It was like rush hour at 9:30 p.m. this past Saturday at the Willowdale intersection. Judging by what people were posting online, almost everybody was out for dinner, or at a party, or at the new vampire movie. There was a big wedding reception at the Stone Barn, and as I was driving home, I even saw a stretch limo heading east on Street Road!
I spent the evening with two dear friends at Kyoto, the Asian restaurant in the little shopping center next to the Kennett Wal-Mart, behind the Hilton Garden hotel. We had excellent sushi, fantastic miso soup with seaweed, a bowl of edamame (soybeans), and shrimp pad thai, and the non-seafood eater in our party had a chicken dish with cilantro (to her delight, she found many dishes on the menu to choose from). There were absolutely no leftovers on anyone's plate.
While sharing a dinner companion's white tuna roll, I inadvertently ingested a clump of undiluted wasabi, the Japanese horseradish paste. I was unable to think, much less speak, for probably 10 seconds as a rush of intense heat rocketed through my sinuses. Talk about powerful! I highly recommend it to anyone suffering from nasal congestion.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Thinking globally
Kanokwan Trakulyingcharoen, an architectural history scholar from Thailand, spent three weeks at the Hagley Museum and Library recently researching the Seagram Building in Manhattan, which was designed by German architect Mies van der Rohe. She is writing her doctoral dissertation (from an Italian university) on several postwar projects by the noted architect and received an H. B. du Pont research fellowship from Hagley to use the library's Seagram corporate archive, which contains "detailed information on how the Seagram Building was imagined, designed and built,"according to a story in the "Hagley Magazine."
"Drawings, letters, corporate minutes, and other documents in the Seagram papers have allowed Trakulyingcharoen to unravel the tangled connections between corporate intentions, design sensibilities, and materials provisioning that made the Seagram Building one of the outstanding examples of the International Style in corporate architecture."
The story says that Ms. Trakulyingcharoen "plans to return to Thailand after completing her dissertation to teach and to write."
The Seagram Building, 375 Park Ave., is 38 stories tall and was completed in 1958. According to Wikipedia it was designed as the headquarters for the Canadian distillers Joseph E. Seagram's & Sons.
The story says that Ms. Trakulyingcharoen "plans to return to Thailand after completing her dissertation to teach and to write."
The Seagram Building, 375 Park Ave., is 38 stories tall and was completed in 1958. According to Wikipedia it was designed as the headquarters for the Canadian distillers Joseph E. Seagram's & Sons.
Smart
From a 1929 etiquette manual:
"Nothing looks works than riding clothes made and worn badly, and nothing looks smarter than they when well made and well put on. A riding habit, no matter, what the fashion happens to be, is like a uniform, in that it must be made and worn according to regulations ... A riding habit is the counterpart of an officer's uniform; it is not worn so as to make the wearer look pretty... The woman who can ride well enough to follow the hounds is too good a sportswoman, too great a lover of good form to be ignorant of the proper outline necessary to smartness of appearance in the saddle. ... Whatever the present fashion may be, have your habit utterly conventional. Don't wear checks or have slant pockets, or eccentric cuffs or lapels; don't have the waist pinched in... And don't try to wear a small size! . . . The above admonitions have held for many decades, and are likely to hold for many more."
"Nothing looks works than riding clothes made and worn badly, and nothing looks smarter than they when well made and well put on. A riding habit, no matter, what the fashion happens to be, is like a uniform, in that it must be made and worn according to regulations ... A riding habit is the counterpart of an officer's uniform; it is not worn so as to make the wearer look pretty... The woman who can ride well enough to follow the hounds is too good a sportswoman, too great a lover of good form to be ignorant of the proper outline necessary to smartness of appearance in the saddle. ... Whatever the present fashion may be, have your habit utterly conventional. Don't wear checks or have slant pockets, or eccentric cuffs or lapels; don't have the waist pinched in... And don't try to wear a small size! . . . The above admonitions have held for many decades, and are likely to hold for many more."
Thursday, November 17, 2011
At sea
East Marlborough resident Stephanie Bernasconi is on her way across the Pacific as part of an intensive oceanography course organized by the Sea Education Association. Stephanie, a Tower Hill grad and now a junior at Dickinson College, spent the past six weeks studying at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts in the land component of the "Oceans and Climate" program. On Nov. 16 she departed from Honolulu harbor aboard the SSV Robert C. Seamans for a 3,000-mile voyage across the Pacific.
"As full, working members of the scientific team and sailing crew ... students deploy oceanographic sampling equipment, manage shipboard operations, navigate by the stars, and make port stops off the beaten path," according to the SEA Semester website. The trip will end at Papeete, Tahiti, on December 23.
Blog entries from the ship are posted daily at www.sea.edu/voyages.
We hope Stephanie spots at least one mermaid, Dickinson's unofficial mascot.
"As full, working members of the scientific team and sailing crew ... students deploy oceanographic sampling equipment, manage shipboard operations, navigate by the stars, and make port stops off the beaten path," according to the SEA Semester website. The trip will end at Papeete, Tahiti, on December 23.
Blog entries from the ship are posted daily at www.sea.edu/voyages.
We hope Stephanie spots at least one mermaid, Dickinson's unofficial mascot.
Bad songs say so much
There's no better way to start a lengthy and entertaining comment thread on Facebook than to ask, What's your least favorite song ever?
Everybody has an opinion. Even Facebook friends you haven't heard from for months will chime in.
I tried it recently, offering up Billy Joel's "Piano Man" and the Oak Ridge Boys' "Elvira" as my Hall of Shame selections.
Suggestions came in all day from all over the world, including some truly awful songs, like "Muskrat Love" by the Captain and Tennille, "Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog" by Three Dog Night, "The Pina Colada Song" by Rupert Holmes, "Young Girl" by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap, and the ear-damaging "Loving You" by Minnie Ripperton.
All dreadful! But I had to take issue with two picks that are absolute disco classics: Donna Summer's "MacArthur Park" and Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive." And what was my pal Susan thinking, suggesting "Yummy Yummy Yummy" by Ohio Express? Has she no love in her tummy?
In the Christmas-song (not carol) category, "Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time" (an aberration by Sir Paul McCartney), "Grandma Got Run Over" and "Two Front Teeth" were nominated, with my full backing.
And my always-entertaining friend Betsy was unmoved, except to dyspepsia, by a country ditty she heard called "Christmas Shoes," in which a little urchin is desperate to buy his dying mother a pair of shoes "before she m
Best Christmas song ever is Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You." And that's not open to debate.
Everybody has an opinion. Even Facebook friends you haven't heard from for months will chime in.
I tried it recently, offering up Billy Joel's "Piano Man" and the Oak Ridge Boys' "Elvira" as my Hall of Shame selections.
Suggestions came in all day from all over the world, including some truly awful songs, like "Muskrat Love" by the Captain and Tennille, "Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog" by Three Dog Night, "The Pina Colada Song" by Rupert Holmes, "Young Girl" by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap, and the ear-damaging "Loving You" by Minnie Ripperton.
All dreadful! But I had to take issue with two picks that are absolute disco classics: Donna Summer's "MacArthur Park" and Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive." And what was my pal Susan thinking, suggesting "Yummy Yummy Yummy" by Ohio Express? Has she no love in her tummy?
In the Christmas-song (not carol) category, "Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time" (an aberration by Sir Paul McCartney), "Grandma Got Run Over" and "Two Front Teeth" were nominated, with my full backing.
And my always-entertaining friend Betsy was unmoved, except to dyspepsia, by a country ditty she heard called "Christmas Shoes," in which a little urchin is desperate to buy his dying mother a pair of shoes "before she m
Best Christmas song ever is Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You." And that's not open to debate.
Polished
A business owner friend told me recently that with money being tight, customers are just looking for an excuse to trade down to a lower-cost product or service. A snippy receptionist or a gristly steak, and you'll never see the patron again.
I think the converse is true, too: a little extra can go a long way to ensuring loyalty.
This afternoon I stopped in to Polished Salon for Natural Nails, 112 S. Union St. in Kennett, to buy a gift card and on a completely uncharacteristic whim decided to get my scratch-and-dent toenails rehabbed while I was there. Too late, I realized I hadn't put enough quarters in the parking meter.
Well, you're not going to believe this: The manager offered to run out and feed the meter for me! Using her own quarters!
Why will I definitely return to Polished?
1. That was above and beyond the call of duty.
2. They did a great job improving my beat-up feet, which actually look civilized for a change.
3. They don't use any acrylic products or iffy chemicals.
4. The workers were kind, cheerful and pleasant, and the place has a happy vibe.
5. And now I know there's free parking behind the building!
I think the converse is true, too: a little extra can go a long way to ensuring loyalty.
This afternoon I stopped in to Polished Salon for Natural Nails, 112 S. Union St. in Kennett, to buy a gift card and on a completely uncharacteristic whim decided to get my scratch-and-dent toenails rehabbed while I was there. Too late, I realized I hadn't put enough quarters in the parking meter.
Well, you're not going to believe this: The manager offered to run out and feed the meter for me! Using her own quarters!
Why will I definitely return to Polished?
1. That was above and beyond the call of duty.
2. They did a great job improving my beat-up feet, which actually look civilized for a change.
3. They don't use any acrylic products or iffy chemicals.
4. The workers were kind, cheerful and pleasant, and the place has a happy vibe.
5. And now I know there's free parking behind the building!
New restaurant
A restaurant called A Bite of Italy is moving into the space formerly occupied by Manny Hattan's in the Shoppes at Longwood Village on East Baltimore Pike. There's a help-wanted sign on the door and it looks as if there's some major renovation work going on inside.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Freedom Train
My friend and loyal reader Mary Larkin Dugan, president of the Kennett Underground Railroad Center, has asked me to spread the word that she's looking for any old family letters, diaries, etc., pertaining to the Underground Railroad in our area.
For instance, she said, "Hannah Cox (house across from Dunkin' Donuts) kept a diary for much of her life, according to her obit, but it's gone missing. It's my holy grail, believe me, because the Coxes took in not only fugitive slaves but also abolitionist big shots like William Lloyd Garrison, Lucretia Mott, Frederick Douglass, and John Greenleaf Whittier. And there are lots of families around here with abolitionist ancestors who might have juicy original sources up in their attics."
Visit the Center's website (http://undergroundrr.kennett.net/) for more information.
For instance, she said, "Hannah Cox (house across from Dunkin' Donuts) kept a diary for much of her life, according to her obit, but it's gone missing. It's my holy grail, believe me, because the Coxes took in not only fugitive slaves but also abolitionist big shots like William Lloyd Garrison, Lucretia Mott, Frederick Douglass, and John Greenleaf Whittier. And there are lots of families around here with abolitionist ancestors who might have juicy original sources up in their attics."
Visit the Center's website (http://undergroundrr.kennett.net/) for more information.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Non-gardener
It's unthinkable to me, but a friend of mine loathes gardening work -- indeed, any outdoor chores -- and does the bare minimum required to insure domestic tranquility. And even that, grudgingly: one splinter from cutting down vines, one bubble of poison ivy on his finger and he places himself on the disabled list for the season.
So imagine my surprise when I was reading an article about a local tree-planting project and saw him quoted as saying that he loves landscape work! But no, my friend has not had a Ebenezer Scrooge-like personality transplant; looking at the accompanying photograph, I could see that there's somebody else out there with the same name. And much, much better shoveling technique.
So imagine my surprise when I was reading an article about a local tree-planting project and saw him quoted as saying that he loves landscape work! But no, my friend has not had a Ebenezer Scrooge-like personality transplant; looking at the accompanying photograph, I could see that there's somebody else out there with the same name. And much, much better shoveling technique.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Food and drink
A few friends ventured into West Chester for dinner the other night and reported having an excellent meal at the Side Bar and Restaurant at 10 East Gay Street (where Vincent's used to be). They loved the plantain chips as appetizers and as entrees had the mixed sausage grill; short ribs over penne; grilled salmon on top of a green salad; and seafood with pasta. Much to their surprise, they found a parking space very close by, and although the restaurant was very busy and they didn't have reservations, the staff managed to find them a table upstairs.
As it happens, I too was in West Chester last week for a late-afternoon drink at the bar at Pietro's Prime Steakhouse, 125 West Market Street. A very nice spot to sit and talk and actually see some non-Unionville faces.
As it happens, I too was in West Chester last week for a late-afternoon drink at the bar at Pietro's Prime Steakhouse, 125 West Market Street. A very nice spot to sit and talk and actually see some non-Unionville faces.
The new 52
This morning I took my inaugural trip on the new stretch of Route 52 between Routes 1 and 926. Instead of the old, winding road, it's a spanking-new, three-quarter-mile-long boulevard that goes over a pond and through some nicely landscaped hills. When you reach the intersection with 926 you can see the "old" Route 52 going off at a funny angle, and it looks pretty decrepit and long abandoned.
I remember hearing about this relocation project for years, from back in the days when there was a Downingtown Farmers Market billboard at the 926/52 intersection. Remember that?
I remember hearing about this relocation project for years, from back in the days when there was a Downingtown Farmers Market billboard at the 926/52 intersection. Remember that?
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