2023 – Go West Old Gal – 2.2 – Napa

Saturday, July 8, 2023, still in Napa, I’m busy selling another cruise.  Business is sure good while I am away.  Keeps me from drinking too much wine, I guess.  Speaking of cruises, I am finally getting to sail on SilverSea in 2024, barring another disaster like COVID, which claimed my first SilverSea assignment.  This one will be September 12 and it sails from Vancouver to Tokyo, so my Vancouver friends will get to put up with me again next year.  There’s no easy link to it on the SilverSea website, but I do have a nice packet of info that I can email to you, if you ask.  I’d be happy to tee up an extension in Tokyo, if anyone signs up.  I do have a couple of nibbles, already.  BTW SilverSea is having a sale until August 31 that includes a two-category upgrade, $1,000 in ship-board credit and a 15% reduced deposit.  They usually take 25%.  Yeah, I’m still working.

I broke my intermittent fast for lunch with Frank and Paula Schultz on the verandah of the Silverado Members’ Clubhouse, a place I fondly remember.  It hasn’t changed.  The view is fabulous, and the chef is better.  I pigged on a very nice quesadilla and a big piece of carrot cake, and thank you very much, Schultzes.  It was magic.  They are here for a long summer but have moved to The Towers, for their city pied à terre.  I’d love to be a fly on the wall when Paula Schultz and Chris Silver get together.  They are going to be BFFs for sure. 

Val found some nice sole for dinner and we had it with Homaje – Viader’s tribute to the Mexicans, who make the wine industry run.  It’s Malbec and Cabernet Sauvignon and it’s yummy, yes, even with fish.  You just cook the fish in artisanal pizza sauce, you see.  Fresh raspberries from the farmer’s market and we were very happy. 

Sunday, July 9, I worked all day until it was time for an extraordinary tasting dinner at Morimoto with the Brown’s – my thank you for my stay with them.   We were having so much fun, I forgot to take pictures of all 7 courses, and the Browns, but here are the few I did get:

Tuna tartare and accompaniments

Mackerel and roe

Sushi

Cod none of the 365 Portugese ways

I had brought a bottle of Viader to drink with it, so I got a chardonnay to have them waive corkage and it was Jayson, by Pahlmeyer.  We all know his name.  It’s great.  What a super evening, the food and the company vying for excellence at the highest levels.  I love it here.

I was up early on Monday, the 11th for my appointment at UCSF with the surgeon who brought the ankle replacement to North America.  If you’re interested, he made a short video to describe it a few years ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDH_zSU7iI4 .  I set the Beemer’s GPS to the address in Berkeley, but only after I had followed my nose a patch too far, because I was on the phone with Celebrity Cruises, trying to negotiate the advertised square footage of a prime concierge cabin that had turned up 18 sq.ft. short.  That’s what I do.  I hold the cruise lines accountable to their advertising.  The jury is still out on this one, I have had to write the resolutions desk.  So, not only was I not winning that one, it took me almost two hours to get to Berkeley, which was more than an hour more than it should have.  Luckily. I had left in plenty of time to be a half-hour early for paperwork. 

The appointment went better than clockwork.  I was 20 minutes late for the paperwork, but was seen right away and filled it in, with the nursing assistant, straight into the computer.  The doctors arrived five minutes later and the examination was on.  Dr. Mann is pushing ninety at this point so he saw me with Dr. Daniel Thuillier, an assistant Professor at UCSF.  They were both delightful, long on comprehension and explanation, but, alas, my problem can’t be solved by a star-ankle replacement.  It’s in the wrong place.  What I need is a Triple Arthrodesis, which is basically an ankle fusion.  It would leave me with the up and down movement you need to walk, but remove forever any side to side motion.  Elvon had an ankle fusion and I watched him go down every time a pebble caused him to lose his balance.  I’ll stick with my excellent physio and massage therapists for as long as I can, after all.  But, at least I know now.  

I was having lunch at Angèle in Napa with Ritzie Cracker, so I called her to confirm arrival and got back on the road.  No sooner was the car on its way, when Isaac, the Beemer’s private consultant, called to say its new starter assembly had arrived.  Since I was going north on Hwy 80 and it was just another couple of exits Napa to Fairfield, I called Ritzie to say I’d be late and would buy her lunch if she drove me back to Laskers’ at Silverado, after.  Deal.  I took it right in.  Ebony, my Lyft driver got me to Angèle for about a quarter after two, and Ritzie and I had steak tartare and fun conversation.  I also had a very dark berry sorbet for dessert that was yummy.  We drank Sancerre.  It was crisp and refreshing.  She’s living in Point Reyes these days and loving it. 

After lunch we checked out Helen Lyall, Napa’s most upscale women’s clothing store.  Helen is finally retiring next month.  I think she’s 94.   I used to get all my more formal wear there.  I still bring some of it on cruises.  So, we got to say goodbye and I got a nice diaphanous top to wear over a sausage (black tights and top) for formal dinners aboard – 70% off.  Then Ritzie drove me “home” where Val served up a Genova lasagna.  It was the vegetarian one but still wonderful.  We washed it down with Biale from their cellar, yum. 

Tuesday, I had lunch again – so much for intermittent fasting this week.  It was well worth it.  I had got the call from Isaac, that the car was ready, late yesterday afternoon, and was off by 9:30 to fetch it, with another Lyft, the driver also named Isaac.  He got treated to another call to Celebrity, still fighting for those extra 18 sq.ft. in prime concierge class or willing to accept a 313 sq.ft. handicapped cabin, because my client is, after all, bringing a wheelchair with her.  It didn’t work, so I really will be writing them now.  I bid a fond farewell to the Beemer’s Isaac, and took off to get a bottle of wine for lunch, as it had to be white.  Val had suggested Beverages and More, corner of Trancas and Jefferson.  When I got to the appropriate fork in the road, the tine to twenty nine was jammed with traffic, so I decided to take the Soscol way in, after all, figuring I could swing over at Imola.  At that thought, the light went on and I knew I should be paying Steven Goldberg, at Cellar Collections, a visit.  He was there.  I got a hug and taken straight to the white wine cellar, where Harvey & Harriet was waiting for me.  Stephen was very enthusiastic about this wine from Paso Robles by Eric Jensen.  Harvey & Harriet are Eric’s parents, and the wine is a 60% chardonnay blend.  This is what they have been doing so well in France, but hardly anybody blends whites here.  It’s light, fresh and delicious and only $24 a bottle.  I bought three and he sent me the tasting notes.  Email me if you want them and I’ll forward Stephen’s email.

Lunch was Carol Berg’s outstanding seafood salad in Freddie Faraone’s wonderful rebuilt house with some of the best views at Silverado.  Here we are:

Left to right, Arlene Phelan, Pati Simon, Melinda Hubbard, Mariann Sheldon, Carol Berg, Freddie Faraone, Deborah Robertson and Leona Biddle doing what we do best, eating and drinking.  It was great to see everyone again.  Huge thanks to Freddie, Carol and Arlene, who provided the yummy peach pie for dessert. 

What’s next?  More work and another dinner, of course.  I got a request from Claude Lacasse in Montreal for a picture of this one, so I remembered to have it taken.  Here I am at Scala’s in downtown Napa with Terry and France Scott:

That was a very good time, too.  Terry and France had been storing wine for me, too, and we got to drink the 2015 Viader.  Eight years from bottling, it’s just perfect.  So was the company.  This is a very special couple because France is also from Montreal.  She’s also still model thin, of which I was glad because I had parked my car in a very tight parking spot and figured out, as I was getting out, that I’d never be able to get back in, if the car beside didn’t move.  So I took France and Terry back with me and, sure enough, she did have to squeeze into the Beemer and back it out for me.  I have such super friends.