My oldest son Edison, who is now sixteen, was invited to stay for a few days with a friend, whose parents live on a vineyard in Napa Valley.  We live in Los Angeles.  So I checked Amtrak, and found a not-too-circuitous route involving an Amtrak bus, a train, and another bus. It seemed like just the right kind of adventure for a 16 year-old. more

After our usual New Year’s Eve caviar dinner (It’s our decadent little tradition. Swanky, but domestic Great Lakes sturgeon for the boys, paddlefish for me and the husband) and our annual singing of Auld Lang Syne into several friends’ telephone answering machines (ukulele accompaniment, some fine guitar picking by our neighbor Doug, two-part harmony) while drinking copious amounts of Drusian Prosecco; after the blowing of horns, the toasting to health and happiness; after doing the first dishes and sleeping the first sleep of 2008, I woke up to make a pile of breakfast and a pot of coffee to ready my three boys for their road trip north. more