O lucky man

So, Otis and I bundled up like Esquimaux last night and took the scooter (on what is likely its last ride of the year) up to the warm and lovely apartment of the warm and lovely Sachet for a get-together that was ostensibly focused on pumpkin soup, but which was actually the setting for some great conversation and community.

Not that the food wasn't wonderful: Sachet's pumpkin soup was sweet and yummy, and she added little quiches and roasted punkin seeds and other goodies to the board; in addition, there was a festive autumnal salad, sweet honey bread and sour pumpernickel, nice wine, and a fresh apple crisp.

But all that culinary goodness became background for thought, and talk, and connection. With a group that included A-Man, E-rik, Silvio, Johnbai, and Dingo (and a late appearance by an after-work O), the topics of conversation ranged from the writing skills of high schoolers to future of the thermohaline system to the condition of roads in Guatemala. It was an engaging, relaxing, stimulating, enjoyable evening, the perfect cap to my day. Thanks to Sachet for spurring it and to everyone who helped realize it.

The day needed a nice nightcap, since it had been filled mostly with school work beforehand. Otis did enter the foreign world of salon hair care (more on that soon), and we took a jaunt up to Shoreline to have lunch with her grandmother, but other than that, the only break from working was a short walk we took midafternoon to keep from falling asleep over our papers. But we are filled with an extra hour of sleep today, thanks to the setting-back-of-the-clocks, so there's energy to spare for today's piles of paper.

A little slice of fun: I tripped over this (don't ask me how) and wanted you to share my slack-jawed amazement. It's Yakov Smirnoff's website.