Earthquake

A sly dog at work told me that he and his wife entered into sexual congress yesterday at 4:00am. When the 4.4 Earthquake struck the Los Angeles basin a few minutes later they both about died laughing, and he had a smile plastered across his face all day long.

I wonder if I should let Caltech know................

Grilled Cheese and Tomato

We are enjoying our first ripe tomatoes from the plant on our deck here in Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, and to us that means grilled cheese sandwiches on Oatnut bread, thick with Boar's Head sliced white American cheese surrounding slices of ripe tomato.

Life is good.

Kobe Bryant

With the Lakers winning the NBA Finals, the Los Angeles media has been awash with coverage of victory celebrations and interviews with the team's stars. One thing I haven't heard that seems so evident to me is this: the Olympics made Kobe a better player and a better person.

The World is in alignment here in Little Tokyo

My wife went out for a walk today; it was a sunny afternoon in Little Tokyo in Los Angeles. When she came back she told me, "The boys are out in force today, sitting around on the benches and ogling and hitting on the girls."

Thank our lucky stars! The World is alignment here in Little Tokyo.

ChoSun Galbee, Korean BBQ in Los Angeles

A friend at work, Sam Soon Kim, asked my wife and me to join her for dinner at a Korean BBQ restaurant in Los Angeles. Shirley and I accepted, and after Sam told us we were going to the ChoSun Galbee Korean BBQ off Olympic Blvd in Koreatown, I went and looked up some reviews.

Non-Asians (or non-Koreans) did not seem to like the service. Many said it was pricey, and that parking was an issue. Many reviewers loved it. Forewarned and forearmed, Shirley and I met Sam at ChoSun Galbee on Tuesday night.

The restaurant was already busy at 6:30 pm, so I pulled into the small valet-parking lot. We met Sam and were shown to our table. If you want BBQ you get a table with a grill in the center. Sam is Korean so we already had an 'in' as she handled the discussions in Korean as to what was good and fresh that night, and she also ordered drinks. One review that I had read earlier said that the best thing to have with dinner was an ice-cold Hite beer, so I asked Sam to order me one.

We ordered two plates of prime beef to BBQ, one plate marinated and one not. We also ordered Galbee Jjim, a cooked short-rib dish. A plethora of small dishes appeared: kimchi, pickled radish, broccoli with a piquant sauce, and many more. There was rice and seaweed soup as well, and a large green salad with a tasty dressing.

Everything was delicious. The BBQ was exquisite, just take it off the grill in front of you and place it on your salad, and we grilled peppers, garlic, onion and mushrooms along with the meat. As for the Galbee Jjim, it was absolutely the best short-rib dish I have ever tasted, the beef melted in my mouth. The seaweed soup was surprisingly good. We were never rushed, and the wait-staff was not cold and distant as much as they were busy; the place was packed.

The three meat dishes we ordered cost between 26 and 31 dollars each, and valet-parking cost two dollars. I'm not sure about the cost of drinks as Sam picked up the tab. But it was impressive that the restaurant was busy as it was.

If I had to choose between a restaurant that was empty and a busy one with difficult parking, well, I'd take the busy one every time.

We had a wonderful dinner, and we had a great time talking to each other and enjoying the atmosphere.

My review: It was excellent.

Olympic Equestrian Competition

It is a Sunday morning in Los Angeles, and as I watch the Olympic Team Equestrian Competition on television, I am remembering my father and my roots back in New England.

From my earliest childhood memories on, there was always one special Saturday every September when the entire family would pile into the station wagon and drive north into Massachusetts to attend the Eastern States Exposition, or the 'Big E', in West Springfield. The 'Big E' is billed as the New England State Fair, and it was always big and exciting when I was a kid. We would go through the exhibits housed in the six buildings on the 'Avenue of States' (one for each New England state), and then we would visit the livestock barns and mill around with the weekend crowd.

I enjoyed eating the fried dough and all the other exotic 'once a year' treats, and I eagerly waited for darkness when the midway would be lit and the carnival rides shown like jewels moving in the night.

It was then that my father would leave the kids with mom and grandma and disappear to the Coliseum to watch the horses in whatever event was happening at the time. Every year it was the same.

The Olympics were another source of joy for my dad, as he watched all the equestrian events that were broadcast during the Games, adding an aura to the stern enigma that my father was to me during those childhood years.

I never did learn where that love of equestrian events came from, or what dreams they inspired in this man of few words.

As I watch the equestrian events this morning in Los Angeles, I realize that there is a lot that I don't know about my deceased father, but the fact that I am remembering him today is enough.

French Toast in Los Angeles

We made French Toast this morning in Los Angeles. Shirley cooked up some bacon while I prepared the eggs. I remembered the first time I tasted the treat from across the pond; it was back in the early 1960s when I was at a summer camp in Connecticut run by the Boy Scouts. My mother never made this for breakfast and I was quite taken with it.

I like to use a nice thin Ciabatta loaf because the bread itself is light and airy. I cut six slices of the Ciabatta bread about three-quarters of an inch thick. My recipe is this: in a bowl, I whisked up 4 large eggs, half a teaspoon of vanilla extract, an ounce and a half of triple sec, two dashes of nutmeg, and a dash of cinnamon. I poured this egg mixture into a large lasagna dish and placed the cut bread flat down in the liquid, turning it over occasionally until the bread was well soaked and most of the liquid absorbed.

The bread was then fried in the bacon fat until it was crispy around the edges and golden brown. We then served it up with a little butter and real maple syrup.

Il était magnifique.

Laudizen King

Manchester: two more from Bowers

I received some nice comments after making two blog posts about the old hometown of Manchester, Connecticut. In the 'Manchester Redux' story, I included a long list of names: names of people that I knew, names of people that played a part during those early years of my life in Manchester. Ironically, I have reconnected with someone on that list, someone that I have not spoken with since high school, and that has been most gratifying and rewarding.

I want to thank all who contacted me.

Below are links to two short stories, stories related by memories from the 3rd grade at the Bowers Elementary School. In one, I learn about the power of symbol and the Holocaust. In the other, I capture an image that comes back to me in Los Angeles many years on.

Power of Symbol

Worms

Laudizen King

Newcomb's Ranch, Angeles Crest, March 2008

It is the first Saturday of Spring in 2008, and Shirley and I took a ride up into the San Gabriel Mountains to visit a little restaurant up on the Angeles Crest Highway called Newcomb's Ranch. As is usually the case on a beautiful Saturday, the place was a beehive of activity as campers, bikers and hikers from all over the Southland descended on Newcomb's for food and camaraderie. The restaurant, only forty miles from downtown LA, sits at just under 5000' of elevation on busy Rte 2. There was some snow on the side of the road, and quite a bit more up on the north facing slopes of the higher peaks.

I talked with several bikers as Shirley mulled about and took in the sights. There was one cherry '67 BMW on the lot that the owner was understandably proud of. I took pictures and talked, then we enjoyed lunch.

Inside the restaurant, some were talking of making a spring ski trip to Mammoth Mountain. Mammoth is a four hour ride up Rte 395 along the eastern Sierra. The road is called the Eastern Sierra Scenic Byway and once you make Lone Pine it is scenic indeed.

I love California and the west.

If you want to see today's galleries, or a past story and gallery about Newcomb's, follow the link below.

2 Wheel Muse

Laudizen King