July 18, 2016

Recorded “The Walrus and the Carpenter” for later broadcast on WSFM-LP, I think it was. A, the radio jock, was doing a show on “oysters” and had consulted a list of “Asheville poets” to find me. I would like to see that list. He was a very tall, lanky, cheerful young man, and I enjoyed meting him, whatever comes of “The Walrus and the Carpenter.” He’d just returned to the US from a long stay in Istanbul. Why he had been in Istanbul he didn’t say. Took the opportunity of being in West Asheville to slouch around Haywood Road, looking into corners I almost never look into. Grubby and lively there. I regretted not being hungry or thirsty and having no excuse to stop in very many of the seemingly endless succession of cafes and specialty restaurants. Did stop in one–all airy in the heat, with big garage doors open at each end and serious women bent over their laptops–where I ordered a vanilla frappe. When it came it tasted most peculiar, but it was cold and wet and I needed it. A few seconds later the barista came and admitted she had poured lavender into the coffee instead of vanilla and would I like another? Explained the very peculiar taste, and, no, did not want another. I think Haywood Road crosses the line past which I find casualness and oh-what-the-hell-ness a little off-putting. Maybe it was just the heat. Baked ferociously for the JCS cast. Found a “plain” cookie recipe, into which one’s imagination might pour. Made coconut cream cookies and maple walnut cookies, making things up as I went.