Miss Laura gets a new life: a bouquet
Today, you may have heard, is the first day of the rest of your life. Forgive the cliche, but every now and again a cliche lines up with actual events. So it does today, Friday, May 1, 2009, which is the final day of the remarkable Miss Laura’s remarkable 24-year career in the trenches (another cliche, but what the heck) of the daily journalism racket.
Farewell to all that. Baby, let the good times roll.
First, a glorious bouquet, which you see above. It’s called “Bouquet of Flowers on a Ledge,” probably because it’s a bouquet and it’s sitting on a ledge. The Dutch artist Ambrosius Bosschaert — they just don’t make names like that any more — painted it in 1619, and it now resides in the Los Angeles County Museum. But not, I imagine, on a ledge.
My next task is to whisk her out of town for a weekend on the Olympic Peninsula in the company of oysters, bubbly, martinis and a select company of relatives who appreciate the generous charms of the oyster (raw and baked), the bubbly (foreign and domestic) and the martini (dirty, with four olives). The children will be along, of course. But that’s what relatives are for, isn’t it? — watching the kids when you need them watched?
Then, beginning Monday, it will be incumbent on me (an odd turn of phrase, but there you have it) to introduce her to my wandering route of coffee houses, especially those with free wireless connections. Who says you can’t work and drink at the same time?
Not that it’s all going to be work. Miss Laura’s friend Beth, who lives in the neighborhood just up the hill, also leaves gainful employment on this sanctified day (shall we call it Good Friday?), and I suspect escapades in the offing. Perhaps with coffee. Perhaps with bubbly. Perhaps with gardens, or a good brisk walk in the coming summer sun.
Note to wife: Go ahead. Sleep in Monday morning. I’ll get the kids off to school. Then, maybe, Helser’s or J&M or Grand Central?
With or without the morning paper.
May 1st, 2009 at 3:35 pm
Laura, Congratulations! Enjoy and prosper. All that should be out on the ledge are the flowers of Mr. Ambrosius Bosschaert.
May 1st, 2009 at 3:57 pm
And I add mine to MTC’s, as well as an invitation in the very near future for more martinis and possibly more oysters and definitely other comestibles chez moi. My daughter, when very small, called tulips, charmingly, trueloves. Bob’s bouquet, and Mr. Ambrosius Bosschaert’s, are it seems to me an illustration of the concept.
May 1st, 2009 at 7:52 pm
OK, you can skip the morning paper, but you WILL have to check in on Portland Arts Watch!
May 1st, 2009 at 9:32 pm
What a lovely valentine, Bob. You’re a prince. Congrats, Laura!
May 3rd, 2009 at 8:47 am
I’m looking forward to hearing about new adventures and new coffee houses and how the oysters and champagne were!
May 3rd, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Best wishes! And I hoped you enjoyed your get away weekend — sounds perfect!
May 3rd, 2009 at 7:24 pm
OK, I read the way above quickly as I was madly trying to finish work and move on to oysters, bubbly and martinis, and I couldn’t reread it because my eyes were, um, puddly, and then I shut down my workhorse computer for the last time and drove out of town where there’s no wireless and then I sped back down I-5 to all these lovely comments, but I can’t reread them because my eyes are all, um, puddly. Thank you for all the good wishes. And thank you to the sweetest slacker husband a slacker wife ever had. The perils of not having a broad career portfolio in the family. OH MY GA!
May 4th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
Congrats you two. Of course, I’m a practical geek. Be aware that the Hood Canal Bridge is closed for six weeks. Might be tailgating those oysters and the chamapagne in Suquamish. Gottal go up 101 and not the 16. Tell me they are kumomoto oysters. - M
May 4th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
Michael! You still can’t resist the breaking news gig. Gotta love that. We take 101. And we take our oysters baked.