Saturday salutations

Today I went out foraging with one of my favorite people for a Sunday Supper of soul food. (More on that later.)

We drove with the windows down.

We listened to Ambulance LTD.

And we saw this guy at the farmers' market.

Then I came home and learned about the video/project below (thanks to the blue hour blog).

Really. You must watch.

It's from Yours Truly, a San Francisco-based group of creative people working together and bringing on the joy.

Yours Truly Presents: The Morning Benders "Excuses" from Yours Truly on Vimeo.

Looking up

Is that sky for real?

One sip at a time

This post is about not eating (or chewing, at least).

I've been feeling sluggish and blah lately, and I've had a big decision to contemplate. So on the advice of one of the photographers at work, I gave up solid food on Monday for a few days of meditation and juice.

My photographer friend is a nicer person than I, because while I initially thought about fasting for clarity on my own issue, he fasts when he wants to give energy and prayers to someone else. I've been trying to follow his lead and send out lots of love as well. I hope you can feel it.

Also this week, I've been watching a 1988 PBS series about Joseph Campbell and the Power of the Myth.

"If a person does not listen to the demands of his own spiritual and heart life and insists on a certain program...You're gonna have a schitzo crackup." -Joseph Campbell

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"I think it's important to live life with a knowledge of its mystery, and of your own mystery. It gives life a new zest, a new balance, a new harmony to do this." -Joseph Campbell

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"In saving yourself, you save the world. The vital person vitalizes...Find your own life and be alive." -Joseph Campbell

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Favorite sweet-spicy juice blend:

Carrot

Ginger

Kale

Apple

Combine in quantities to your liking, but hit it hard with ginger for lots of sass.

Day 6: The Furlough and a Fork World Tour

For my last day of eating ethnic food over furlough, I went with friends to The Smiling Elephant before heading down to 12th & Porter for the Bodhicitta Belly Dance show.

Tom Kha soup…

…and Pad Kee Mao with tofu.

Over dinner Ann asked about our most memorable food experiences. For all four of us, it involved meals in other countries, and most of us couldn't remember the actual food. It was more about the people and the experience -- a cave in Belgium for Emily, seaside towns in Italy for both Ann and me, and a dinner over a pan of paella in Spain for Liz.

Toward the end of our meal, the Smiling Elephant owner Sam Kopsombut, a tiny Thai man wearing a racing hat, stood over our table asking about the food. He was still kind of winded from cooking. The place had been packed, and “I do everything,” he said as he gestured like tossing noodles. He also told us that it had taken him three years to get the restaurant ready to open.

But I loved it most when I asked him about the religious relics at the register where we paid our tab to an American server dude. Mr. Kopsombut said The Monk brings luck.

American server dude: “When will it bring me some luck?”

Mr. Kopsombut: “When you wish…(long pause)...and work.”