No. 9

Numerology folks, this year anyway, since it is for me, my 45th. The no. 9 has always had a place in my heart (or obsessive brain…) as I was born on the 27th and the permutations of nine have always intrigued me. When I couldn’t learn my multiplication tables as a kid, somehow I got the nines, snaking around my brain like a boa, they became a kind of mantra to me. My year of birth, my ssn# all involve the nines. My sister was also born on the 27th and exactly, to the day, one year and six months away from me. Or 18 months. Next occurance isn’t ‘till I’m 54 so I proclaim this a good year, an important year, not knowing exactly how or why. Today (the day I've published this) is the 9th, 8/9/07. Hmm.  Was it a coincidence that while in  Pittsburgh on my “vacation” (who vacations in Pittsburgh? People from California I guess) I was turned onto a great delicious beer called, of course, “No. 9” from the Magic Hat Brewery in Vermont maybe? Thanks to my man Flood for that tip, and for showing me a good time at my old haunt, the Cage.

So yeah, I was traveling and away for several weeks: Pittsburgh, Niagara Falls, then LA. Each action packed and fun. Just skip over the stuff that doesn’t interest you as usual. All of it? Then what the hell you doin’ here anyway?

A note on flying. USAir? Once again, on-time and efficient, and cramped and uncomfortable. With all the talk now about flight delays and tarmac sittin’ I’ve got to come down on the side of my buds over at USAir. I’ve been flying from SFO to PIT for like 20 years now, and I’ve never (knocking wood…) had so much as a delay. They for sure ain’t the cheapest, and I’m on the phone with them annually bickering about my unusuable flyer miles and their crazy, non-linear prices, but they do what they say they’re gonna do. Sadly, they haven’t rec’d the message about how much space a human needs to exist comfortably for four or five hours. The giant fella’s in front of me decisions to recline destroyed what little space I had. The movie was jittery and the headphones didn’t work. But they got us there and back exactly on time and alive and for that I thank them

Old Pittsburgh buds: A shout to the good ol friends I got to see: Flood, the Tractor, Mag, Zyl and as a bonus M.Marcus. Apologies to those I missed. Goddamnit. My folks had a giant pile of busted and malfunctioning machinery for me to attend to, plus repairs, revamps, etc. plus seein’ a lot of my family who I’d not seen in a while including the elusive sister. All my youngest cousins now have kids, and the cutest ones ever at that. So it was all good.

Highlights from da ‘burgh:

Glass: Pittsburgh has always had a beautiful flower conservatory in Schenley Park. It’s one of the classic Victorian white frame and glass affairs that you see in major cities. This year though some extreme visionaries in Pittsburgh got the famous glass artist Dale Chihuly to install site-specific pieces throughout the conservatory, and the show there is utterly amazing. I mean beyond what you’d expect. I mean a nearly indescribable, must- experience show of importance. I love glass anyway. I’m a fondler of glass and stone from way back. I think I described here once how I coerced a very tolerant security guard at the DeYoung Museum in SF to let me touch a bunch of their glass collection while she looked the other way. Oh! So I’m pre-programmed to love Chihuly His glass is more organic and fragile for me to want to touch, since I also have a tendency to break glass. There was this giant tower of rough lavender slabs rising above an outdoor pond that did call out for a some touchin’. Basically you walk though these lush, growing environments of the conservatory, and growing amid the exotic plants are lovely, seemingly alive glass sculptures. Some are totally integrated into the plantscapes, others dominate and inspire jaw-dropping gasps and shock. It’s a major work of art, perhaps as beautiful as something like Falling Water (also in the Pgh area). I’ve got pix that I took on my phone which will have to suffice. Or you can go to his website, or the Phipps Conservatory website. I have to hand it to Phipps and Pittsburgh. They landed a major deal with that show and I urge as many peeps as possible in the area to see it.

Segway riding: While busy complaining to various restaurant managers about our shitty meals in more than one Pittsburgh estab., (we ate badly but for free all over Pgh.) we spied a little booth offering Segway tours of the area. F. has had a big jones to ride one of these for a while now, so we signed up. OMG how much fun was that? The Segue is like the Mac of electric scooters. After about five minutes of futzing around with it, you are suddenly gliding around without effort. There’s really no maneuvering at all, you almost just think about stopping, going, turning, and the thing does it. It becomes part of you in a way and you start to imagine a life without walking.

Speaking of a “jones,” I turned the kid onto the great, “Basketball Jones” the other day. That was a pervasive song from my childhood, listening to it on the “new sounds of 13Q” radio in Pgh. 13Q was an AM station I believe and asked us all to answer our phones “I listen to the new sounds of 13Q” in case one of them were calling and we’d get a prize. Never won the prize, though did annoy all callers to the skir-mansion in those days. “Fox on the Run” by Sweet was also a big one, that hearing now can transport me immediately back to my kid-room, tghe clock radio to which 13Q was endlessly tuned, which is now the guest room for our visit. ELO, BTO, Heart, all on the radio again. So here’s to my friend, Tyrone Shoelaces of the great East Westchester North Stars.

Not all was lost culinar-ily in the ‘burgh. The giants at Mineos still have the goods, still walk the good walk. Pizza unlike any other. To my mind it is the best you can possibly eat. Many disagree and brutal pizza wars ensued, me finding shelter on lower Murray Ave, hunkered down in a dangerous place near Napoli and Aiellos. Spies up Forbes dropped coupons from circling copters and we were issued slices from Village Pizza and it wasn’t half bad. Exlnt grease quotient, foldable, New York-y. But seemingly a whole different food group than Mineos where I found temporary shelter once again. I had ordered two large pies to bring back to safety. The guy goes “you want them to go?” and I’m a little surprised by this, as I’ve never been asked that of a phone pick-up order. But the guy says he knows my cousin, Big Jim Skirblog who apparently often comes in and destroys a few za’s while taking in the pleasant surroundings. Jim is a famous triathlete by the way, so he can eat two flippin’ zas and whatever else he wants cause he’s in shape. Me? I shudda stuck to 3 maybe four cuts, but what you gonna do? And for breakfast and lunch the next day.

At one point we made it to a border crossing and after some consternation about our papers were allowed access to the New Dumpling House only three or fours doors down from Mineos. This place was undergoing its own civil war, doing battle with itself, offering both Japanese and Chinese food. Most of us opted for sushi and were extremely pleased at how well it was done. I was bullied and coerced by the sassy waitress (resistance is futile) to sample the “live scallops.” Live scallops? Formerally live and now just on the half shell, same as Venus. And they were delicious.

Niagara Falls: As gaudy as you want it to be, or as lovely. Rushing water. What could be better? I think I’d read that rushing water releases a lot of negative ions, or Ozone or something, which is very calming to the humans and other primates. Why else are we so drawn to this place? At the falls you can get pretty close over in Canada, and cool was the spot where the water just goes over the edge. Calm then violent. Then the obligatory crush of tackiness and commercialism busting out on all sides. But we’d expect nothing less, and I was looking as forward to the gift shoppes as I was the falls. Had dinner at the Skylon tower rising over everything to revolve and serve sliced prime rib to the people. Filled up on beets and cold crab legs. Could not get a flippin’ drink made with the proper amount of alcohol anywhere in PA or Canada. Giant casino across the road and I somehow won money playing the dollar slots, so I got to treat everybody to a crappy breakfast and even crappier lunch on the way home. Border crossing was anticlimactic: only a driver’s license needed for Amerikkan citizen, after we fretted and worried about our lack of passports and birth certificates. Hard questioning by agents as to “how are you all related?” “uh, um, what?” But they let us through and back again.

LA/Orange Co. Inlaws this time with a trip to Ditney Land planned. You may undoubtedly remember from last year that we “strangely, did not hate Disneyland” so planned another sojourn there. Personally I was hot to get back on Space Mountain and the Indiana Jones ride, as last year I was silently suffering from claustrophobia and anxiety (and some leftover back problems) and felt pretty uneasy on many of the rides, esp the ones that go slowly underground like Pirates of the Caribbean. Lexapro has changed all that for me (I actually fell asleep on the plane across the country, something I’d probably never done in my life before. I can’t tell you how monumental that was for me – air travel being a giant source of anxiety for basically my whole life, suddenly gone.) I had a blast not being uneasy on Pirates or even the Haunted Mansion even when it stalled half way through due to mechanical difficulties and poor kiddo and I were being haunted by the same pop-up ghost from a tombstone over and over again. Unfort. my son was not as anxiety-free for that. We tried to work the “fast track system” better this time, but still didn’t get a pass to Space Mtn until like 8:30 at night! Had to make due with eating a giant corn dog, drinking an $8 cup of beer and settling down to the stomach churning California Screaming Coaster and its upside down Mouse Ears loop. Corn dog tried to come up but stayed inside the body thankfully. Good coaster that, esp. since I’d been rained out of the wonderful Thunderbolt back in Pgh. Loved the Soaring California ride, again anxiety free; bought a “Grumpy” hat, walked about 1,000 miles on aching feet, finally to get to Space Mtn and it was BROKEN! WTF?? about 100 of us were shouting. I was crestfallen and defeated and tried my best not to devolve into a tantruming baby, and was a bit curious how angry and frustrated I was about it. Head hung low I realized the only thing that could cheer me up was walking through the park gnawing on a giant turkey leg over in Frontier Land. And that giant turkey leg was just about good enough to do the trick. Smoky and juicy, fit for a King Henry the Eighth.

Got to see my old bud The Pickle in LA who took us for a rather hilarious tour of Hollywood, pointing out non-existent places and people and getting us lost. Done as a true local, we loved it! Great to see you Mark. Then there was the very odd, jury-is-still-out, “Pageant of the Masters” a tableaux vivant show down in Laguna Beach. What is it? Well, lets just say that for reasons that are not entirely clear to me, people, artists and brilliant stagecraft folks have decided to recreate famous works of art using painted backdrops and real people costumed and painted so that from a distance, the whole thing looks exactly like the referent painting. Like Degas ballet dancers, the dancers are women posed and unmoving so that from we were sitting, you couldn’t tell if it really was a painting or not. There is no arguing that it is very artfully done and that the illusions are flawless. I’m just not sure about the project as a whole. To be sure there were easily 5,000 or more (white) people packed into the outdoor amphitheater in Laguna Beach and we hear that it’s sold out all summer. Yet I was wondering just what it was I was seeing during most of it. Look it up here.

As a capper on a lovely Orange Co. stay we made it up to San Pedro where my brother-in-law docks his sailboat. A thrill for me as we all know, Pedro being the home of the Minutemen, and in the recent film about them, Mike Watt is seen driving around the town. Actually a pleasant enough place, and we had been clued into an amazing sandwich shoppe called I think the Beehive, or maybe Busy Bee Market? To be sure a sandwich lovers dream place. The whole store is devoted only to the art of the sandwich and nothing else. I’m not talking some high falutin ‘Wichcraft type place, or even your fabuloso Genova Deli over in Oaktown. This place is an unpretentious working person’s deli counter surrounded on all sides by everything you need to compliment your sandwich, row after row of chips and cookies, and case after case of cold beverages. You go and tell them what you want, and they slice and construct it to order, dipping what needs to be dipped, slathering what needs to be slathered. I had me some mortadella and provolone, while others had meatball, or salami and swiss, or roast chicken  and avocado. We took ‘em down to the boat to enjoy, then took the boat out to sail. Skirb was even allowed to pilot the thing for a while using wind power and his own questionable sense of direction alone. And I did not wreck or maroon us.

So I’ve wasted much of your time and I’m sure left out a lot of what I should have included and included a lot which I should have left out, but we’re back now, and will be reporting again on all things skirb. Will let you know if in this 45th year nines rule, or we’re all just divisible by three.

Comments

[Geener]

I was told there'd be no math....Glad to hear yinz had fun on your travels. Let me know when we can arrange for stories 'live and in person.'