So…sitting right behind me is a SEMI famous local personality who has a cooking show on community television. Somebody else recognized him and said hi or I wouldn’t have even noticed.

I really really want to tell him to include more vegan dishes, that there’s a huge demographic out there that would love him if he included cruelty-free recipes, but he’s totally self absorbed and constantly texting on his phone. Additionally, he’s not THAT famous or he wouldn’t be sitting in the cheap seats, right?

His style of cooking isn’t my cup of tea, but I support his “I’m just a regular guy” niche of encouraging everyone to cook with the ingredients already on hand in the pantry.

So far I haven’t annoyed him, but I’m not at all a shy, timid forest creature. I have zero problem approaching anyone. For any reason. No matter who they are.

On the other side of me is a young man wearing a Stanford Medical School sweatshirt. He’s starting med school in the fall. (I asked.) How awesome is that! I told him I was proud of him. I’m sure you might think…who am I to share unwanted praise, right? But I did. Bright children who follow their academic/life dreams need our support and encouragement. It takes a village, yes it does, and it only takes a minute to utter a few positive words.

I was trying to watch Curb Your Enthusiasm but for some reason I couldn’t get my phone to enlarge to full screen, so a kind stranger directly to my right (an obvious techie) took my phone and messed around with it until he figured out what the problem was.

As terrible as the stories are on the news, in spite of the violence and Covid variants and all the rest, there are still kind and helpful people in this world.

Not a bad way to spend 2 1/2 hours. Not bad at all, especially when I arrive to THIS:

And this: