letter jan 10

Dear everyone

Happy New Year! This is my first letter of 2010. I think it is at least three weeks since my last letter. Did we do anything important prior to arriving (late) in Mexico? About a week before, Cindy and I went to a taping of “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me”. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=35 This is a quiz show broadcast on WBEZ twice on Saturdays, and sold to a variety of NPR radio stations around the country. It is taped at the Chase Auditorium (the building I still think of as the First National Bank Building - - more on that later). Cindy and I ate at a small Greek diner type restaurant around the corner, and then stood in line to get in. Of note - - this was Carl Kasell’s last NPR broadcast before retiring as a news reader for NPR. For the last thirty years he has been waking up at around 2 AM everyday. Now his only duty is WWDTM. Our special call-in star was Andy Williams, the singer. Apparently he has a biography out now http://www.andywilliams.com/ with some racy stories about his time with the Sinatra ‘Rat Pack’, and his misadventures in Scandinavia. Peter Sagal couldn’t get him to repeat any of it on air, though. Andy Williams couldn’t answer enough questions correctly for the listener at home to get Carl Kasell on their answering machine. It was pretty interesting to watch how they did the taping, but wee left before they could do any of the corrections on bloopers, since the taping is on Thursday, and we had things to do the next day.

Shortly after the weekend Cindy and the kids went to Albany. I followed a few days later, but I had a few glorious quiet days alone in the house with Meeko. I rented District 9 http://www.d-9.com/ . Sort of interesting, but not very believable. I also saw a movie with Jean Claude Van Damme called JCVD http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1130988/ . This was surprisingly enjoyable. I think I saw one other, but I have already forgotten what it was.

I got to Albany on Friday (Christmas day), and was picked up at the airport and taken to Cindy’s sister Lynda’s house. All Cindy’s immediate family, except for her dad, was there. We hung out for a while, and then we drove down south to Cindy’s Mom’s house for the evening. Saturday noon we drove back to Lynda’s, and then onto Aunt June’s house for another party with many many Scalzo’s. We slept at Lynda’s because we had to get to the Albany airport early to catch a flight to Philadelphia for our connection to Cancun. When we got there the airlines were in disarray due to bad weather the previous 24 hrs, and we were told we probably wouldn’t make our connection. We gave up our overbooked seats, and were given some kind of ‘guaranteed’ ticket for the 7 PM flight (the two earlier flights at 11 and 3 had been cancelled). This did not make me feel very sanguine about our chances to get the last flight out to Cancun. Worst of all is that our Albany-Philly flight made up for lost time, although it left an hour late, and we probably could have made our connection. Nevertheless we spent 12 hours in the airport, eating cheese steak, and watching the Steelers beat the Ravens due to the Ravens ineptitude. This kept the Steelers’ play-off hopes alive for a little bit longer, alas, they didn’t make them. Of the few games the Bears did win this year, why did it have to be against them?

Anyway, we did make it to Cancun, and arrived at the hotel around 1:30 AM. Our time in Mexico was fun and relaxing as usual. The boys and I went for a scuba trip to Cozumel. Getting there and back took about 6 hours, and the Scuba was only about 2-3 hours. Better to stay in a hotel on Cozumel if you really want to do a lot of diving. The book club discussion of Antigone was okay, but this and Northanger Abbey were not books that took over the imaginations of the readers sufficiently to make a good discussion. Perhaps next year, under Jeff’s managerial skills, it will be better.

We managed to get back from Mexico without problems, unlike many of the rest of us. Getting back to work and school was a bit of a change. We suffered through the Steelers’ and Bears’ last, irrelevant wins. We got some new movies from Blockbuster. On Friday I watched My Dinner With Andre http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082783/. This was the first time I had ever seen this movie, although I always like Wallace Shawn. Although there is a lot pretension in the movie, I think it is purposefully so. There is a lot of food for thought. Do Andre and Wallace fight? If so, who wins? Do I look at Chicago buildings the same way Wallace does at the end of the movie - - through the veil of history? Is this why I can’t bring myself to call the 1st Nat’l building (or the Sears Tower, or Fields) by their new names?

Yesterday morning we had a quick visit from an old PEA friend of mine, Anthony Chen. Anthony is an MD who is the director of a health clinic in the Seattle area. His wife is an academic internist. Anthony was here with his son for a cousin’s wedding, and they were staying the Hyatt Lodge at Hamburger University http://thelodge.hyatt.com/hyatt/hotels/index.jsp . He said the rooms were nice, but clearly configured for the corporate world. It’s only about ten minutes from our house. Alex is also a PEA grad, and is a freshman at Duke now. We ate bagels, and the boys and Alex played video games while Cindy and I talked to Anthony about health care. Later that evening Cindy and I went out to a new restaurant called Guava http://www.guava-tlc.com/ in nearby Westmont. We shared a crabmeat ceviche (they were out of the bay scallops) and vegetable empanadas. Cindy had pork loin and I had steak churrasco, as well as a ginger-mango mojito. Everything was very good. This afternoon I took the kids to see Avatar http://www.avatarmovie.com/ . It really is everything the critics say - - visually stunning, but a biologically and physically inconsistent story. And Jeff could have created a better alien language, I’m sure. Still, you should see it in a movie theatre.

Jasper got an iTouch which we have all been marveling at. He swims a 500 in a meet next weekend. Nothing much new to report on Lucas and Nicola, except that they are studying (we hope) for their first semester finals which are this coming Tues-Thurs. I am reading Neal Stephenson’s Anathem http://www.amazon.com/Anathem-Neal-Stephenson/dp/0061474096 for the second time. He is a really creative writer.

Love H.