The Business Lunch

Another scratch off for the “to-do” list--lunch in Jericho, home of the Oxford yuppie, with my number 1 blog fan. Chip and I scheduled a “business lunch” at Branca, a nouvelle Italian bistro on Walton Street. It’s a puzzle to me at this point how I continue blogging once this blog is no longer a travel/culture diary. Am I doomed to a life in nursing or can I try something new? My “hating taking care of sick people” thing is what a nurse recruiter might consider a bad fit for most health care settings. Nurse Ratched is a role model. Maybe I need to keep my finger on the pause button for a bit longer.



What better way to contemplate a fantasy alternative career than with a fantasy business lunch? Chip will confirm that I am completely out of touch with reality as regards the business world. Since my parents also worked in health care, my ideas about the business world are based largely in all I’ve carefully studied on television dramas like Dallas and Dynasty as well as the daytime soap opera, The Young and the Restless. As a business professor, Chip sees business as a complicated sociological matrix of industry, unions, technology and a dynamically changing workforce (I just made that up with words I’ve heard him use on the phone). For me, business is an office with a desk, computer and a phone and power lunches, business dinners, early morning planning sessions with coffee and pastries, and cocktail parties after work with “clients”. A parade of social gatherings with food. You are familiar with Darren Stevens and Mr. Tate on Bewitched? Then you have my vision.



I used to love meetings when I was a staff nurse. If they need a staff nurse at a meeting instead of at the bedside, it’s usually driven at an administrative level to introduce an “innovative new strategy of care” which implies cost saving measures for the hospital sure to lengthen hours, decrease staffing or cap a pay scale. They unlock your shock collar and let you leave the patient care area to go to a boardroom with a white erase board and and comfy chairs in an area of the hospital that doesn’t smell like poop, but more like flowers and leather. There I could sit for an hour without having to respond to the unrelenting universal needs of the suffering--sustenance, pain relief, oxygen, emotional support and elimination. Timed well, the inspired and experienced nurse could plan her day around coinciding unpleasant tasks, like weighing her obese patient with the bed scale or getting her post-surgical patient on the bedpan, with her meeting time.
“Right, I just put Mrs. Johnson on the bedpan, Sally. Can you check on her in about ten minutes? And grab a weight on Room 406 if you would? Thanks, you’re a peach.” I’m sure I never did that.



My power lunch started with an Island Breeze Punch or some such, a lovely drink of Campari, limoncello, cassis and lemon topped with Prosecco. We had a great luxurious two plus hour lunch as business people do, and left around 4pm. The restaurant was peaceful between the lunch and dinner crowds. We cycled home at dusk to children wondering why their unrelenting demands for tea had not yet been satisfied.



The Christmas decorations are up. Little house in Oxford is ready for Santa.

Like I said back in February 2007....I love a snow day

Madison snow day in years past

February 2007

I was up at the regular time this morning, got the girls off to school and sat down to check the Internet. I checked the weather around the U.S. cities where I and my nearest and dearest live and noted a remarkably well timed snowstorm in southeastern Wisconsin that might result in school closings. Snow days are few and far between in Madison but not unheard of especially in the past five years. I think the number of driving parents, the increase and diversity of the student population, the snow day once or twice a season is a realistic hope. The key to the Madison snow day is the city bus service. If the city buses can run safely, schools are open. But I suspect a more practical matter weighs heavily in these decisions--whether the teachers will be trapped at the end of the day with screaming parentless children one minute after contracted hours. Have you ever really looked at a teacher at 3pm? They've done their job admirably but it is time for their students to go home. That contract is binding baby, and if there is the slightest whiff of an army of teachers stuck at school with our kids past their working hours, I think things could get ugly fast. I am naturally suspicious and think the worst of people and organizations, which is why I think this.

In any case, any snow day for a friend is a snow day for me. (see above link to a post from over a year ago before my blogging had really taken root). The timing of this storm looked promising, with the bulk of the snow falling during the school day and peaking at 3pm. I hopped on the Channel3000 website and began streaming the live morning show which starts at 5am at home. I kept watch for my friends most of whom still lay in their warm beds, even emailing one teacher friend that I knew would be awake. She emailed back, dubious of her chances. I shared my theory about teachers being trapped with little monsters, and she thought I might have a point although she is one of those teachers who would gladly stay with the little monsters regardless of her contract. I told her to hang in there until 5:50am, an arbitrary time of my choosing. Sure enough as I was typing, she emailed back, NO SCHOOL. She called me minutes later, a teacher with a free day off in the middle of the week! That's like talking to a kid on Christmas morning! We had a good old chinwag about all sorts of fun topics and reveled together in her day off. Everyday for me is a day off, but her celebration is mine as well today. I stayed in my pajamas until 3pm, chatting on Skype with my dad and playing with my pictures on Snapfish.

I love snow days. They are like found money. Stay in your pajamas, don't do anything practical or organizational or useful, Madison. I am with you in spirit.

Another year, another daughter

Posh Spice

Her Italian high heels

A second family birthday in two weeks. This girl came quickly into the world with a pixie-ish face too whimsical to be a Madeline. And so she became Allison Amy. Blonde and blue eyed, reasoned and practical, stylish and sporty--always a genius although we didn't know it. Her nursery school teacher approached us about entering Ally into an early readers study as she'd been identified through a local university. Say what now? She's an early reader? In the shadow of her sister's "Letterman's amazing kid tricks" linguistic skills, Ally went along through her early years unbothered by intrusive, overpraising, highly scrutinizing parents. She's always been a Mama's girl. Took forever to wean her, she still wants to sit with me on planes and trains and up until recently, would set up residence on Chip's side of the bed, complete with stuff on the night stand whenever he went out of town overnight. She's got a face for nicknames. The Beaner, Allyboots shortened often to just Boots, and Chummy. Now she's just Ally to her friends. I can refer to her as Ally but to her face, she's Al or Allison. Sometimes still Boots.

She's a tenderhearted girl, but private about her feelings and determined to hide her vulnerability. It's in her actions that I see the tenderness. She'll always offer me an earbud on plane or train so I can share a song with her. She'll never exclude a friend out of spite or anger and she's got a teflon coating when it comes to girl drama. She loves animals and from age three has dabbled in vegetarianism which I expect to become full blown in college once there's a permanent salad bar option. She's rarely in trouble with us because for her, confrontation is not comfortable. She goes along with most things but digs in vigorously on a few others, which makes it harder to compel her to change anything. She doesn't lie. The brutality of truth as I try to keep up with the fashion trends. I find myself desperately seeking her approval....of my outfits. And that's where our family turns into American Idol. Olivia is Paula. She always finds a nice thing to say and has a hard time being critical, even when it's warranted. Chip is Ryan. He's just here to keep the show moving and change the subject if things get heated. And Ally is Simon. Just yesterday, and it pains her to even have to deal with my amateur attempts...."You have way too much goin' on there, Mom."

She's newly independent since August. Carrying key, wallet and bus pass, she rides the city buses and strides alone through town in the late afternoons wearing her iPod and stopping occasionally for milkshakes, school supplies or baguettes. Her wit has sharpened with the introduction to British telly, and her style has grown even more mature. High heels and skinny jeans...definitely new. There's sure to be some backsliding when we head home to the familiar, but she's returning to America as Ally Extra. Goodbye to Chummy. I'll miss her... but she did always kick and steal the covers.

The Les Mis experience

Ally's birthday request was to see a show in London and she chose Les Mis. For my part, although I've seen it once before, I started crying by the second song and stayed weepy until intermission. I pulled it together until Eponine took one for the Revolution. I could feel the giant drops hitting my blouse again. Occasionally, Chip would reach over and pat my knee because he figured I was crying. Generally, he was correct. It's tragic and epic and getting caught up in the story is part of the fun. Even the ensuing headache that comes with holding back the full blown sobs is almost worth it. It's just like the Steel Magnolias or the Brian's Song headache. I wish they had a little cigarette girl who came around at intermission and sold Advil.



After the show, we strolled Camdentown while waiting for our dinner companions. Excellent bargains, for the very young and hip of course.





A nod to my friend Nina. I can't take pictures of food like she does, but we went for pizza at Marine Ices in Chalk Farm. Sprinted to Paddington with three minutes to spare for the last train to Oxford. Tomorrow, we worship the birthday girl. Better get my rest.

Wrong Platform

This is the picture looking across the train tracks in the Oxford station. I'm supposed to be sitting on the other side, but when I took this photo, I didn't know that.

From the moment I looked at the train board, I didn't feel quite right about my 9:55 train. I'm a nervous Nellie whenever I travel, which is well established at 35,000 feet. Mr. Ativan and Mrs. Stoli generally fly with me, but I don't usually take them with me on trains. My fears amass slowly, organizing into a storm of low level panic (all in my head, you'd never know I'm the crazy lady on the platform) around where the wrong train or plane or bus might go with me on it as prisoner. I might end up in a remote part of England and there would be no stops ever and I'll never see my family again and I'll run out of money and live on the streets. I call it negative magical thinking. I'm very full of it when I travel. I don't imagine the average worst. I invent outrageous new worst.

My issue this morning: I didn't know there were two 9:55am trains. I see one listed to arrive at platform 2. I go to platform 2 but I know that's wrong for Didcot Parkway. All the trains on platform 2 go the opposite way from Didcot. The announcement for the train on platform 1, which includes a stop at Didcot, repeats several times as if it's trying to snap me out of my conviction about platform 2. It does a little, as I think to myself maybe I should just go take that train. Still I sit at platform 2 until a train arrives. I say to the conductor, "Does this stop at Didcot?", knowing full well it can't possibly unless somebody's going to manually carry the engine around to drive the train back the way it came. And yet I ask. He's confused by the question. "We just left Didcot," he says. I sprint up the steps, across the footbridge, down the other steps and leap onto the other train at platform 1, the train I should have been on all along. I think to myself, "Did everyone on this train just see me sitting across the tracks a minute ago?" I make no eye contact with anyone.



I was, in the end, safely delivered to Bath Spa for its annual Christmas Market, one of the best in England they claim. Sadly, though, the combination of suitcase restrictions and preparation for leaving in six weeks stymied my usual buying patterns.

Daft singer but oh so jolly



Lots of people, needed a break. Took a walk out of the tourist area and up the hill. If you're familiar with Jane Austen, you know several of her books are set in Bath. So, having seen Persuasion just this week on the Beeb, I headed for the familiar circus where Ann frantically runs in search of hottie Captain Wentworth to accept his proposal. Made me swoon just taking the picture.



I climb higher...Bath from the top of the hill, or nearly. In the old days, the higher up the hill you lived, the richer you were. I KNOW they took carriages because there is no way a woman in a corset would have the wind to climb this hill.

From Above

On the way down

An hour walk around the town then back to the market to buy the few things I'll carry home. A choir singing Christmas carols in the market.




It's a good time to call it a day. Starting to sprinkle a little bit. A rainbow says "take the 2:43 and change in Didcot".



On the train home, I pass green countryside. You wouldn't know it's winter except the sun is setting at 3:30pm.



Home to the cozy, Christmasy house and a nice martini. When Ally saw my decorative efforts, she said, "Mom, get a friend."

A Junonia of a friend...

Sanibel Shells

Why did we expect that Olivia and Allison would do well with this trip abroad? Well, I guess because I moved from Philadelphia to New Orleans at age 17 and it didn't kill me. We expected, and with some gentle nurturing, got cooperation and success from these girls of ours. Shaking things up is good. Blows your mind, enlarges your world. But I remind myself how painful and lonely it was in the short run of my moving year until I met Mollie, Leslie and Susan. This post is a bit random but that's kinda how it is with long friendships. So many memories unorganized and crowded together in no order, displacing one another randomly. I feel like I'm bobbing for apples. I plunge my head under the water, cheat a little and pull out one or two easy ones with stems.

"You have to meet Leslie", Mollie said. "She wants to meet you. She's from Philadelphia too." It was already too weird that Mollie and I shared a mutual friend in Philadelphia. They had met at camp and got along so well, that Karen insisted Mollie call me once I moved to New Orleans, which she dutifully did. We were more surprised than anyone to find out we were attending the same school and that we liked each other quite a lot. Now another connection to Philadelphia, a girl also relocated to New Orleans from Philly and also attending this small private school in uptown New Orleans. Karma...God's will....luck....? Even then, I suspected a sinister master plan of the Universe to bring together the "gigglers" as my mom not so affectionately referred to us. With age, the giggles have turned to cackles and we're still too loud in public, but feh. We're still friends to this day.

My first memory of Leslie was at my first high school party where historically for me, food and soft drinks were served and parents were home. My previous experiences with teenage parties had involved alleys and fields and there was often running from police involved. Food? Parents? Kids acting civilized and the lights turned on? "Excuse me, to what year in the 1950s have I moved?"

Kitten's Paw

She arrived late, having finished a shift working at a Sno-ball stand. Don't get me started on Sno-balls. They are a sorrowful answer to Philly "wutter" ice--NO subtlety whatsoever. Sickly sweet mounds of cracked, bobbly ice drenched with syrup so nuclear that it is entirely possible the syrup indelibly stains internal organs and causes lethal cancers. Leslie wore painter's pants (coolest trousers ever) that looked appropriately like an actual painter's pants with bright splotches of red, blue and purple syrup in a pattern that suggested an explosion or food fight. And indeed there was a story that Leslie had to remedy some clog or problem with hoses or something, idiots she was working with couldn't fix it, but she did...made her late...etc. As her father is the handiest of men, the JCC's answer to MacGyver if you will, Leslie was and still is the go-to person for any technical or mechanical emergency. It's telling that once I called her house when we were in high school and was told by her mom that she couldn't come to the phone because she was sandwiched between attic and second floor rafters, helping her dad install ceiling fans. Say WHAAAAAAT?

When she met me, she enthusiastically said something like, "You're from Philadelphia! Me, too. I'm so happy you're here." That said, she flitted off to the patio to have a cigarette and a Tab, occasionally waving and smiling at me when she caught my eye. And that was it. We were friends. Done. No further questions. Full acceptance. Work out the details later. It helped that we grew closer in a shared math class, passing notes about Robbie and Ricky and um....Billy....and laughing while sweet Mr. Pfister made brave attempts to teach us trigonometry (I searched vigorously for his picture, but to no avail). Leslie actually learned the math along with having fun. Me, not so much.

Baby's Ear

Sanibel Stoop

Leslie still likes to laugh and that has certainly nurtured our relationship over the years since making my friends laugh is my raison d'etre. We have shared moments of complete and absurd hilarity --must include yet another teenage driving memory of she and I in her VW, as she adjusted her driver's side mirror and it literally just dropped off the side of the car, bouncing and shattering in a million pieces behind us on Claiborne Avenue--to moments of pain and sadness like that of losing a parent--to the nurturing of each other through relationships, marriages, jobs and children--to finally, the rather obsessive quest for the perfect shell. Today is Leslie's birthday and I wish the baby of our little group of friends a very happy day.

It's December already

I flipped the calendar last night for the second to the last time here in Oxford and it sort of stopped me in my tracks. It seems now that the time went by fast, when I know that in August and September the days were so long and heavy that I thought our time here would drag on and on and sadly so. My friend Natalie reassured me during those days that reaching the halfway point of any extended time away from home would signal a change in feeling. She couldn't have been more right. I clung to that thought in September and I owe her a lot of thanks for articulating that notion clearly at a time when I felt I could hear so little. Some healing time and two trips to Europe have bookended the intervening months and brought me suddenly to putting up Christmas lights.

"What do we still need to do?" Chip and I asked one another this morning. We have some "must dos" left:
1. Evensong at Christ Church
2. A Christmas dinner at a restaurant
3. Lunch at the Trout
4. Christmas shopping at Harrods, John Lewis and Carnaby Street in London
5. Ashmolean Museum
6. Lunch in one of trendy Jericho's restaurants
7. Train ride to Bath for Christmas market
8. A pint of beer during the day, in the sunshine, by myself! at the Head of the River pub---OH WAIT DID IT!



Checked off the list just hours ago, it was 12:20pm and I had about an hour of sunlight left--no kidding, the sun hugs a very shallow arc these days and a glimpse of the actual ball of fire requires a trip to elevated ground outside the hours of 10am-2pm. On my way home from the grocery store, I glanced down to the Head of the River patio--bright sunshine on the picnic tables. I made a beeline for them, rolling my little shopping trolley down the wheelchair ramps like the nutty old lady I'm becoming, grabbed the table most likely to stay in the sunshine over the next hour and ordered a pint of Fuller's and a bowl of soup. For three months I have walked by this patio and on sunny days seen people having beers in the sunshine and thought "I need to do that." After four days in a hotel with my adorably cuddly, close knit, claustrophobically (spellcheck suggested "catastrophically" which also fits) clingy children, a pint alone today sounded particularly good. Only my shopping trolley for company, I parked it across from me like a dining partner, confident that the weather would keep the raw chicken fresh. The temperature...aah, yes. 5 degrees-ish C. But when something's on the list, you have got to play through the pain. My only quick translation from Celsius to Fahrenheit is 37 to 98.6, which most health care experts like myself can tell you. But 5? Roughly, refrigerator temperature, which is why it now makes sense why the shopping trolley looked so happy. Not exactly impressive to my Wisconsin friends, but with no ski hill in sight and only wearing my fleece jacket and pashmina, I felt like quite the robust little Englishwoman. I turned my face to the sun and tried to soak up any meager UV light that might have made it through the atmosphere. By 3:30pm, it looks like this, so I feel fortunate to have grabbed that hour of sunshine today. Back to the list tomorrow. Almost time for tea, which is a good thing as I need to reinvigorate myself from my midday beer.