Well Fall is quickly approaching which gives one pause to consider summer, but we are attempting to delay fall as long as possible! Getting away for labor day weekend, one of the last attempts before the craziness of the school year starts with my job. Nearing the cusp of fall this summer has been great. We saw tons of great bands, visit friends old and new, and just enjoy each others company. I find it hard to pick one event as the end all of the summer, be it 3 hour walks at the beach in Maine, finding out our friend sally is having twins, the 12 hour road trip or seeing my always favorite Kirsten Hersh and the great Matisyahu.  What I think personally I will remember about this summer is being able to spend quality time with Kathy. Taking a lot of fridays off, it was nice to just have lots of weekend to spend with my wife. One does ever appreciate the time one can spend with someone you truly care about. It makes you realize just how great some people in your life are and how some surprise you daily in just how amazing they are.

We just got back from a nice weekend at the Cape. My Aunt rents out a little cottage by a private beach in South Dennisport, and she was nice enough to let us stay for the weekend.
The beach nearby was small and sea-weed covered, but it was nice to hear the ocean when we opened up the windows to the cottage to sleep at night!

The first night we were there we hung out in Hyannis-about 20 minutes south of Dennisport. We had some sandwiches at a little Italian cafe and then headed over to the Cape Cod melody tent to see yet another concert–this time Susan Tedeschi.

The Cape Cod melody tent is indeed a tent. It’s a relatively small arena so no matter where you sat you felt close to the stage–and the stage rotated!

She put on an absolutely amazing show. Her backup band consisted of a kickass saxophonist, keyboard player, and drummer. She was very sweet and humble about herself in between songs, but boy, that woman can belt it out! The one unfortunate part about the event was we had the misfortune of sitting in front of a VERY loud, very obnoxious drunk couple who talked through the whole show. They kept making comments about how bad Susan’s butt looked in her jeans (which it didn’t look bad! They just couldn’t find anything better to do). And whenever she sang a slower song, they blabbered on about how they couldn’t stand her slower songs. I wanted to turn around and deck them one, but they seemed like the kind of obnoxious people who would just talk louder if you asked them to shut up. So Chris and I moved outside where we could still hear and see Susan, and we enjoyed the rest of the show much better that way. (I hope those 2 drunkards get what they deserve one day!)

Day 2 of our stay we went to visit our good friends Sally and Shaari, who recently moved to Sandwich, MA from Northampton. It was great to visit with them, their new house was gorgeous and we had a nice time chatting and hanging out. We played frisbee with their adorable black lab, Dixie, went out to lunch and relaxed on a beach in town. We also found out the exciting news that they are expecting-gulp-twins!!

The rest of our day was spent playing rummy out on the front porch of the cottage (I totally kicked Chris in the butt with that game!), walking by the shore and eating out (mostly). We had some okay meals–Royal Pizza had decent pizza and Cafe El Dolce had nice sanwiches. The Sundae School had the best ice cream, and Woolfies bakery had nice blueberry iced coffee and cinnamon twists. Sunday morning we ate at the Breakfast Room, which was mediocre. The raspberry french toast I ordered looked like it was covered in pepto bismol–and kind of had that consistency too. Oh well, you can’t win em all…

We saw a lot of cool places to look at for next time we go.
It was only a short stay at the Cape but we had such a good time we’re hoping to go back later in the fall or earlier next summer. Gotta love being by the ocean!

Today is a sad, sad day for the donut empire. Chris and I have just found out that the GREATEST donut shop in Orlando, and in THE WORLD, just closed its doors. Yes, folks, Hotties Donuts is officially closed.

You may be wondering why 2 healthy vegetarians would be so upset over something which seems so opposite their lifestyle. Aren’t donuts the devil? Well, if you come to this conclusion then you must not have tasted the aforementioned donut!

We discovered said donuts on a (long, healthy) walk to a (healthy, vegetarian) Indian restaurant which we loved to eat at in Orlando. We spotted the (fattening, unhealthy) donut shop across the way on our walk back.
We looked inside the window and found that a. Hotties does not, nor has ever used trans fats or animal-derived fats in their baking., and b. There were a lot of unique flavors to try. So we agreed that, since we had walked for over an hour, it wouldn’t hurt us too much to try just one. So we asked for a chocolate donut with peanut butter in the middle. When we sat down and bit into it, we realized what insane things people might do for such goodness.

So we took to walking to Hotties donuts nearly every other day in the Florida, oftentimes forgetting about the Indian restaurant across the way. We tried mint-chocolate donuts, orange-glazed donuts, and Boston creme donuts that would make Dunkin Donuts hang themselves by a noose in defeat.

I am certain grown men have wept when biting into a Hotties Donut. I was certain that I’d have pregnancy cravings of pickles covered in a Hotties cinnamon-glazed. Hotties wasn’t just a donut shop, it was a sensation. It put Krispy Kremes around the world to shame.

Now that I hear of the news I’m not sure what we’ll do. When we take our next trip to Florida, what will be our motivating factor for those scorching, long walks? (You see, Hotties did actually motivate us to walk more, so therefore it essentially was good for us….kinda…) It’s sad that we’ll never bite into a peanut-butter chocolate again. Hotties, we’ll try to carry on without ya, but it’ll be hard….it’ll be hard….

Today I had a patient who just returned from a 2-year military stay in Iraq (“this time it wasn’t my choice to go over there”, he told me). He presented with severe decay and advanced periodontal disease. He was so frustrated with the quality of dental care in the military, and it made me upset to hear it. He still paid his insurance premiums every month, only to receive the absolute bare minimum of care. He got no regular cleanings, and if decay was spotted on a tooth, even if it was a small and easy to restore spot, teeth were just extracted there. He did not want to lose teeth so he refused to have them deal with the decay. So he is now dealing with some major restorative work that could’ve easily been prevented.

I know we talked about healthcare in a previous post. But this outrages me, and it’s frustrating that, in all aspects of healthcare for military personell, this case is not surprising. Not only is there a nationwide healthcare provision deficit, but the lack of healthcare provided for our military-in and of active duty-is simply atrocious. Injured vets are paying out of pocket and/or yet to recieve care for benefits promised to them from the army? When all the troops come home (I should say “if” the troops come home), this problem will only magnify tenfold and increase mistrust in our government (trust and government no longer go hand in hand). I’m not an apple pie and Ford kind of American, but doesn’t this just seem unpatriotic?

A few months ago we got the Condo appraised and it was suggested that we just do minor touchups. Well it is summer and with the prospect of finding a house anytime soon being as likely as me running for pope, I have done little in the way of those “touchups”. The weather is just way too nice and the weekends too short to spend them painting, scraping, or replacing items besides the fall is much better weather wise for that type of stuff.

So I have been obsessing of late with replacing the flooring on our second floor (sans the bathroom which I already did) mainly due to the carpet we have. I freely admit it was home depot special carpet we bought right after some water damage to replace the horrible stuff that was already there. At the time we needed something ASAP and with kathy in college, whoever could put it in quickest won. The carpet is starting to show it’s age and the installers did less than a good job putting it in. I could attempt to re-stretch it but risk opening some of the seams even more.

So my obsession with what type of flooring to replace the carpet with started. Looking online, all the big box stores, a couple local places, and in CT didn’t really help that much. There are a ton of choices and the ever important cost/value/comfort/environment factor. With Kathy’s allergies too, it becomes a big factor in what to get to minimize any chance of the flooring making them worse.

Well last night at 11pm or so I took the plunge and ordered some solid bamboo flooring from a place in CT, decided that I had to end the obsession. Might as well take the plunge and do the hallway, closet, and stairs and order the bedrooms next week or so. I would have loved to get Teragren which every professional found thought it was good (it is in the dental office Kathy works with too) but given that we are going to be in the condo for not much longer it made no sense (it is pricey). I am thinking of this as good practice for putting in a solid hardwood floor which I have only done once before.

So my obsession hopeful has ended for the time being, now the fun part will begin soon, ripping stuff apart.

Read again they may be making a movie based on Voltron, how cool would that be. Seems this time it might actually happen.

http://www.Etsy.com–a huge portal where people hawk their homemade artwork! (Leah should do this!).

Blonde Redhead’s new album, “23”–I’ve just fallen in love with this group, but I’m learning that they’ve been around for a while. A Japanese art student meets Italian twin brothers and forms a band–the rest is magic. They are like the Lush of the new millenium. Check out their myspace page and listen to the title track, it’s fantastic: http://www.myspace.com/blonderedhead

The BBC show, “Coupling”. Thanks to Netflix new “watch it now” feature, we’ve been able to watch this show that our friend Bruno has been raving about. It’s like the naughtier version of Friends, and even funnier.

Yoko Ono, “Yes, I’m a Witch”. I take back anything bad I ever though about Yoko Ono. Sure, she’s a wee bit out there and some of her older “Plastic Ono” stuff is a little TOO avante-garde for my taste, but that’s just Yoko. She is a real artist, and she’s been recently growing on me. I just discovered this new album of hers in which she collaborates new versions of her songs with other artists–she is still featured in all of the songs. Hearing her sing “Revelations” with Cat Power and “Kiss Kiss” with Peaches makes it worth listening to the entire album.

yay!

These are just funny quotes we’ve heard from various people over the past few months, we thought we’d share them.

“I hope he at least had a nice body”.- 64 year old patient commenting on a recent “streaker” in downtown Brattleboro.”

“Every time you call me a girl’s name, I die a little inside”-Zach Braff , “JD” from Scrubs.

From a French lesbian we met at a concert describing breasts “Just a handful is good for me. Anything more than a handful, I don’t know what to do with all the extra.”

“Idiots are fun, no wonder every village wants one”-Hugh Laurie, “House”

“These deatheaters can move about as fast as Severus Snape when confronted with shampoo”–Fred from Harry Potter’s The Deathly Hallows

“Get your hands off my daughter, you bitch!”, Mrs. Weasly defending her daughter in The Deathly Hallows

“I’m so gay that I was the one sperm that cried “No! No! Don’t make me go into that scary cave!!”-from BBC’s Coupling

“When you go stalking animals at night with a flashlight at a campground, I call it “Night Elking”; of course if you find a dangerous one you are screwed, you can’t shine it do death”–rambling from one of Chris’ online friends

“No one ever said Facism would be easy”-a patient, in response to the current Bush regime

“Giving people flowers actually isn’t all that nice a thing. It’s like saying, “Here…now watch these die”-Demetri Martin

“Cirque du Soleil is like heroin for old people”-Patton Oswalt

“Cheese is the devil’s plaything”-Hugh Laurie, “House”

“We are the sharpshooters, flock of parachuters, necessary voodoo”.-Bjork, Earth Intruders

“That woman needs a brain enema”-saying overheard by someone observing another woman wearing a strange fur coat