Sounds fun (Palm Springs). I'm in New Jersey. Flew here today for my grandmother's funeral. She passed away last week, at 105 y/o. Her life was very full and long, her last year had been in a sort of gently fading twilight, and her death was, it seems, pretty peaceful and painless, at home with no tubes or machines. So her passing was as gentle as it should have been. Life was kind to her, and at the end no less. Laying on the couch, lights off, thinking about this house and the things left over from fifty years of being my grandparents' home. There are photographs, my grandfather's calligraphy scrolls, my grandmother's needlepoint art. Those will be taken, I suppose many have already been over the past couple of years. Then there is the random daily stuff that has no value, but that I recognize from fifty years of visiting and sometimes living here. Old toys and books, dishes, things like that. I suppose it will all be disposed of, except for a few bits that people might take for sentimental reasons. Then the house will be sold, as a fixer because it needs a total remodel, although in a nice neighborhood with a good sized lot. And that may, I think, be it for New Jersey, for me. My aunt and uncle and one first cousin live here, but without my grandparents, my connection to this place, a place I never liked much, will be done. I think I'm going to cook dinner tomorrow at my aunt's. She has a nice Bluestar range and that is where most of the family will be. Her daughter, my other first cousin, is flying in tomorrow. She lives in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia where her husband works for the United Nations. I don't think they like it as much as Switzerland, where they lived for the last several years. But the UN HCR (High Commission For Refugees) moves its senior staff around every several years. They don't get permanent cushy posts in comfortable cities; they have to go where the refugees are, so Ethiopia was, I think, better than some places they might have ended up. There isn't much scope for home cooking as an expat in Addis Ababa, I'm told. Especially with young kids who are adapting from their previous Franco-Swiss diet (and life). So I figure she might like a dinner at home, at her mom's home anyway. Menu undecided but I'm thinking about chicken marbela. I also have a hankering for ceviche. They may not go together, but tough. Otherwise, no interesting cooking recently. I have spent the last month on back to back to back business trips. So I've been eating like crap - airport food, hotel food, restaurant food. Occasionally a good ramen or other street food in New York, but mostly crap. As the weeks of this have dragged on, and I've gotten fatter and flabbier, I've started skipping restaurants altogether and going to grocery stores and delis to get "healthy" things to eat. So my diet has mostly dwindled to Greek yoghurt, canned sardines and tuna, bread and cheese, fruit, takeout sushi, and coffee. It's not a bad diet but there isn't much cooking or variety involved. Although I have discovered that canned tuna plus Greek yoghurt plus a little salt or soy sauce makes a creditable and oh-so-healthy tuna salad. And that chopped raw salmon, Greek yoghurt, and one of those super-miniature bottles of hot sauce that you can filch from restaurants makes a reasonable spicy salmon filling. When I get home on Monday, I don't have another trip on the calendar for months. I'm going to cook up a storm, enjoy being home on weekends, re-acquaint myself with bicycling everywhere, lose this travel flab, and appreciate springtime in Portland.

Getting to a chore that I have put off too many years. Hope to finish it this next month. Finishing a tablecloth for a classmate of my son's. He found it partially done in his mother's house when he cleaned up after he death. It has proven to be a far more daunting task than I thought it would be, and my trepidation has led me to put it away too many times.

Still clear skies, mostly, but getting colder. The leaves are mostly down. I'm getting out the winter clothes and wrapping the backyard up for another Oregon rainy season. We are hoping for snow this year, after four years with hardly a trace. My son wants to build a microscope this weekend, so we'll do that. My daughter may want to go to the darkroom. I want to take one early morning and go for a bike ride. I might go explore some of the steep windy roads in the West Hill that lead to the zoo. Or just do laps up my local hill, less scenic but a more efficient workout. Sometimes I wear a heart rate monitor on these rides. Afterwards I can look at the data and see how my heart rate spiked when the road turned upwards or when the speed rose. The rule of thumb is that your maximum heart rate is 220 minus your age. I think that is bunkum, or at least that it varies so much between individuals that it is no rule at all. I have gotten my heart rate up to 200 beats/ minute, only for a few seconds, but those were exhilarating seconds. On a pretty routine basis, I ride at 170 bpm which is 85% of my max heart rate, or a. "submaximal" heart rate. There is a whole science of training by heart rate - you are supposed to spend X time at 80%+ of max, Y time at 60%, and so on. I don't pay attention to that. I just like to get up to 170 bpm frequently and see if anything untoward happens. It is kind of my personal security blanket. There is another test you can do, which is a little more useful. You get your heart rate up to 150 bpm or so, which might mean a few minutes of jumping jacks or chopping wood or running fast. Then stop, sit down, and see how long it takes for your heart rate to settle down to 100 bpm. It should only take one or two minutes. If your heart continues to beat at a high rate for much longer, that is a worrisome sign. This is called "recovery heart rate". Finally, there is "resting pulse". The true resting pulse is taken when you are laying down and completely relaxed. In the morning, right after waking up, is a good time. Some people have a high resting pulse, some a lower one. The interesting thing is how it changes. If you get serious about exercise, you can lower your resting pulse quite dramatically. That is a sign that your heart has become more efficient, which is a good thing. I've been thinking a lot about getting older. My kids are only teenagers, and I'm fifty. I don't know when they will have kids. When I have grandchildren, I want to take them riding and skiing and fishing. That means I will have to be strong and athletic into my seventies. Gulp. My dad had a heart attack in his mid seventies. My neighbor is seventy-five and has CHF and PAH. I've got a lot of work to do, anyway that is how it feels, so I get on the bike every day and push until it hurts. It actually is kind of pleasant to hurt. I think I've learned a little about masochism. But I digress. What were we talking about? Cooking. I'm going to go through my Momofuku cookbook and make some Asian comfort food. Daughter is getting interested in sushi so we'll make some basic rolls. Son is a big ramen fan, we'll roast some pork and leeks and make a big hot bowlful. I'll make some meals for my neighbor with the health problems. And I think I will try baking bread again. I was on a low-carb kick this summer, but it turns out I need some carbs. Carbs = glycogen. Glycogen = muscle energy for efforts longer than a few minutes. No carbs = weak muscles. Doesn't work for me.

I imagine it will be pretty quiet here - DH has the flu. Need to get a load of groceries as we're out of many things. Probably will cook up some soup or chili, read, putter around. Tomorrow there is a free movie at the library - His Girl Friday, but unless DH feels a whole lot better we'll probably skip it. We have the DVD but it's so much more fun to see a movie with others. Plus free popcorn and a lecture about the movie and its making. They do this every month so if we don't make this one, there will be others.