Zzzzzz…i woke up bright and early, 4:30 a.m. yesterday i ran around and exercised and gave massages and was certain i’d sleep through the night.
wrong. at least, though, i figured if i did happen to wake up at 4:30, i’d quickly fall back to sleep, because of the extreme tiredness.
wrong again.
so here i sit, bleary-eyed, wishing for a nap. but there’s going to be much busy-ness again today, plus the temperature is supposed to soar up into the 70’s, so i’ll have to be outside.
i’ve been sitting here in a public place, writing as i listen to some retired people talking. they’re discussing restaurants, and food, and one woman started her sentence, “that time i was taking the QE2 from Europe…” This quickly sent me into a decline; am i ever going to get the opportunity to sail on the QE2 either to or from Europe? It seems extremely unlikely at this time.
but then again, you never know.
she went on, though, to describe the fanciest, most elegant dessert she’d ever eaten in her life. Her waiter on the ship knew she loved chocolate, and one night served her a little bitty chocolate grand piano, filled with whipped something or other. she couldn’t believe how fancy and delicious it was.
ok. so this is a woman who clearly travels well, who’s been around, who’s sailed across the sea in the cushiest way possible. and this dessert she had on board, the most amazing thing she’s had IN HER LIFE…i’ve had it.
i described it in one of my gracetalks. i was served the exact same chocolate grand piano, at an ultra-deluxe wedding reception at the beverly wilshire hotel in beverly hills. the groom was the son of one of the heads of hewlett-packard, i can’t remember if it was hewlett or packard, just that it was the most elegant party i’d ever been to. the chocolate piano was lavish, but at the time, the whole spectacle was so over the top that the piano was just the…icing on the cake.
somehow, this made me feel a little better about my lot in life. i’ve been working really really hard on being more content with my lot in L, because i do know, deep down, that i really have almost nothing to complain about. but still, knowing that i’ve already achieved one woman’s idea of dessert perfection makes me feel even better.
incidentally, my ideal dessert (thus far – i’m certain i’ll run into even more tantalizing desserts in the years ahead) was something i ordered at the outdoor cafe at the museum of modern art in Los Angeles. it was a moist little perfect chocolate cake that had a gooey delicious hazelnut chocolate filling inside. kind of like having a warm chocolate Nutella truffle inside the cake. i was there having lunch with christine, on her lunch hour, and i ordered the dessert impetuously because i usually don’t do anything that rash, at least not at lunchtime.
the chocolate cake beat the chocolate piano, because the piano was really about spectacle, and for me, it was all part of the spectacle of the wedding reception. but the cake was an unexpected delight, and an unexpected delight is always an…unexpected delight.
i’ve been sitting here deleting hidden comments on my postings. one of them, from may 24th of last year, had 176 hidden comments from evil gambling places and worse. we eliminated the comment problem by eliminating readers’ abilities to post comments, but somehow the infiltrators are still able to post them on earlier entries.
but here’s a comment i uncovered this morning while deleting, part of the may 24th listing:
“Happy Belated Birthday Grace! Sorry I missed it. However, I would like to treat you to a scoop of B-R ice cream at your convenience, as a belated BD-treat.”
i’d written about how people should get a scoop of ice cream for their birthday, as well as getting the day off of work.
now i add to that, everybody should get some kind of actual vacation destination if they want it. a short trip to chicago, a jaunt to the bahamas, something like that.
more importantly, though, i do believe that the poster of that comment FORGOT to give me my free scoop of ice cream last year! so, if you remember writing that comment to me, i’m ready for my ice cream. two scoops, since it’s so very belated.
ok then,
morning grace with more of a late-afternoon/early evening grace mentality