David Sedaris Loves Marmots

It's true, actually. David Sedaris visited Spokane for the 2005 Get Lit! festival. The morning of his speaking engagement, he went for a walk downtown and encountered the herd of marmots that roams Riverfront Park, grazing and occasionally accosting passers-by for potato chips and cigarettes. Hey, these are urban marmots, baby.

That evening, Mr. Sedaris spoke briefly about the marmots. He explained that he got a haircut before the show, and asked the barber about the weird giant rodents wandering through the downtown park. The barber said that they were marmots, and essentially harmless as long as you didn't bogart the food.

And what do they eat? Sedaris asked.

The barber knew just what marmots eat. Marshmallows, he said. Marmots eat marshmallows.

I'm sure they would eat marshmallows, given the chance. Spokane Parks Department has begun a campaign to discourage feeding park wildlife and make the marmots more skittish around people, though. The marmots were beginning to resemble fuzzy toilet seat covers from all the handouts. It's difficult to pretend that you're maintaining a natural environment when you have a colony of obese marmots sprawled on the warm river rocks, Big Gulps propped up on their stomachs, handfuls of pork rinds stored in their little cheek pouches.

The feeding also had to stop because too many Spokane residents are not born naturalists. People loved to feed the small furry critters who would come right up to the restaurant patio or the picnic blanket and make big beseeching eyes and take the food right out of your hands and clutch it endearingly between little furry paws. Except some of those "marmots" had long, pink, snaky tails. Almost like, I don't know, wharf rats?

Awww. Cute!

Best Lunch Ever

The cheese plate for two at Saunders Cheese Market:

Around the plate, starting at the 12:00 position:

- Pajerin 2 Latti (hiding behind the cup of olives)
- lightly toasted baguette
- Pecorino fresca
- green grapes
- salumetto
- grilled and marinated vegetables, including artichoke hearts, peppers, cippolini, and mushrooms
- Shropshire
- Marcona almonds
- Cerignola olives (center cup)

Trust the people behind the counter to pick your cheeses for you. Left to my own devices, I never would have picked the Pecorino fresca, but oh yum. Milder and creamier than a percorino romano, with an herb and olive oil rind, it was the best thing on the plate.

Saturday Morning Breakfast

The winter doldrums are officially over on the Saturday morning that I wake up and suggest that we walk over to the Rockwood Bakery. We have a favorite route that meanders down the alleyways between big, old houses, and lets me peek into people's back gardens. (I am a shameless home and garden voyeur. People could be having a crazed orgy in full view of their front window and I would be all "Why won't they move so I can get a better look at the woodwork?")



Walking to the Rockwood in the spring sunshine was a popular pastime this morning, with a stroller traffic jam at the entry and a line to order coffee and pastries that ended right at the front door. To pass the time, I made friends with a small pug who happily clowned for the camera.



Quiche, coffee, a walnut shortbread, the newspaper and enough sunshine that I'm now noticing the slight pink sting on my shoulders. Finally, winter falls away and I remember that I belong outside.

Vegetable Soup

We joined a local CSA run by Tolstoy Farm a few years back. It was, and continues to be, a great way to make sure that you're buying the freshest local organic produce possible, supporting local farmers, etc. Notice I didn't say "eating," because the year we joined happened to be a bad year for farming. Except for beets. It was apparently the best year for beets EVER.

I hate beets.

Oh, I tried, to be certain. I pored over my copy of Greene on Greens. We had them roasted, grilled, borscht-ed, cold, hot, smothered in butter, swimming in sour cream. It doesn't matter. To my palate, beets = spicy dirt.

We finally admitted defeat and ended our CSA membership. We bought organic produce at the grocery store, and tried to remember to hit the Farmer's Market in the summer. Happily, there's now a better option.

Fresh Abundance delivers a box of organic produce to our doorstep every other Thursday. If there's something available from local farmers, it's in the box. If the box isn't well-rounded enough with the local produce, then organic produce from further afield is added. It strikes a neat balance between my desire for the freshest produce available, and my need to not be faced with a carton of beets.

Oh, and that's the best part. If you're a delivery customer, and you're getting the pre-built boxes, you can specify three kinds of produce you'd just as soon not see in your box. I have to admit to a maniacal cackle or two as I typed in "1. Beets 2. Beets 3. BEEEEETS."

Miller's Hardware

Terry Pratchett writes about L-space, the ability of books in large quantity to warp time and space around themselves. If you've ever spent time in a sufficiently old used bookshop, you'll be familiar with the phenomenon of the shop that appears tiny from the outside, and yet seems to have miles upon miles of bookshelves inside.


Miller's Hardware, on 29th and Regal, seems to operate under a similar loosening of the normal time-space rules. It is small and dark and cluttered, without the 20-foot ceilings and rows of shopping carts that most of us expect when we walk in a big box home store. And yet, whenever we need something for the Charming Wreck, Miller's has it. Doesn't matter what we ask for - parts for our old stove, fuses, an angle grinder, galvanized boot trays, replacement Christmas tree light bulbs, vacuum bags. Miller's has it. What's more, they employ people who know where the stock is, and better, know what it's all for. As a bonus, they know people. People who do esoteric things, like sharpen mower blades or work on old hot water heating systems or fix snowblowers. If you're not wired into the network of wily old guys who know how to do stuff, shopping at Miller's is the next best thing.

Breakfast at the Old European

The menus at the Old European used to be much longer, with lengthy explanations of just how "European" everything on the menu was. Pancakes? European. Fried Egg Sandwich? European. Coffee? European. Punchline of a moderately filthy joke I used to tell in grade school? European.

The new menus are now succinct and to the point, without the long apocryphal origin stories. The giant mounds of food remain the same, however: witness the "Goulash." 4 eggs, potatoes, sausage, bacon, ham, peppers, cheese, and tomatoes in a glorious mound of hangover-curing, weekend-starting, greasy goodness - just the thing to get Matt fueled up for a fun day of basement renovations.

Honestly, though, the real reason to go to Old European is for the aebelskivers. A cross between a pancake and a doughnut, these little balls of doughy goodness are possibly the most genuinely European dish on the menu.

The service at the Old European is usually scattered and a little surly. But in the current age of "Hi! My name's Chad and I'm going to sit in your lap and tell you about the specials and put my hand on your shoulder and forge a special, special friendship with you today!" I honestly don't mind a little snarl with my coffee, as long as the coffee keeps coming.

If they could only combine the vibrating chair and the hot tub...

The downtown Home and Garden show usually serves as our official spring wakeup call. Walk around and kick the tires on some shrubs, chat with tree service people, discover a new toy, sit on a lawn tractor or two, and suddenly we're ready to start playing outside again. Or at least ready to spread mulch and manure.

Unfortunately, the home show this year was short on inspiration and long on hot tubs. Which, hey, who doesn't love a hot tub or ten, but in our teensy back yard, we'd have to stand in the hot tub in order to barbecue or prune the lilac. So no hot tub.

This year's show also offered a large number of vibrating things. These booths were by far the most popular. People crowded around to be next in line for hot vibrating action. People who visit this blog after googling "hot vibrating action" are going to be sadly disappointed.

Maybe we should have given in to the siren call of the vibrating chairs. The people in them certainly looked content. Or maybe we should invent a vibrating hot tub chair and have next year's most popular booth. It would certainly beat spreading manure.

Walking to Work

I work 1.2 miles from my home, a fact I know only from the Gmap Pedometer. If it weren't for that, I'd simply work 15 minutes away on foot, a rough fact learned by walking the route somewhat regularly.

I live 1.2 miles from my office. Same fact, different direction. Following the same route, my home is a 20-25 minute walk from work, again learned by walking the route. The time difference isn't from my energy level early in the morning and late in the day (my job is not very strenuous). The difference is the hill. Walking down vs. walking up.

Walking down is a joy. Spokane's south hill rises steeply between 7th and what would be 10th Avenue. But 10th is known as Cliff Avenue for good reason. At the crest of this short, steep hill, you can see the whole of downtown from above. The new Convention Center and the Performing Arts Center. The Paulson Building. The Davenport Hotel and the new Davenport Tower. The other tall buildings, most named after banks. Riverfront Park and the Pavilion. The river. And beyond the river to the Courthouse and the north side. On a clear day, you can see Mount Spokane. Heck, Mount Spokane is so close, you can often see it on a hazy day as well.

And just a few minutes later, you're in the middle of it.

As you can probably guess, I have made the walk down the hill more often than the walk up. Coming home, I almost always take the bus. The ride takes 3-4 minutes and drops me off right across the street from my house. It would take me longer to drive myself and find parking.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that my maximum, worst-case-scenario, total daily commute is never more than 40 minutes. And that is one of the many reasons why I love living in Spokane.