Dirty Laundry

Sparing No Expense

So, since BEAT THE BAND is coming out on September 14th—which is just 52 short days away—I thought I’d start some heavy duty promotion. You can see my first shameless plug in the picture below. It was fairly pricey to hire the plane out and all but I think the few minutes the good people of NYC got to see my message will translate directly into mega book sales. Of course, it might have been smart to tip people off as to what “Beat the Band” was supposed to mean, but what can you do.

After my wonderful visit to the Burial Park last week I decided it would be a good idea to lose a bit of weight. Just, because, you know, all the pastry eating that goes along with being a writer (an occupational hazard, I’m afraid) has taken it’s toll on my waistline. Plus, I need to fit in the suit I purchased eight years ago so that I can wear it to my step-son’s wedding in September. You might not know this about me (or maybe you do, but I’ll assume the former) but I REALLY love my food. A really good tasting menu dinner with great wine is probably in my top five best things to do of all time. In fact, if I ever find out the exact date I’m going to vacate this lovely planet of ours, I would seriously consider flying to London and going to Gordon Ramsey’s wildly-overpriced-but-amazingly-worth-it restaurant for my final meal.

The other four best things of all time? Well, I’ll probably get around to telling you at some point or other.

Of course, now watching my food so that I can shed my winter coat has taken precedence over eating truly fabulous food. But that’s not to say I’m not cooking some good meals. In fact, I made probably the best eggplant parmesan that has ever been tasted by human (and dog, because Scooter demanded his share) lips. I could be all modest and say that it was just simply tasty. But I’m not going to do that because it wouldn’t be true. I made my own tomato sauce and carefully sliced the eggplant into thick slices (a secret I learned from my friend at Zambri’s Restaurant - the best Italian in Victoria by a Canadian mile) and breaded and fried the pieces. I layered it all carefully with parmesan and mozzarella cheese and baked the hell out of it until the top was crispy-licious! I wish I had a way of sharing it with all of you because you would have been impressed.

What else? Let’s see. I’m still in love with my iPad. So many great apps to play… I mean… work with. If you haven’t bought one yet, you should.

Going through serious hockey withdrawal. It always hits mid-July. But luckily I’m waist-deep into Book Three of my Swim the Fly Trilogy. I’m not sure I should call it The Swim the Fly Trilogy but I don’t have a better name for it right now, so we’re stuck with that.

I guess that’s about it for now. Oh, yeah, I’m reading THE PASSAGE by Justin Cronin. It’s a big long fat book but really well done. It’s vampires after the apocalypse but that doesn’t do justice to it at all. I’ll recommend it right now even though I’m only half through, just because the writing is so good. It’s scary vampires. The way they were always meant to be.

Posted by Don Calame on 7.24.10 at 02:43 pm in Prattlings. (1) Comments