domicile

More on the Book

Since we got back from New York things have remained busy with the book, which is fabulous, though finding time for life and work is proving increasingly challenging.

We had an interview with a local TV station earlier this week (and another one planned for next week) on Studio 4 with Fanny Kieffer. I have to say, with a past as a media activist and an academic history with media studies it's a bit strange to be a part of the machine. That said, Fanny was a truly awesome interviewer. Either she truly does take the time to really get to know each of her subjects or she's got a killer assistant. Either way, her questions were by far the most thoughtful we've had to date. If you want to watch a clip on YouTube you can do so here. (Sidenote: Boy howdy do I ever sound like a west coaster...).

Lauren has also compiled a list of reviews of the book from bloggers and folks who have emailed us. While formal press is nothing to sneeze at, it's so great to receive personal reviews from people who have sought out and read the book (versus people whose job it is to review books). The reviews have been compiled on our site, if you're interested.

New Bag Love

In our house we've reached a point where we have almost too many reusable shopping bags. In this day and age when one acquires a new cloth shopping bag with every conference and gift with purchase promo it feels like reusable bags are in danger of becoming their own environmental menace. That said, of all the reusable bags we had, I didn't have any of the nice fold-up-really-small fit in your purse kind of variety. For ages now I've been meaning to make one, but when I saw the Flip and Tumble bags on Crunchy Chicken's website I folded and ordered two (one in pretty blue for me one manly black for Martin).

They arrived a few weeks ago and I'm totally smitten. I'll admit I'm totally suckered by the whole K-Way pocket approach (see a Quicktime video of the pocket in action here!) and my design snob self loves the monochromatic palette of the bag/handle combo. And, because it is as promised nice and small I've been keeping it in my bag since it arrived and using it all the time. I kept it in my purse in New York and it got plenty of use there, allowing me to not really need a bag for any purchases (until I went to Park Slope and blew my entire summer clothing budget in one afternoon, as those purchases would not fit in my lovely Flip and Tumble bag). Martin's also a fan of his svelt black/grey combo bag and has been putting it to regular use.

While I'm on the topic of Martin and reusable bags I do have to give one quick shout out to local reusable bag makers BYOB. Martin is a huge fan of their organic cotton deer bag, which he has termed "the stag bag". We use ours all the time for grocery trips, though it doesn't squash up small enough for me to carry it around all the time.

Veggie in New York

We have done some truly awesome veggie/vegan eating since we arrived in New York on Sunday night. Much of that has been thanks to the recommendations of friends (Felicia is a rock star in more ways than one), as well as general internet researching.We're still here for a few more days and I've got a few places on my list I'm hoping to get to, but so far here's my run down on veggie recommendations in New York, for those who are so inclined:

• Peep: (Soho, 177 Prince Street) We ended up at Peep thanks to our lovely hosts for the first part of our trip. Chris and Sara very kindly put us up in their Soho flat for three nights, and helped us find good food when we first arrived. Peep doesn't honestly have the scope of veggie thai options that many places I've been to have offered, but really that's just splitting hairs. The entire back half of their menu can be made with tofu and really I always order green curry with eggplant anyway, so why am I complaining? Peep also managed to fit our request for "good thai food, and flattering lighting". After a day of airports and planes lighting felt like it mattered. The tasty cocktails were a bonus too.
• Bread: (Nolita, 20 Spring Street) Felicia brought us to Bread, so I knew it would be a winner. Bread is not a veggie specific place (neither is Peep) but there were plenty of options to choose from. Predictably, Bread has awesome bread. They also have wickedly tasty tomato soup and a to die for mushroom polenta dish that Felicia implored me to ordered (and rightly so). This is the kind of place with very tasty gourmet paninis (on awesome bread) made with gourmet cheeses and tasty bits. There were plenty of meaty options at bread too, but as a veggie I definitely didn't feel left out. It's a very cute little room too, though Felicia warns of occasional drunk eurotrash. This would be the perfect spot to stop for a lunch break while shopping Soho or Nolita, and made for an excellent Monday night dinner.
• Candle 79: (154 East 79th @ Lexington) We ducked into Candle 79 (they also have a second locations called the Candle Cafe) after spending the morning at the Met. It was a recommendation from our client, who we met with the day before. I say ducked in as this was the day of the rain. All the food at both Candle Cafe's is entirely vegan and absolutely delicious. Truly stunning. Apparently seitan is their speciality. It was really hard not to order dessert.
• Brown: (Lower East Side, 61 Hester Street) Another recommendation from Felicia, though she couldn't join us, so we took our gracious hosts Chris and Sara with us. Brown is also not a veggie exclusive place (and if memory serves may be a bit tricky for vegans as they had a lot of local cheese in things), but was definitely tasty and offered several veggie choices. Their schtick is local food (most of it coming from the Hudson Valley) and organic beers and wines. Brown is a pretty tiny room (I'd say it seats 20) that reminded me very much of being in Europe. Simple decor, excellent light fixtures, high ceilings, white walls. The food was excellent and again turning down dessert was a bit painful.

Tonight we're off to Angelica's Kitchen, which a friend back home literally took my hands in hers while emploring me to visit. Fortunately I only had a small bowl of soup for lunch at Union station in DC this afternoon, so I may be able to squeeze in dessert tonight!

Busy, busy, busy

It turns out all this publishing a book business is rather enough to keep one occupied for days/weeks on end. Between various book related things, and book blog posting I feel like I've barely had time for domestic life, let alone time to blog about it.

Martin, on the other hand, is up to all kinds of housey stuff lately, but sadly he's hopeless at documenting it, and even worse at typing. So some of that will go unrecorded until I find the time to put it together.

Between making my living at the computer and all the book related computer time, I've been trying to spend most of my down time away from the computer. Martin and I have in fact recently taken up a semi-regular habit (say 2-3 times a week) of going to the community centre gym. I'm enjoying it more than I've enjoyed gym-like exercise in the past (I'm typically more of a dance class/yoga kind of exercise girl) and in a further twist of strangeness am actually really enjoying the treadmill. I was always the girl left out running around the track long after everyone else had gone back into the changeroom in P.E. class, so enjoying running is truly novel to me. There's just something about the total contrast between all the sitting and thinking of my normal life and clocking miles on the treadmill that is making me rather happy these days. I've also found that I most enjoy my time at the gym when I've got either comedy (hello hello David Cross!), audio books or language podcasts on my iPod. Today Lauren turned me on to the Stephen Fry podcast (or podgram as he calls them) and I can not recommend a better accompaniment for exercise if you, like me, enjoy a little wit and esoteric commentary with your treadmill time. (Having actually just typed that, I'm going to assume I may be among the very few who do in fact enjoy comedic musings on Victorian era aestheticism on the treadmill, but if you're one of the other few I dare say you'll thank me as you chuckle through cardio).

We're off to Seattle, New York and DC next week on a mini book tour of sorts. If anyone has ideas for recommending things to do, see and eat in New York in particular I'd love to hear it (we're in Seattle very briefly and in DC for not much longer). So far I've been taken by the hand and instructed to eat at Angelica's Kitchen and I've discovered a Seville connected vendor of handmade flamenco shoes that I must stop in on. All other recommendations for beautiful foods, lovely shops and must see locations are most welcome.