Trans/plant/portation

It appears that it is not illegal in the State of Washington to produce or purchase unhomogenized, unpasteurized milk. Of course, they also have medical marijuana up here, but that’s another story. This story is about yogurt, hence the bacteria.

I suppose if one is going to be situated in a small town — call it a city if you like, but really, if we’re talking fewer than six digits of people, we’re talking town. Anyway, if this small town is in the corner of a state bordered by people nostalic for the Wild West and people nostalgic for fascism, one needs to begin playing to one’s strengths, in this case, baking and cooking. Not that these are the only things that one does, but when one begins referring to oneself in the third person (and people don’t bring up Suede of Project Runway), baking and cooking are the easiest strengths to highlight. So bear with one. Erm, me.

Susanne and I were invited to a farm share dinner, which was nice because we used to do those occasionally in DC. We asked what we could contribute and were delighted to be told: DESSERT. So I thought about making cheesecake, as I have in years past, when I’ve made delights like these:

Caramel toffee cheesecake

A caramel toffee cheesecake with the traditional graham cracker crust. There’s also the chocolate mousse cheesecake with an Oreo crust, and finally, the brownie and chocolate swirl cheesecake with a vanilla sponge cake crust.

None of these, however, did I make for the farm share dinner. I made this, a chocolate fudge cake with a masala chai-infused ganache.

Hopefully it went some distance toward making some friends! 

Chocolate cheesecake

chocolate fudge cake

Meanwhile, I made my first foray into growing bacteria in milk, or rather, I made some yogurt last week. Baking the cake was a motivator, so I poured 8 cups of raw milk into a nice large pot and made it not raw anymore by bringing it slowly to 180 degrees. I wound up with three batches setting overnight — a vanilla batch, a plain batch, and a small batch with local organic honey. It turned out really well! Now I need some recipes using yogurt because 8 cups of yogurt is a LOT of yogurt to get through in its two-week life span.

Maybe that’ll be my new career — yogurt maker for the stars. I just need some flavor ideas that are novel and hip, and I’m in business.

I think I’ve mentioned before that there is a whole different concept of space out here west of the Ye Ole Mississippi. That is, space has space here. There’s no bragging about one’s luxury 800 sq. ft. apartment. No sucking in your gut to pass a person with a grocery cart in the aisle of your local market. No squeezing by the jackass in the H2 on 9th Street Northeast when you’re just trying to get home after an annoying day at work, and they’re trying to break the land speed record for an oversized SUV.

Out here, they don’t know what to do with all the space. Small plots of land grow wheat. Drive-in movie theaters are not an extinct species like they are back east. Abandoned buildings sit and slowly crumble for years because there’s no hurry to use their old footprints for the next gentrification effort. Actually, they wouldn’t know a gentrifying neighborhood if it bit them on their collective butts, even though we all know that gentrifying neighborhoods go out of their way to get all bitey and nasty.

I can’t remember the last time I saw a bus, come to think of it. There are a couple of those trolleys on tires that roam around the downtown, especially on the weekends, when downtown looks particularly picturesque.

Small glimpse of a beautiful car

Adding to the picturesqueness of this weekend was a classic car show that occupied most of Main Street by the farmer’s market. All of the angle parking was taken up with about 100 cars from the 1950s through the 1970s, yet there was still plenty of street parking for the folks who came to see the cars. That wouldn’t have happened on even a Wednesday morning in DC. That’s how much space they have.

Everything that we’re used to on the East Coast has its component over here, but the counterpart here comes with a “drive-thru” option, in case you’re too damn lazy to get out of your car. There are, in no apparent order:

Drive-through pharmacies

Drive-through espresso shops

Drive-through supermarkets

Drive-through auto parts stores

Still to discover are drive-through furniture stores, but they can’t be far behind.

In case you don’t have a problem with commitment and instead prefer to drive-in and hang around for a while, there are plenty of drive-in restaurants, and I’m not just talking about A&W. Fast Eddie’s here in Walla Walla was presented to us after I was whining that I wanted a malt. They had 20 flavors of milkshakes and malts on the menu — and by “menu,” I mean oversized white board that doubled as a sun-blocking device while you’re sitting in your car with the food on your window, like Fred Flintstone in the show opener. While I wouldn’t actually call them fast per se, for it took about 15 minutes to get a burger, hot wings, and two shakes (my craving was contagious, apparently), the food was tasty and the eating-in-the-car novel, at least for now. There weren’t serving on roller skates, but at the Sonic in Richland, they are.

For Jody -- a 1965 Mustang

We drove down into Pendleton, Oregon, to see what was there and to check out a restaurant we learned about last week. We picked the wrong time of day for the eatery, since it wouldn’t open for a few hours, but we got to see the town a bit. Pendleton is pretty well known for its wool blankets and other fabrics, at least say Susanne and my mother. And I am not about to disagree with either one of them! Pendleton also hosts a rodeo Round Up every year in September. We found a quilting shop, a caramel popcorn shop, used bookstore, and loads of western wear stores. I may have to pick up a cowboy hat at some point. Not sure if black or white is more my style, though.

Since Raphael’s was closed, we ate at the Hamley Steakhouse, which tells a lot of the history of Hamley & Co., which was very tasty and very cowboy. We actually sat right next to the old bank counter front of the First National Bank, which was held up by Butch Cassidy and the Kid — that was pretty cool. I don’t think of Oregon as the old west, but I suppose it was here. Silly northeasterner, am I. Susanne put back most of a plate of baby back ribs and I went for a medium-rare gaucho-style rib eye steak. Definitely recommended if you find yourself in Pendleton. Though I’d stay away on Sundays, since most everything else is closed.

Hey, they like to enjoy the space around here, okay?

Classic Car show in Walla Walla

It’s actually a bigger town than you would at first notice, there being two big chunks of streets and neighborhoods here — one more up-down, and one caddy-corner and off to the side from the first chunk. But it is still quite small, at least in comparison to DC. I feel like most people in DC stick to their own neighborhood most of the time. Maybe they Metro everywhere and don’t get away from those more accessible zones. Maybe it took a while to figure out where everything was in proximity to their residence, so why spend time looking for a coffee house, a video rental place, a small restaurant, that’s not near where they live?

But there’s something interesting to me in sussing out the hole-in-a-wall and mom-and-pop places where they know your name when you walk in and sit down. There’s something fun about comparing your local experience to ones that are catering to someone else. Susanne and I clocked in many hours at Sidamo in DC, where the owner roasts the coffee on the premises every morning, and the whole street smells of carefully prepared espresso. And Mimi would see us and give us a great big hug, and I never thought twice about it until I realized I haven’t been hugged by anyone but Susanne since we moved. It’s an odd, nearly silent absence.

I have most of a pound of Sidamo coffee in the kitchen, and I may pick up some more when I head back to the east coast next month, but at some point, I’ll have to find a place out here — and it’s not like there are no good coffee joints in the Pacific Northwest! Far from it. But none of them shout my name when I enter, none of them feel like my own comfort zone, just yet anyway.

We live, unsuspectingly enough, next to the college’s recycling center. The front of the building, which apparently nobody notices, hosts a sign that says the plant is closed for remodeling. The side of the building, which apparently everyone knows and loves, has no such sign, and so keeps being visited by erstwhile recyclers with mountains of cardboard and aluminum. There is also a whole cast of characters who have some kind of — I can only come up with “addiction” — to coming over and visiting the empty building. One of them wanders around the city looking for discarded items that can be recycled, and one of them swears loudly every time he sees that more shit has been dropped off here, to the tune of how your grandfather swears in your distant memory: “Son of a BITCH!” “You goddamn mother of BITCHES!” I just feel like he picked up his sing-song cursing streams during a tour in the US Navy, since that’s where my grandfather learned them. You know, it’s like kind of an oral history of sorts.

Our neighbors

The recycling center has a beat up pickup trunk from the 1970s that just started leaking gas yesterday. We had previously been annoyed that it was parked right up against our house, under our kitchen and dining room windows, but this now pales in comparison with the very combustible and dangerous fuel leak, which is currently being contained in a — you guessed it — 5-pound coffee tin. Utilitarian and recyclable, all at once! I gently explained, in my most West Coast, indirect manner possible (for a born and raised East Coast person) that this was maybe not the best nor safest way to deal with a toxic chemical known for its volatility. I found agreement, which is good. Now hopefully the whole matter gets resolved.

I guess I can’t say we had a local recycling center we used, but that was because we lived in a big city and had a place for recycling for our building. The most we had to contend with was the occasional angry raccoon we’d disturbed as we walked home. Here in Walla Walla, it’s more about the disturbing gas can or angry resident instead.

We plan on taking a drive tomorrow so I’ll be sure to post with pictures and comments of our trip!

I’ve started harping on my friends who have little kids to send more pictures of them, since Susanne and I have been going through some withdrawal and who likes withdrawal? I was amused to get this one of little A, because he looks very much like a former coworker of mine, Mark. So now I suspect Mark is a closet sperm donor. Those of you who know him, cast a gander at this and make your own judgment…

Spawn of Mark?

So I have a job — well, we’ll loosely call it this — interview today. Actually, I have half an hour to convince some woman in HR that they should find a place for me in their firm. I’ll have to sell myself without looking like I’m a salesman, be charming but not overcharming, specialized enough that I look like a great catch without looking like I’m too compartmentalized. Whew! Should be easy to thread that needle — though it might be hard getting the derriere of yours truly through it…

Walla Walla is nestled in a valley in southeast Washington State, a largely arid but fertile up-and-down landscape bordered by the Blue Mountains and miles and miles of scrubland. Its sandy soil allows for deep drainage and the mild rainfall lets vinegrowers and farmers control the level of water for their crops via irrigation. So it is that many, many vineyards have popped up here over the years, which have in turn given rise to vineyard-hopping, though I don’t suppose the more uppity wine enthusiasts call it that. 

Susanne’s very good friend and his girlfriend came to visit us this weekend, and we tooled around the area looking for some tasting adventures. Why not, when the alternative is to continue another long day of unpacking and finding new homes for all of the things we saw fit to send across the continent?

Road into the grapes

We were told, at one of the vineyards, that the locals never make these tours, that it’s only a visitor’s thing. But if that’s the case, it seems strange to me that so many of the restaurants and coffee shops in town are closed today, on a holiday weekend. It’s not, it’s been pointed out to me, like it’s Arbor Day (a genuinely important day in its own right, I’m sure). Perhaps there’s no overlap between people excited by wine and people excited by New York Style pizza, except for me, our friend Jody, and about 12,834 people I’ve met over the years.

At the vineyard

Perhaps Walla Walla is in transition, figuring itself out, moving from some identity it used to have and taking on a new one that meets its needs and new environment better.

Oh, wait. That’s me. Silly boy.

Grapes on the vine

Last day in Seattle included a run to the tourist section of Pike Place to get some Dilettante chocolates. Oh, they are so good, even if the service there is a tad worse than spotty. Go ahead and serve them with a frown, I’ll be a truffle-eating monster later. Plus, one Seattle kid being semi-hostile is still nothing like the open disdain and service of frustration one receives in most of DC, so these folks don’t actually impress me at this point. I’m sure I’ll reset my service parameters at some point and then the trips to the big cities out here will leave me shocked and confused. But for now I shrug them off. I shrug you off, mean chocolate lady!

We stopped in at Lush right after, which was amusing for the fact that another staffer at Dilettante was in there complaining to the Lush staff that Chris Rock had come in for a mocha and decried the bad service there and stormed out.

See? It’s not just me. Even CELEBRITIES suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous service there.

Lunch was nice, consisting of a big bowl of brown rice and spiced lamb.

Bowl-a-Rama lunch

Tasty, and $7.50 to boot. DC could use more little shops like that. So could Walla Walla, for that matter.

We passed by Barneys which had the oddest little window display I’ve ever seen. Feel free to offer opinions and analysis on this:

The train is coming at Barneys

Okay, what is up with this? Also notice the tormentor — a woman with a villain mustache. So beware the transgender person? Or, we had to mark her as the evil one in this picture because the guy tied to the train tracks with the oncoming engine wasn’t enough to clue us in?

And why is there a pump bottle of soap on her head? 

Barney, Barney, Barney, you’ve gone a bit off the rails yourself, haven’t you? Must be that constant comparison to the annoying purple dinosaur.

We went out for dinner later at Ray’s Boathouse in a completely different corner of the city, and the fish was truly amazing. I ate my weight in mussels for the first course, which were drenched in a spicy tomatoesque bisque, and had a sweet fillet of sablefish atop grilled baby bok choy and delicate rice. Oh, eating quality seafare is so nice, even if it means Susanne has to miss the fun. But I’ll keep it to a minimum, since I do enjoy my dining partner more than what I’m eating.

A quiet evening when we got back, I got up in the morning and chatted with my friend who was hosting me for this trip, and said goodbye to her adorable feline. Found Susanne at what seems quite a patchwork of an airport, and we headed back to Walla Walla. As sure enough, we left the clouds behind as we passed through the Cascades again. Note to Washington State Transportation — your road sure is pretty, but can’t you make it quieter? I’m getting hearing loss making this 290-mile trip!

Kiwi the Cat

Ah, Seattle. When first I spied you in the summer of 2005, you gave me day upon day of warm sunshine, making it seem as though your tendency toward rain was all myth and bunk. It was a wonderful romance we had, and I’ll never forget it.

Sunny Seattle

Yet like so many flings begun without thought for the long-term, we soured, and this time, you’re grouchy, distant, mad about something you won’t communicate. And you rain, rain, rain, barely getting into the high 70s, so that I feel your chill down to my bones. Where did we go wrong, Seattle? How could I have offended you so much that you feel this is your choice, to be so unforgiving? I wanted to live in your confines; your state gave me the other corner instead. I’m doing the best I can, honoring your lakes and your downtown, reveling in your curvy streets and dynamic nightlife. I’ve attempted to support your economy as a faithful visitor, and if you’re a little nicer to me I promise I shall return many times. Unless that’s not what you want.

View from Lake Washington

Don’t push me out, Seattle. Let’s try to start over.

It’s been great, weather notwithstanding, to be back here, visiting an old friend from graduate school, and making little forays into the city. My bad knee is definitely hampering me too much, but I’m doing what I can and I certainly look forward to the day when I can run around a city again, sniffing out the fun offerings and things to see. 

Susanne is out on the other coast at a conference and we’ll rendezvous tomorrow at the airport before heading back to Wallyworld for its annual Fair and Frontier Days. Insert picture of Susanne sneezing at all of the livestock, and heck, maybe we’ll head out of town again and do some exploring at a few of the local apple and pear vineyards. I sure would love to bake a fruit pie and try to make the kitchen feel more like home.

Getting from these separate corners of the state — and there’s a whole lot of nothing in parts of the middle, for sure — is mostly achieved via one mountain pass, which shuts down frequently in winter. It’s not exactly reassuring to see “Chain Tie-On Area” signs and “Grade 5% next 2 miles.” The road in summer seems straightforward enough, though I wouldn’t chance it without brakes you’re sure will work well. And it’s a great view, though I don’t think that’s Mount Rainier we can see off to the west, but some other less tall peak. I need to research that.

I wandered around town yesterday, amused that there’s a neighborhood here called Capitol Hill. They’re very proud of their neighborhood name, and it must have some cache, because you see it everywhere.

Trader Joe's

Later I drove down to the Pike Place Market, looking for some fun window shopping, but primarily looking for a parking spot under $10. It was not to be found in the walking distance I can currently handle. And I’m sad to say that Dilettante Chocolates has closed its Capitol Hill location, but only temporarily as it opens a new shop down the street next month. Still, I need to procure some on this trip, so I’ll venture out to the one downtown later today. 

In the afternoon I met up with my friend and we shared a bit of ethiopian take out at park on Lake Washington. In the east nobody would be out in the water in weather like this — we love our warm Atlantic, even if it does produce awful hurricanes and tropical storms. The Pacific just never seems to heat up over here. But hey, native Seattle-ites will run down the feet-slicing rocky shores, climb up onto a floating dock, and springboard off into the icy water, loving every minute of it. I look on in horror and amazement. And once again feel like I’ve ventured into some foreign country over here. Everyone is so used to needing their black leather jackets and faded jeans they don’t actually change into something else when the temperature is 95F. They just go about their business sweating their asses off, and man, it has got to produce some funky leather smells after a while. So perhaps a dip in the frigid lake works for them after that, who knows. But the water looked pretty, and I really like it when busy cities have their leisurely parts. And Seattle seems to have plenty.

Two boys with Pith helmets

It’s funny what comes to mind when one says they used to live in Washington, DC, to someone who has never lived there. They tell me, almost like a reflex, that it’s the murder capitol of the country. I think the PR folks for Mayor Fenty need to get off their asses and come up with something, anything, else to replace this perception. Possible new mottos could be:

DC: 50,000 Lawyers Couldn’t Be Wrong — except, I guess, most folks don’t know that there are 50,000 lawyers working in the city. So maybe that one is out.

City of Monuments

Come for the Cherry Blossoms, Stay for the Slowly Flooding Metro

Okay, okay, so maybe “murder capitol” rolls off the tongue better than any of those. But hey, there was that recent Supreme Court decision to overturn the city’s ban on handguns, so perhaps a new campaign could focus on the pro-gun tourist. 

“Show the Murder Capitol Who’s Who!”

Or maybe not.

So I’ve started trying to figure out how to respond to these accusations that DC would have eventually killed me, either by terrorist attack, nuclear bomb, random violence, shock of the cost of living, or terrible traffic. And while many of those things could happen, that’s like chastising someone who lives in Florida as waiting around to die in a hurricane. Instead I think most initial responses are something like, “wow, do you miss the sun?”

Florida people, correct me if I’m wrong.

I’ve tried to tell people that the violence isn’t that bad, all told, that it’s pretty, has a lot of free museums and other cultural attractions, etc. And then they lean in, lower their voice so as to avoid Big Brother’s invisible gaze, and say, “and there are a lot of POLITICAL people out there.”

This is where I gasp and looked shocked.

“Political people, are you sure?” I’ve sometimes put my hand over my heart in an ironic pledge position, but really to suggest that my pulse may quit at any second. And then they of course realize I’m kidding.

This conversation, had about half a dozen times since moving, has been interesting and mildly amusing. But I didn’t expect to have it while trying to buy two new cell phones from my carrier this morning. I even got to see a permit to carry a concealed weapon (which frankly, I could have made myself with some plastic laminating sheets and my old Royal typewriter that I used to bang out bad short stories when I was a kid.

“Bet you won’t see this in DC, mister.”

He had me there. His point was that there would be many fewer violent attacks there if you weren’t sure if your intended victim was packing or not. I did not care to debate this with him, wanting only the nice shiny LG phones that would make it easier to text, and bring Susanne finally into the 21st century. Or even 1995, for that matter, since the woman has eschewed mobile devices until now. I just told him that I took care to stay in safe neighborhoods and not do anything stupid. Like pull a gun out of my pants to thwart some would-be mugger, only to have him wrest it from me and shoot me in the face. Because that would be my life if I had a gun. Or rather, the end of my life.

Nice to know, though, that certain people are carrying out here. They’re indebted to this Wild West thing. All I really want is a job.

Let’s just say the two sides are pretty close. It’s bigger than it lets on, but it’s pretty small nonetheless. I’ve taken barely any photos since I’ve been trying to get the house in order, which is coming along, finally. We may have turned a corner. Tomorrow I’ll be heading to Seattle for a few days and I’ll get to spend quality time with an old friend, so I’m really looking forward to that!

Backstage Bistro in Walla2

I’m here at Verve, a “coffee and art house,” which is currently hosting about 5 moms and their kids for a mid-morning get-together. It’s not exactly the hip quiet I was looking for in which to write, but it’s nice that nobody here is frowning on them, either. That’s something to like about this place. I’ve started a list, I suppose, since I just adore lists. So far, on it are the following:

Walla Walla Wheatbrew, a local heffeweisen that is pretty enjoyable with lemon or orange.

The desserts at the Colville St. Patisserie, which nearly makes all of last week’s awfulness bearable.

The slower pace, as referred to earlier, though I’m still on my DC gear so I haven’t noticed it much yet.

Speaking of gears, there is also this:

Outside a transmission shop, Walla Walla

I’m at a loss for words, I think. But I see a new LJ icon in my future.

It’s a bit rainy today, which is fine because it keeps things cooler around here. It’s not just an abstraction of desert, it was 111F earlier last week. Thank goodness we missed that day. We’re about halfway unpacked, I’d say. Once the pictures all go up we can cover up a bunch of the wall dings, so it’ll look a lot better. It just doesn’t seem like good business practice to me to never inspect one’s investment properties and just wait for shit to break. What’s a $1,000 roof repair today will be a $20,000 roof replacement later, right? But hey, I don’t run the place. I don’t even work here!

So Walla Walla, also called Wallyworld, which I find funny because of Vacation, is kind of cute, kind of hot, kind of small, kind of interesting. I have to hit the pavement for real and get a job. That perhaps deserves its own blog. Kidding.

Stone Soup in Walla Walla

So Walla Walla is from one of the native American tribes around here, meaning “water water.” It’s right upon the Columbia river and is a big part of the burgeoning wine industry in Washington State. It’s pretty isolated, about 40 miles from the first thing you could call a “big” town, and about two hours south of Spokane. There’s a westerner-easterner of Washington rift here that I’d never thought about but that is reminiscent of the North VA vs rest of the state infighting that folks in the DC area know all too well.

Politics is a little different out here. The WA governer, Chirs Gregoire, came out here last week to give a stump speech on the campaign trail, since she’s up for re-election. About 100 people showed up at this very coffeehouse to hear her speak, and they clapped and had occasional standing ovations. It all ended with chants of “four more years!” Interesting to see their fervor, after I’d gone to Clinton’s concession speech, which looked more like this:

Clinton concession speech

I’m not saying one is better or worse than the other, just that there are some different expectations about what government means, how it runs, what politicians can really offer their constituents, and whether political change comes from within or outside the system. I feel very tentative about engaging in any political discussion in a way I didn’t hesitate back in DC, because I knew the grounds for conversation. I have to suss them out here. It’s one more adjustment to make, I suppose.

Okay, on to the researching part of my day. I’ll have lots more photos of Washington soon.

Here are some more photos of Lang on my Flickr account:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/evmaroon/sets/72157606911832888/

And here are some shots driving through Montana:

Montana mountains

I’ve only seen things like that in photos on well meaning but irritating motivational posters. Quite another thing to see them in real life, I can attest.

Prairie and clouds

Again, even though the prairie got somewhat monotonous, it was still incredible and all that sky!

Montana as a storm rolls in

This was the start of a storm that I mentioned in a previous post. We got to see quite a light show up in the Rocky Mountains at real western saloon place named Trixie’s, where Susanne used the one and only outhouse we saw on our trip. I asked how it was and she rolled her eyes at me, because isn’t that OBVIOUS. Well, yes, it is. But as I wasn’t going to use it myself — I think I’d rather die of a bladder explosion — I only had her eyewitness testimony to describe it for me. So I’ll just go on my possibly condescending, limited stereotypes of outhouses to imagine the experience. Thanks a lot, Susanne. 😉

Now then, we left the picturesque West for entry into our new abode, which is best summed up thusly:

Our new toilet

Let’s just say we’re cleaning and unpacking and it’s a bit overwhelming but we’re getting there. Baby steps, people, baby steps. Will post more later about a few things we’ve done since showing up in this town.

Next up: Walla Walla farmer’s market, our first trip to Sonic, and a speech by Chris Gregoire.