Month: March 2021

A Book Review: The Sun Down Motel

 

Image credit: tieury / 123RF Stock Photo

I did a search looking for haunted house books because I was in the mood for some ghosties. The Sun Down Motel popped up right away. I was intrigued because I also have a thing for old motels, abandoned motor courts, and the like.  Also, the book is set in upstate New York,  the area in which I live. I also happened to live in upstate NY in 1982, which is the year the protagonist’s aunt vanished.

I wasn’t expecting another The Shining (the only book I’ve ever read that scared the daylights out of me in broad daylight),  but based on the hype I expected a lot more than was delivered.

First of all, the book switched back and forth between 1982 and “the present”, muddling the story. The characters were interchangeable. Only the names changed. I kept having to stop and figure out in whose point of view/which year I was reading. The only distinct and memorable character was the motel itself. Needless to say, the motel was the only character even approaching likability.

I was also highly offended by the constant litany that 1982 was a different time and young women didn’t need to be as careful as “in the present.” I was a young single woman in 1982 in upstate New York. The time wasn’t that different. At least, not enough to use it as a justification for carelessness.

The story is billed as a mystery.  Nope. Suspenseful. What? I put the book down for days at a time because I simply didn’t care about the story.

My take? Don’t bother.

 

Menu: Dreaming of Food

I don’t know if it’s all the take-out I’ve eaten over the past year or my vow to spend money more wisely, but I am obsessed with take-out from two separate local restaurants. The problem is the cost for Grub Hub is prohibitive. Neither restaurant is convenient for pick up.

One of the (many) local pizza chains has an antipasto I dream about. Yes. Salad. I don’t know what it is about this particular antipasto that makes it so compelling, but I’m not the only one who thinks so. My Day Job, pre-pandemic, used to bring in food for us on a really regular basis. (They still do, but presentation has changed.) When pizza, wings, and salad were brought in from this particular place, the salad was the first thing to go. Same menu from other pizzerias, there is usually salad left over. Not because the pizza and wings were bad–not at all, but because the salad–the antipasto was so good.

Another small, local chain has three items I’ve been know to order at once so I can have leftovers.  I can actually get five to seven meals from the three items.

  • A smothered brisket sandwich. The beef melts in your mouth. Provolone cheese. Caramelized onions. Barbecue sauce. On a great roll. (I’m very finicky about sandwich rolls.) The sandwich comes with fries.
  • Rough Road Pasta, which is penne, chicken, sausage, onions, roasted red peppers in a smoky tomato cream sauce and asiago cheese. I think they may have changed the recipe in the past year or so, because there seems to be less smoke and more heat. But it is still amazing.
  • Mac-&-Cheese Bonfire. It’s cavatappi pasta (kind of like rotini, but more substantial and not as tightly spiraled) in a creamy four-cheese sauce, topped with bbq pulled pork, fried onions, homemade buttermilk ranch dressing, and green onions. Heart attack on a plate.

I have been craving these four things for weeks.  I may have to get over my aversion to winter driving and do some curbside pickup.

Music: Besieged by the Moon Playlist

In keeping with my habit of creating a playlist for my works-in-progress, here is what I listened to to keep me in the story of Besieged by the Moon.

No Roots (Alice Merton)
Night Moves (Bob Seger)
Iris (The Goo-Goo Dolls)
Promise Land (Hannah Miller)
Broken Arrow (Robbie Roberstson)
Doctor My Eyes (Jackson Browne)
Don’t Lie to Me (Barbra Streisand)
Hallelujah (Pentatonix)
Fighting the Decree (Brittney Mitchell)
People Have the Power (Patti Smith)
Sound of Silence (Disturbed)
Miles (Christina Perri)
Daylight Again/Cost of Freedom (Crosby, Stills, & Nash)
Universal Soldier (Donovan)
A Little Bit More (Dr. Hook)
Arms (Christina Perri)
One Tin Soldier (The Original Caste)

Motherhood Memory: Child Imagery

When my children were young, we periodically took overnight family vacations. One of the first ones was to Niagara Falls. Y-Chromo was about five. This may have been the first time we were away from home for something that wasn’t family-related. Yes, we’d stayed in hotels for Thanksgiving visits, but there was always the distraction of seldom-seen relatives on those occasions.

Y told everyone we met where we were staying: “Family-friendly” name of the chain.  He always seemed to speak in advertising slogans.

The first morning, we were waiting to go to breakfast–my husband was probably in the shower or watching the news or something. Y turned to me. “Mommy, look at how the sunshine is spreading like butter on the wall.”

Whoa.

“Where did you hear that?” I asked him.

“Oh, I just saw the yellow sun on the wall and that’s what I thought of.”

Y inherited his mathiness from his dad’s side of the family, but that imagery came straight from his maternal genes.

 

 

 

Musing: A Story I Heard

I heard the following story from someone I believe.

My source went to Great Britain for her semester abroad. One of her classmates had a prosthetic leg.  This person was a bit of a jerk. Young. Immature.  When it came time to go through the metal detector at the airport, he never said a word.

Of course he set off the detector.

HIs fellow classmates told him afterward, “Hey, stop being a jerk.”

The process repeated at every airport. Coming and going. I’m surprised the individual wasn’t put on some kind airline list.

The kicker, though, was what he confessed when they eventually landed back in the USA at their “home” airport: he’d used his prosthetic leg for smuggling Cuban cigars into the country.

Really?