Madras Bhavan

For those of you who knew about that nice little Indian Buffet on Church that seemed to disappear, well, it’s back.  And it is amazing.  Seriously, the food is the best Indian food I’ve ever had.  Each thing had about three flavors.  Let’s take the chicken tandoori.  First, you’d taste the kind of pinky-pinkness and then the tender chicken and then, at the last second, a hint of cinnamon.  Cinnamon!  It’s the perfect spice for that dish.

And they had this rice that looked like confetti.

And they had something, I don’t know what, but it was brown on the outside, kind of yellowy on the inside and covered in warm honey.  When I am Queen of All, I will take baths in that.  It’s that decadent.

I’ve always kind of been ambivalent, leaning towards positive about Indian food, but this was so good that I have decided that I like it.

I give it five Brown Things Covered in Warm Honey out of five.

Schoolgirl Crushes

I think one of the reasons I’m a good blogger–okay, fine, a great blogger, the best blogger you read–is that I have and have had for as long as I can remember, a running interior monologue that just don’t really shut the fuck up, which I have channelled, in part, into this.

Seriously, if you ever ask me, “What are you thinking about?” and I say, “Nothing,” frankly, I’m lying.

What am I thinking about?  Well, either my mind has wandered a million miles away and I’m thinking about driving around the Delta or camping or George Bush or something that has nothing to do with our day, or I’m probably thinking about what it would be like to have sex with you.

Why?

Well, it’s not just because you’re hot, it’s because, I think, a person can live in their head or they can live in the world, but it’s very hard to find the right balance between the two of those (and I imagine it’d be very different for everyone–what that balance is) and I have spent most of my life living in my head–for all kinds of reasons. (For instance, this weekend, I caused egg to be spilled all over the floor and it was a huge mess and I realized, as I stood there kind of paralyzed, that I was waiting to be, at the least, yelled at… okay, honestly, I was waiting to see if I’d be hit.  That’s so fucked up.  I’m embarrassed to admit that.  Let’s just let that stand as an explanation and not talk about it.  My point is that I’m kind of awkward in the world in ways that have been unpleasant for me and so I think it’s easy enough for me to just retreat into my head.)

I’d like not to live completely in my head.  I have a body that, while no means perfect, is fun for me and it feels good to be in it, moving around in a world that doesn’t actually hurt me regularly.  For the most part, days are beautiful; life is short and I want to be in it and present in it.

So, I spend a lot less time living in my head than I used to.  I meditate, to learn to quiet that voice, for one.  And for two, I force myself to get out there in the world and do things I’d rather not (and when I say that, understand that those are often perfectly pleasant things).

I think the voice in my head uses the lure of thinking about sex to entice me back into my head.  There I am, having ice cream with you and we’re talking feminist theory or talking about getting tattoos, and randomly, I start thinking about running my lips along the curve of your shoulder.

It doesn’t mean that I want to stop being your friend and take up as your lover.  It doesn’t mean that I’m waiting around for you to realize how much you want me in return.  I don’t think it means much at all, other than that some part of me wants me to be more present in my head than there with you–and that’s kind of an effective way to do it, because who doesn’t like to think about sex?

I don’t know.  I guess I just thought that this is how it is for everyone.  You meet people; you like them; you’re friends with them.  Some part of you is all “And be sure to pack your sexy pajamas so that when you get to Boston [or the town of your choice] you can seduce the Divine Ms. B [or the friend of your choice]” and the grown-up part of you has to be all “What the fuck?  No, that’s our friend.  I don’t really like him or her that way.”

Bleh.  This seemed clearer in my head when I was walking the dog, but I reread it and I see that it’s a mess.  Can we sum it up in three questions?  Let’s see:

1.  Isn’t everyone running around wondering what it would be like to fuck everyone else?  (Shoot, for instance, I met the Blue Collar Muse and his wife once and was all–“Four kids, really?  They must know what they’re doing.  I wonder if I could seduce them both…”  As if I’d ever knowingly sleep with a Republican. WTF?  But there you go.)

2.  Isn’t it fine as long as you don’t mistake it for meaning anything more than that?

3.  Is it stupid for me to even be wondering about this?

They Were the Best of Duplexes; They Were the Worst of Duplexes

So, both sets of duplexes that Mrs. Wigglebottom and I have been watching take shape over the course of our morning walks appear to be done.

I can only judge from the outside. But judge I must. 509 & 511 Acklen Park are on the market for $699,000 a piece. Though they are cuter than the ones they put up last year, I must point out two things.

1. 509 Acklen Park has a silver vent stuck right on the front of it. If the link works, you can see it clearly in this picture. Yes, spend seven hundred thousand dollars to have a vent stuck right on the front of your house. I mean, if that doesn’t say “My architect is kind of a moron” I don’t know what does. But also, check out the brick. See how nice it is?

2. 511 Acklen Park has its beautiful brickwork covered by a thin layer of plaster, which, if you see how nice the brick looks, you’d immediately want to have sand-blasted off. Believe me, this picture actually makes it look better than it does in real life, and that picture makes it look like someone has done a crappy job of frosting the house in butter cream.

$699,000 to live in our neighborhood. Folks, I don’t even know what to tell you. When I first moved to my neighborhood, the big houses along Murphy Road were only commanding $250,000-$300,000. $699,000 to share a foundation with someone.

I couldn’t find a listing for the duplex on Theresa (402 Theresa, I believe), but from the outside, these are cute as hell. First, they fit the scale of the neighborhood a lot better (because, let’s face it, we all know the first part of the above-discussed condo development doesn’t appear to be full and the next phase hasn’t begun and shoot, even the “for rent” signs are staying up longer and longer, so if you buy your $700,000 duplex, it’s going to be years before the neighborhood is full of other $700,000 duplexes, if it ever is, and not working class tiny Monopoly houses). Second, they’re a style that tickles me–part Prairie/part Pagoda. They’re a kind of faded John Deere green with corn-gold highlights and dark reddish wood trim.

Just darling as hell.

The only misstep visible from the outside is that the roof has, visually, a lot of weight and the poles at the back corners of the house are a little thin in consideration of that. Otherwise, everything about it from the outside says “Don’t you want to imagine yourself living here?”

I’ll be interested to see what they hit the market at and how quickly they sell, because, frankly, that seems to me a more realistic vision for how our neighborhood is going to gentrify.

Edited to Add:  I give you 402 Theresa.  Yes, mid-200s which is insane, but less, far less insane than 700.  I’m just jealous that I will never own a home and certainly never be able to pay a quarter of a million dollars for one.  On the other hand, this is a lot of space for $250, considering that just the other side of I-440, they’re paying that for lofts.