We had a very nice weekend. Sabbath was quiet; it was quite cold so we did not leave the house. I had come up with an interesting idea for lunch: a half-and-half quiche. Barry likes mushrooms while I don’t, and I like broccoli while he doesn’t. So I made one quiche that was broccoli on one side and mushrooms on the other. The vegetables did a nice job of keeping to their own sides, so it worked, and we each had something we enjoyed.
Saturday night we headed up to a place called Watercolor Café in Larchmont (Westchester County). Leslie Pintchik, a jazz pianist, and her husband, bassist Scott Hardy, were performing. Neither Barry nor I had ever been particularly fond of jazz, but we “discovered” Leslie because she and her group would often play at Kavehaz, a long-since-closed club in Greenwich Village that we used to like for its amazing hot chocolate and its early (6:00 pm) music set. As we became familiar faces in the small crowd, we soon found ourselves chatting with Leslie and Scott during their breaks, which led to a friendship. Over the few years before my illness we had often been up in Sharon when they were performing in New York so we missed many of their performances. During this past year, they were in New York a number of times but despite our best intentions, when the time came, I was just too tired to go. So it was a particular pleasure to actually make it to Watercolor Café. We probably had in mind to stay for only one set but we just could not leave! Leslie and Scott now have a new drummer who was also excellent, and they played some new tunes that Leslie told us they will be recording this week for their next CD. Please check out her music and performance schedule at http://www.lesliepintchik.com/index.html.
The weather was not great on Sunday, and Barry was working against a grant application deadline, so we had a quiet day at home. But Monday afternoon, with the grant finally at the grants office awaiting its final push out the door and down to NIH, we decided to get out of the house for a bit, and went to see the new documentary “Koch” about the man who was Mayor of New York City from 1978-1989. We spent very little time in New York City during those years, and were certainly preoccupied raising our two little girls, so I don’t remember much of that period. But the documentary was excellent, and I felt that the filmmaker presented a fair and even-handed view of the mayor, with his strengths and weaknesses. New York was a very different city back then, with barely a glimmer of the relatively kind and gentle (even safe) place it is now.
Tuesday was a full day. In the morning I met with Anna (Heidi is on vacation). That went well; she gave me another “quiz” which I successfully completed this morning, along with some more specific advice on which Lumosity games to play. Barry went up to his office while I met with her. Then we had lunch at a small restaurant called U Café which is about a block away from the 92nd Street Y, where I attended my first music class. The instructor talked about Haydn, and we listened to and analyzed his 21st symphony, which is only about 10 minutes long and was originally written for just four instruments. I learned something that should have perhaps been obvious but I had never considered. The reason why many of these early pieces appear so repetitive is that the only way they could be heard was in live performance, so the composers used repetition to ensure that their tunes would be remembered. Sounds a little bit like the exercises I am doing to retrain my brain!
Not surprisingly, with one exception I was the youngest person in the class of 18 or so. Many of the people seemed to know each other; it was clear from their conversations that they had been in the instructors' class(es) previously. As I continue to gain strength I hope to be more comfortable socializing a bit.
By the time we arrived home I was pretty much beat, but something in the mail reminded me that I had not received my W2 form, and I had no recollection from last year of how to access it on-line. We were able to get through to the Pfizer Help folks and eventually managed to log in and download the form. Needless to say I added all the information to my list of computer accounts, because I will need it again next year and I do not expect to remember it.
Barry is teaching his class this morning, and I am here updating the blog. We have a pile of “homework” related to our efforts to put our paperwork and finances in order that we hope to begin to tackle this afternoon. Tomorrow we will be heading up to Sharon for the weekend. It works out well that Barry can get away early because they are predicting possible snow for Friday, and it is not fun to drive in that. We haven’t seen the children in two weeks and we have a lot of plans with family and friends for the weekend so it would be a shame not to make it up there.
Meanwhile I am continuing to play with my new toy aka smart phone. I’m cautiously optimistic that eventually I will learn how to use it. Then I might be willing to start giving out the number! But then I will need to figure out how not to become addicted to it.
Stay warm and dry, and please do keep in touch!
Love,
Rebecca
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