Sunday, April 6, 2008

Dancing. And eating

This weekend was no riding, but I did do some dancing at the Arcata Folk Festival. We drove up on Friday and arrived in time to do some wine tasting with friends from DC, Len and Lisa. Their participation in the every other year festival is the main reason I go. They are really good friends who I miss a lot.
We went to a wine shop on the square in Arcata and had two "flights" of three wines each. Jerry and I shared two flights and Len and Lisa shared two. One set consisted of inexpensive Italian wines, and honestly, the three of us didn't like any of them. The other three were expensive California wine, and each was better than the one before. They were out of our price range, so it was nice, for not much money, to be able to taste them.

We then went to the dance, most of which was at least for me, not that wonderful because I'm pretty spoiled by really good ethnic music from my time back east. But, one band, Zabava, from the SF area played a wonderful set of Macedonian tunes and I really put my knee to the test. I'm happy to say it held up beautifully. That set, and their set on Saturday night were the highlights of the festival for me.

A dinner was sold at the event Saturday, and I had high expectations. The chef for West Coast Balkan camp was making a chicken and apricot tagine. I'm sad to say that it was pretty tasteless and boring. I think perhaps even some salt could have salvaged it. It was edible, but I really did expect better.

Breakfast today was on the road in Willits at around noon or one. I had a really good scramble with spinach, portobello mushroom, onion, tomatoes and some cheddar. I was pleased they didn't overload it with cheese. I had considered asking them to leave out the cheese, but I had already asked to 86 the green peppers, and didn't want to seem too demanding. But the amount of cheese was perfect. And, they served Thanksgiving Coffee, Mendocino County's finest.

The weekend was punctuated with empty calories from store-bought baked goods. What possessed me to eat them is a mystery.

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