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Ari arrived early from work and when he and Saul moved everything into position, we all thought it looked spectacular. No buyers remorse, whatsoever! We all had been searching for the right cabinet for the foyer for over a year. Ari knew it was perfect the minute he saw it. The same happened with the oriental. It took him less than five minutes to decide to buy it. He has kept to his plan of finishing the house little-by-little with just the pieces he wants, and not accumulating stuff just to fill space.
As the afternoon progressed, I was developing stomach pains. Since I was not hungry, for dinner we ate at a downscale, but very delicious Middle Eastern chain restaurant in the city that Ari had tried and liked on his lunch hour—Roti Mediterranean Grill. I had only a bowl of lemon chicken soup. It is the type of place where you order at the front and they give you a number that they call when your order is ready. It was perfect considering the good quality of the food and the way I was feeling. Later in the evening, the stomach pains increased so much I considered going to the emergency room. As I waited for the doctor to call me back, I threw up and immediately felt much better. Then, I feared I had caught the norovirus as Saul and I had eaten exactly the same things at lunch and he was okay. As the hours passed, and Ari kept us company, I continued to feel fine and was grateful that I had not needed a trip to the hospital or that our weekend had not been ruined by a three-day bout of illness.
Over the weekend, Ari made an appointment for Saul to have his beard shaved, and treated him to an awesome experience at Grooming Lounge where a progression of seven hot towels were used, he was shaven, massaged, and his face was treated with a variety of emollients that left his face not only clean-shaven, but as smooth as a baby’s bottom for a few days. His beard had become a nuisance to him as its coarseness began to prickle him as he slept. Afterward, we stopped by Ari’s new office in DC in a gorgeous office building that has modern installations of color-changing glass walls, and huge panels of grain-matched white marble backlit with white light. His work area is light and airy and recently done in an ultra-modern color palette of gray, yellow, blue and white. Common areas, such as the lunchroom, were the epitome of practical, modern, sleek design with every up-to-the-minute convenience imaginable. After touring the office, we walked down the street to Bobby Flay’s new fast food concept, Bobby’s Burger Palace, where Saul and Ari had lunch while I just sipped a ginger ale to make sure I was fully recovered from the trials of the previous evening.
In the evening, I finally felt up to eating and we revisited the Lebanese Taverna in Pentagon City for a reprise of the meal we had enjoyed so much a few weeks earlier. It did not disappoint, although the waiter did not have the spark of the guy on our previous encounter. After dinner, we wandered around the mall for a few hours until it closed, not buying anything, but enjoying the diversity of people from all over the world, in every type of native garb, who had been deposited there by buses or tours to get their fix of American goods.
On Sunday, after stopping for some supplies at Home Depot, Saul and Ari affixed his bed to his headboard, a project that has been waiting for some time. The weather, unlike what was predicted, was beautiful, and the bulbs Ari and I planted a couple of years ago have begun to emerge in his garden, a gratifying result of just an hour’s worth of labor. We had brunch together at the Tastee Diner in Silver Spring before heading home. On Sunday evening, I decorated a Presley Bella cake for Sister Lisa’s birthday while Saul caught up with a ton of schoolwork.
In the ensuing week, I finished my publication and shipped it out. Saul and I picked up Marianne and took her to lunch for her birthday at Thai Orchid in Blue Bell. She had never had Thai food before and seemed to enjoy it very much, especially the fried bananas we shared for dessert. Work began on our house and we are pleased with the progress being made. I finished reading two books in the last week on the Kindle app of my iPhone, Rob Lowe’s autobiography, Stories I Only Tell My Friends, and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot. I like that whole new worlds opened up to me in reading these, something I find particularly gratifying about non-fiction. Whether the information is biased, or has an “axe to grind,” is mostly irrelevant to me. It represents the way in which an author chooses to reveal a perception of reality to the rest of us. Trying to take some meaning from the apparently random experiences of our lives is something with which I struggle all the time in this blog.
Adele and Larry bought a house in The Villages in central Florida a few days ago. They are planning to spend several months there in the winter each year. Ken and Randi, who are still in Hawaii, called to let us know that, next year, they have booked a place there from January through April. Beth spent the week out in Tucson looking for a place. Her house next door will be going on the market in the next month or so. It seems the whole family is on the move. Only Larry joined us for Shabbat dinner this week. Faith is in Israel for her grandson’s bar mitzvah on Masada. Beth was in Tucson. We had homemade challah, leek and cauliflower soup, spinach salad with hot sesame dressing, sesame-crusted seared tuna, and homemade potato knishes. For dessert, we had cranberry upside down cake with whipped cream and coffee. Saul and I went from store to store gathering our supplies for the Men’s Club dinner on Thursday that we are cooking tomorrow at MBI-EE. At services on Saturday, we learned that there are very few reservations, so we may not have as much work to prepare everything for this Mural Arts of Philadelphia program that is being presented. It is a subject that is very interesting to me. I think the murals all over the city are exceptionally beautiful and diverse.
Last night, on the spur of the moment, Beth called to ask if we would like to join her and her friends and former tenants, Manuel and Ilsa for dinner. We were delighted to see them again, and we met at a Mexican restaurant in Blue Bell called Tamarindo’s that they liked. I will probably never eat at any other Mexican restaurant than this one. The food was delicious and authentic and the entreés came with free margaritas that were the best I have ever had. The staff came around with beautiful hammered copper pitchers and refilled our glasses with margaritas, just as good waiters usually fill one’s water glasses with water, which they also did regularly. I usually suffer quite a bit from drinking margaritas because the prepared mix that most restaurants use is full of sulphites, which give me sharp pains beneath my ears. Last night I was feeling no pain at all. In fact, I was as pleasantly high on margarita’s as I have ever been. Manuel and Ilsa seemed incredibly happy. Ilsa says she is now in her dream job. They insisted on treating us to dinner. Afterward, we stopped in at Beth’s house to see the progress of the work there and meet her second rescued Cairn terrier. Arriving home a short time later, I tried to stay awake to watch the Oscars, but I was feeling wonderful, sated, and drowsy. All I really got to see was the incredible Cirque du Soleil performance. Today, I had to be content with watching the highlights on the red carpet from reruns of last night. After a little more shopping today, I will be ready for preparing a dinner for 30 to 40 people tomorrow. Glad there was no hangover from my overindulgence this time.
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