Check It Nice

For the past four days I've been in working phase of my working vacation painting in the Redlands.  Like much of California (that I've been to), it's a easy going nice scenic place.  When I first pulled in to town I thought to myself, oh, just another suburb.  But after peeling back my quick to judge assumption, I've grown to find the area more than pleasant.  It's not just pleasant due to the majestic work of plate tectonics, but because of what I assume are progressive zoning controls.  I haven't read the code, but the ample amount of strip mall chain stores here don't have the sterile anywhere USA feel that most suburbs do.  There is no clutter of erected signs reaching for the sky as well as your attention and the landscaping is abundant.  Unlike every commercial site I've designed as a professional planner where parking lot design came in at the beginning of the process, it is apparent that here landscaping and aesthetics are considered early on.  While designing all of my sites it was common to factor in the planted landscaping requirements towards the end of the design process whereas planted landscaping in this community is clearly a priority.  Although this area sees to lack local recreation (only relying on this from my minimal exposure to the city), if I end up in the design field of planning again I would love to work in a city with controls like this. It feels more like designing for the people instead of designing for the money.

Anyway.....I didn't intend to write much in this blog, especially about issues of urban planning.  I'm sure I could write a more insightful and lengthy blog about this subject but at the end of each day of painting I'm too lazy to exercise my brain too much.

This brings me to what I intended to be the short topic of this post.  Although I've haven't had the energy to muster up a blog post, I have been keeping up with the ones I follow.  And I recommend that you follow them too, check em out, peruse and enjoy.  I should note that if you like my friend Matt's blog, he also writes for a local online newspaper.  His articles there are equally entertaining.

This wore me out!  Going to bed....

Today, you will eat at SpiritLand Bistro....

These are the words my host in Santa Barbara says to me as he leans in inches from my face.  I actually couldn't understand what he was saying partly because he has a slurred annunciation of some words but also because he invited himself right in to my private space and never closed his lips while he was telling this to me - this was a distraction.  He kept raving about the restaurant but the more he talked the less I heard as I tried to get comfortable with the vicinity of his face to mine all the while wondering how to kindly back away without being rude.  I'm at least a foot and half taller than him so not only is he close but he's forcing his mug up to mine.  Finally I say to him I'm running late for a yoga class I had planned on taking and then instantly there was release and relief from his magnetic face and I'm no longer breathing his breath.  He then tells me he's never been there before but I should try it....WHAT!  All that and he's never even been there himself.  This guy cracks me up with every encounter (our first was him giving me the tour of my place and then he immediately and seamlessly went on to tell me how great the nude beaches were here 20 years ago). 

Well, off I went downtown not thinking much about the restaurant but how interesting our exchange was.  I thought to myself I'll try to find the place before I leave but I'm in no rush to eat out as I am preparing all my my meals here in the kitchen (via Trader Joes frozen department and the Farmers Market).

As it turns out my host must have some special diva gnome powers because I took a different route home from the studio and walked right to the SpiritLand Cafe.  I wasn't really that hungry but figured I should just go with this serendipitous situation.  And I'm glad I did.

The place was cozy and the service was extremely polite and friendly.  The focus of this restaurant is not only organic but the healthy properties of the food/dishes.  There are meat, vegetarian, vegan and raw selections.  I was there during lunch so I grabbed a lunch box to go and took it to eat in the secret garden that is my yard.  I chose the Curry Delight box and was not disappointed:  roasted yam, tempeh, seasonal vegetables and Thai curry sauce. A+

If you're ever in Santa Barbara I highly recommend this place...and I have been there!

http://www.spiritlandbistro.com/

Groom Of The Stool

As a painter/handyman I mostly work alone leaving me to the entertainment and sometimes displeasure of my own thoughts.  The intention of this blog is to provide an outlet for all the vast random thoughts that knock around in my head while working all day, and to write about all things food related and urban planning/policy (and sometimes policy that effects food). 

For the most part I like this type of work (handyman) - I'm my own boss, I hire my friends and there is a satisfying immediate sense of accomplishment when the job is done.  However, I still consider myself an Urban Planner and when people ask what I do I stumble around trying to explain that I'm a laid off Urban Planner who is back in school for my Masters and I work as a handyman for a temporary form of income.  It's time's like these, and the times when I cannot escape my head, that the work feels like a drag.  Like I'm torturing myself and wasting my education and intelligence....am I dong the right thing going back to school?

Then I start to think of the Groom of the Stool. The Groom of the Stool in short is an appointed position to wipe the excrement  from the rear end of royalty...yes...this is for real.  When I first heard of this I couldn't help but question what type of person had this job. Was it a punishment, was it something that you aspire to do and apply for?  Royalty, you never cease to amaze me with conceit and traditions.  However, it turns out that the Groom of the Stool is the most intimate person to the King and is witness to the Kings secrets and privileged information.  Thus this man becomes feared and powerful.  Eventually, throughout the decades, the position of Groom of the Stool transformed itself in to a high level government positions in finance and matters of the state.

This leads me to think...people who have held literally one of the crappiest jobs in history have gone on to be powerful and successful.  Not that I want power, but it does make my job seem less crappy and I re-focus on my passion for my studies and the personal success that will follow.  I know one day explaining what I do won't be such a bumbled ramble.

Groom of the Stool fact in history:  Groom of the Stool Sir Henry Norris apparently got a little too intimate with the rear of King Henry's second wife and was beheaded for adultery.