations, which totaled 22 people. Now, that number does include Beth, who was one of two people who were not here in person and connected via Teams because they stayed home due to not feeling well. The other was Mackenzie, who may or may not have participated in the presentation if she either was feeling better or was here in person, but I have no idea.
There was a couple of people who got out of participating in a presentation at all, even though they were listed as part of the "Team Shareout" on the meeting agenda: Amanda, Associate HBC Merchandiser; and Cathryn, Fresh Department Support Specialist (my counterpart in Deli and Meat). I could be totally wrong here, but my best guess is that Cathryn was simply happy to sit it out and Leon was good with that; and Steven was happy to do the whole HBC presentation and I have no idea whether Amanda was good with that.
The only Merchandiser not in attendance yesterday was Michael, Prepared Foods Merchandiser, and I don't know if he was also ill or just out of town or what. He was the only one of our now 31-person department who had no presence at all in the meeting yesterday.
The only others I have not yet mentioned are Dave, VP of Merchandising who facilitated the meeting all day; Tracy, Fresh Director; and Justine, Sr. Director of Merchandising (formerly Center Store Director). Moving both Cathryn and Brandi to be among Gabby's direct reports (thereby doubling them for her) was part of a recent organizational change, which also had three people previously under the "Store Operations" umbrella move to becoming more of Tracy's direct reports (of which he now has
eight): John the Produce Operations Manager; Jeff the Meat Operations Manager; and Steve the Central Kitchen Manager. Oh wait, I don't think this Steve guy was there either. That makes two who had no presence at all yesterday. I truly don't even know who that guy is, and I am just realizing now that it means that Merchandising now has a Steven, a Stephen, and a Steve. He's actually been in that position since 2021, just in a different deparrment. Still. Enough with the Steves already! It's confusing enough with all the Chrises around here.
Anyway! I wanted to mention the Pricing & Promotions "Shareout." Each slide has bullet points of both successes, lessons learned, etc. from the past year and projects and challenges expected in the years to come. Gabby, true to form, was pretty methodical about including specific bullet points she felt both Amy and I would be well positioned to speak on. Amy's focused on member promotions and mine, predictably, focused on system upgrades and pricing investments. Gabby had four bullet points under each of the two sections, asking Amy and me to speak to one each; Gabby spoke to the other four, basically splitting them in half between herself and then both Amy and me.
I didn't love it. How I feel about being put in this kind of position, kind of formally speaking about our projects to the entire department, seems to vary depending on the context, the day, the subject matter, etc. Sometimes I'm not nervous at all about it. Yesterday, for some reason, it made me a little nervous. I'm way better at communicating to groups in writing. I was much happier and more comfortable once it was over, but at least I only had to be a little nervous for a short period of time: knowing our "Team Shareout" was not until after lunch, I didn't worry about it at all until then. And of course, soon enough it was over.
For the record, I don't resent being asked to speak. I know where Gabby's head was at in wanting us all to be a part of a team effort with this—not only to present as a team (more successfully than some other teams did, just by virtue of doing it this way), but because I know Gabby wants us to speak on the things for which we can take a lot of the credit. It's one of many things that make her a great manager. I've genuinely never had a better one.
I do have to mention when Peter and Stephen went up to present for Beer and Wine, though. In terms of presenting, Peter was easily the best of the day. (And although Stephen went and stood with him, he didn't really do any of the presenting.)
Peter started by saying, "How many here are celebrating
Dry January?" A good quarter of the room raised their hands—something that surprised me, honestly (I was not one of them, get real). Peter then lowered his head a little and sighed, with just the tiniest bit of theatricality. Then he said: "I suggest the Fishtail Sauvignon Blanc. It's
really dry." Ha! That got a hearty laugh out of the entire room.
— पाँच हजार सात सौ चौंतीस —
[posted 12:30 pm]
