A Winelover's Wanderings

Yes, indeed, today would have been Martin Luther King Jr.'s 80th birthday. Born in 1929, MLK died at age 39 in 1968. Such a long time ago, but his loss is still keenly felt.

The special birthday I am referring to, though, is NOT MLK's. My brother Tony was born on January 15, 1949. He was a beautiful baby - golden curls and a sweet smile. Until my Mom finally had his hair cut, everyone thought he was a girl.

Tony attended schools here in Southern California and college at UC Riverside and Univ of British Columbia. We thought he was a professional student and would never get a job!

He was a math major but then switched over to computer science for his master's degree and his doctorate. He ended up working as a professor in the computer science department of the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

His personal life took an upturn during these years too - he married Margie, a gal with two young boys. A ready-made family!

But time was not on their side. In June of 1983, Tony and Margie were riding on their tandem bicycle in the Wisconsin countryside and were hit by a drunk driver. Tony was killed instantly, and Margie was in a coma for several months and had her leg amputated. They were both 34.

Today would have been Tony's 60th birthday. Although his life was cut short at an early age, he accomplished so much, both professionally and personally. Some of his computer science papers are still published online. He made his mark, and I am proud of him!

Happy 60th Birthday, Tony!

It's a travel day today. Bill and I are heading to Paso Robles - even Hoochie is going along. But, there is a method to our madness. Bill is riding up with me and then we will rent a U-Haul so he can bring home my Mother's china closet and a few other items from my folks' house in Paso.

Hoochie is just along for the ride. We could have boarded her at home, but my sister will be in Paso too, and she wants to see Hoochie the Poochie. JoAnne will be retiring this year, and she is dying to have a dog, so Hoochie will be good practice.

Our goal on this trip is to sell our folks' car and give away our Mom's organ. So, I am off to CraigsList to put in ads.

Of course, I picked this particular week to make the trip because of the Slow Travel GTG there, the 3rd annual Slow Bowl. Shannon has organized this event every year (on Super Bowl weekend) and does a terrific job. We won't be able to visit the wineries this year with the rest of the group, but by next year we should have the Paso house sold and be able to participate fully. JoAnne and I will be at the Saturday night GTG - we wouldn't miss that for the world!

I hope to be able to post from there, but if I don't, I will see you on February 1st. As you can see in my sidebar, I have vowed to post each day in February, along with my compadres, the other February bloggers. Be sure to check them all out!

Bye for now!

Busy - yes! But fun too!

As I mentioned several days ago, Bill and I headed up to Paso Robles on Wednesday to do some work at my folks' house and to attend the Slow Travel Saturday night dinner.

Hoochie, our boxer/mastiff dog, went along with us. We had never taken her on a long trip before, and I was a little nervous about it. But, she did beautifully. She slept in the back seat of the car most of the way - and home with Bill in the U-Haul truck yesterday. She was a really good traveler and behaved herself in the Paso house. We may take her with us again! She is a great Slow Traveler!

I listed three items on CraigsList before I left home - my folks' Lincoln Towncar, a piece of furniture, and my Mom's organ. We got lots of calls for the FREE organ - go figure! We had previously tried and tried to donate the organ - to small churches, to a senior center, to anyone who would come and pick it up. So, we did succeed in sending the organ to a good home - a lady who remembered playing the exact same organ at her uncle's house when she was a child.

We also accomplished planting some roses along the driveway and some other green plants bordering the house. It makes the house look much nicer, which will hopefully help sell it later this year.

Our plan is to return to Paso in early May to sell the furniture and get the house ready to list for sale. It has only taken us three years to get to this point!

This is the boring work part of our trip. Stay tuned tomorrow for the fun part - the Slow Travel dinner.

I know we always talk about Slow Travel GTG's, but I am here today to tell you about another kind of get-together - with my neighbors.

Bill and I live in the country on a dead-end street, and we are friendly with nearly all of our neighbors. For many years, we have been having GTG's two or three times a year with all of the neighbors who can come. Sometimes we order pizza, but sometimes it is a potluck. We drink lots of wine and catch up on all of the news.

Last Saturday was our latest GTG. Since it was winter, we decided that a soup event was in order. Plus appetizers plus dessert. You can be assured that no one ever goes hungry!

Our neighbors G & E were the hosts because they probably have the best place for entertaining a group, so we all converged there at about 3 p.m. We brought an appetizer (Luisa's Slow Bowl Chili Dip) and a soup (Jerry's Mexican Turkey Soup).

Our host had a new All Clad Slow Cooker with removable cooking insert, and he made Thomas Keller's (of French Laundry fame) Slow-Cooker Cassoulet. And was it ever yummy!

Here are some of the other appetizers:

A really great cheeseball and crackers:

A healthy veggie platter:

Little hot dogs in BBQ sauce:

Other soups included two kinds of chili (different and both delicious) and a slow cooked beef stew. The photos for those didn't turn out, so you will have to trust me that they were good!

By the time we had dessert, I was stuffed. But I didn't let that stop me - I sampled each and every dessert! No photos, though - sorry about that.

Last but not least was the wine. There were several white wines that we sampled. Bill and I brought a double magnum of 2002 Solaris Cabernet that we had been saving for a couple of years to have when there was a group to help drink it. And, yes, we did finish it all! Here is a photo of the bottle:

I am starting to sound like a broken record - off to Paso Robles to have another yard sale and clean out my folks' house.

But, there is light at the end of the tunnel because this time we are going to finally sell the furniture and completely clear out the house so we can paint and put it up for sale.

Hopefully, the car will sell too.

My sister and I have been at this for several years - our Mom died in August 2005 and our Dad a year later. So, we are anxious to finish the project, but we are sad too because it is truly the end of an era.

I hope to be able to blog from there, but if I don't, I will check in when I get home next Tuesday.

Sorry that I missed a few days posting while I was out of town. I thought I would be able to keep up with my blog, but there were just not enough hours in the day. Plus the fact that we sold the computer at a yard sale, so I couldn't get online after a day or so.

Anyway, I am back and will begin my regular posts tomorrow. Thank you all for sticking around!

Memorial Day is a time to pay tribute to our men and women in the armed serices, who risk their lives on a daily basis to protect our country's safety. I know it is supposed to be service people who died in the service of their country, but I am saluting them all, living or dead.

My Dad was one of those men, a proud Marine through and through. He never went out of the house without his Marine cap on.

Earl Gillians was his name, and he was actually my step-dad but more of a father to me than my birth father. He joined the Marines in 1940 - I am told he lied about his age because he wasn't old enough to join.

Earl was present at both the bombing of Pearl Harbor on 12/7/41 and at the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima on 2/23/45.

Earl and his Marine compatriots were in their tents at Pearl Harbor when the attack began, and he always said that the Japanese planes were so low, they could see the whites of the pilots' eyes. Pretty scary!

In my research, I came across this website which shows some original Pearl Harbor photos, as the attack was happening.

One of the most famous military photos of WWII (or maybe most famous of all time) was the Raising the flag on Iwo Jima. The photographer won a Pulitzer Prize for his photo, and it was the basis for the USMC War Memorial statue at Arlington National Cemetery.

Photo by Joe Rosenthal - Associated Press

So, on this Memorial Day, I salute my Dad and all of the soldiers who came before and after him. Thank you all!

Longtime friends are a particular joy. They know your history, and they still like you! What could be better?

My friend Hap Trout was such a friend. We met in Palm Springs in 1962 - I worked at the local newspaper (Desert Sun) and he worked at the local radio station next door (KDES). We covered some of the same events, so we got to know each other pretty well.

Here is one of those events - President John Kennedy was visiting the desert, and there was a press party attended by Pierre Salinger, the White House press secretary. And, yes, that IS me. I was about 20 at the time.

Hap wasn't his real name - he was officially Raymond Martin Trout. Part Indian, he always told everyone. He even named one of his sons Brook. He was born in Perth Amboy, NJ and attended schools there, where he was an excellent athlete. After college he joined the Air Force and was assigned to the Armed Forces Radio Service, where he worked on entertaining the troops stationed abroad. He used this broadcast experience to get work when his military service was over, and one of his first jobs was in Palm Springs, where I met him. He was the news director for KDES there and interviewed many celebrities. He was really proud of all of the autographed photos he got from those he interviewed. After his Palm Springs years, he worked at KCBQ in San Diego and at KFRC in San Francisco as general manager.

In the early 70's he moved from broadcasting to bar owner when he acquired a cocktail lounge in the Pasadena, CA area (I think it was called The Office). Then came a western roadhouse called Hap's O.K. Corral in the San Fernando Valley, CA and finally a restaurant called Crossroads in the World Trade Center in downtown Los Angeles. I did the accounting for the first two bars, so we stayed in touch.

In about 1990 he retired and moved to Grants Pass, Oregon with his wife Dawn. He continued his athletic pursuits as a member of a senior softball team, the Rogue River Relics.

An imposing figure at 6'4", Hap loved the spotlight. He was also very creative and wrote a weekly email newsletter and also "Cowboy poetry".

Thru the almost-50 years I knew him, I always sent him a birthday greeting of some kind. He got so used to getting those greetings that he got upset with me if I missed doing it. He would write and say, "Well, where is my birthday card?"

So, this is my birthday greeting today to my friend, Hap. He passed away in February (while taking a nap in his favorite chair), but I know he's watching to see if I will remember his special day.

This is my favorite photo of him back in the 60's.

Just back from Paso Robles (again) in the continuing saga of finally liquidating our folks' house and car. Even though it is a small thing, I feel like it was a major accomplishment. We finally sold the car!

It's a big car, and people are downsizing their cars rather than upsizing. So, it took just the right person to buy this car.

First of all, you have to understand that our folks just loved this car. It was their dream car, and they felt safe in it. And it was oh so comfortable. When our step-dad got ill and knew he wouldn't be driving it anymore, he wanted to know what we were going to do with it. So we kind of felt obligated to find it a good home with someone who would appreciate it like they did.

And it was kind of like serendipity (does that mean fate made it happen?). I put it back on Craigslist for the third time last Thursday, and I got a phone call Friday morning from a gal whose husband had the exact same car (1996 Lincoln Towncar). He had hit a deer the day before, and the insurance company had totaled the car. He was really depressed because he loved the car. So, they came to see it Sunday afternoon after we got to Paso Robles and both took it for a test drive. They were getting their insurance money the next morning, so we arranged to meet them at the DMV in San Luis Obispo (they were from Lompc) and took care of all of the paperwork.

The husband was SO happy to have a replacement for his beloved car. And, my sister and I were also happy that it had a new home where someone would really love and cherish it.

So, we are down to the last to-do on our Paso Robles list - sell the house. It is officially listed and being shown, so we shall see what happens. Maybe another serendipity?

It's going to be a stay-at-home holiday for us. I hate driving on holiday weekends, so we usually don't travel on most holidays.

But that doesn't mean we don't have any plans. We are having a neighborhood GTG this afternoon. Lots of good food and wine.

But, first things first. I hung my flag when I first got up.

Check back later - I will add to my post as the day progresses. I didn't want to make you wait until the day was over before I posted!

I am taking two salads to the GTG, both of which have been featured by our Sunday Salad Samplers group.

Black Bean Corn Salad was featured in week #2. I again added asparagus to the other veggies and used bell peppers in four colors. I also added some little tomatoes, a mini heirloom blend that TJ's had this week. Aren't they darling?

My second salad is this week's, which is one I chose, Blue Watermelon Salad. It is actually more like a fruit salad because it also has grapes, strawberries, and oranges in it.

We have these neighborhood GTG's every few months and, as usual, we did not go away hungry or thirsty. I didn't get a photo of the burgers and hot dogs, but take a look at:

Appetizers:

Salads:

These are my folks, Vi and Earl Gillians. This photo was taken many years ago (about 25) when they visited me in Cherry Valley for Christmas. That is the fireplace in my living room.

Earl was actually my step-father, but he was more of a Dad to me than my birth father. He and my Mom met where they worked in Riverside, CA, and they were married in 1964.

Vi and Earl moved to Paso Robles in the late 70's and lived there for more than 25 years. During the years they lived there, they saw a huge growth in population and the number of local wineries.

They both worked for the Paso Robles school district, Vi in the payroll accounting department and Earl as the head of maintenance at the PR high school. After they retired, Vi kept getting called back to the payroll department to help out, well into her 70's.

My sister JoAnne and I would always head to Paso for the Mid-State Fair in July-August. Our folks loved to have their "little girls" there. We ate way too much and talked and talked (drank some good wines too).

I have always loved Paso except in the summer when it gets to 100 degrees plus. My Mom, in particular, hated the heat. That is one reason they got a little vacation place in Pollack Pines, CA, where they could go to escape the heat. They loved it there.

Vi had the sharpest mind until the day she died at age 89. She attributed that to the fact that she did at least one crossword puzzle a day. She remembered lots of things that my sister and I could not - she was totally amazing.

But her body did not keep up with her mind at the end - she had open heart surgery at age 89 (just six weeks shy of her 90th birthday) and died after about a 10-day stay in the hospital on August 5, 2005.

Earl was pretty lost without Vi - she was the love of his life and the center of his world. He was diagnosed with lung cancer (a life-long smoker) and lived exactly one year longer. He died on August 5, 2006. We think he planned it that way because he kept asking his caregivers what the date was. I think it was a lovely romantic thing to happen, although Earl would pooh-pooh it if he were here.

So, today I am celebrating the lives of my folks, and I will drink a toast to them and to their amazing love.