Today is Wednesday, January 3, 2024.     This is my first blog in the nascent year and it’s funny even writing the new year here.  It will take some getting used to, I must admit.

As I had indicated in my last blog in December, Elliot and I ventured out to Amherst on Sunday, December 31, to spend New Year’s with our dear friends “Michelle” and “Richard.”   Now that we’re back, I have to write that we had oodles of fun spending quality time with Michelle and Richard.    New Year’s was amazing in that Michelle came up with an extremely novel idea:   she had 11 of her guests prepare different kinds of tapas.     She had everything arranged beforehand:  ingredients, bowls, utensils, measuring tools, and even provided complimentary blue aprons, which we took home on Tuesday.   Our dish was Catalan lamb skewers, where we were tasked with preparing pepper sauce and cucumber-yogurt salad, as well as skewering slices of lamb and putting them on a fryer.   Other guests made empanadas, a huge helping of salad, smelts, a mushroom dish, and so on.   After preparing all of these dishes, we all sat down and ate the fruits of our labor.  Michelle provided dessert in the form of luscious Mexican wedding cookies and other homemade baked goods. 

We saw the ball drop in Times Square at midnight and then we watched a little of the Twilight Zone marathon on the syfy channel.   Then we left our host and hostess’s home to drive to our hotel, the Courtyard at Marriott, in Hadley, on Russell Street, which was only about 10 minutes away.   I then proceeded to watch two true-crime hours on MSNBC.    I then went to bed at 3 a.m. on January 1.

The next morning, we drove back to Michelle and Richard’s house for a mouthwatering breakfast of homemade blueberry pancakes and turkey sausage.   To walk off our breakfast, Richard drove us to the Sweet Alice Conservation Area, in Amherst, where we took a modest hike through the wooded area.   We then stopped off at a surprisingly open grocery store nearby, where I picked up a half dozen of apple cider donuts.  

At 6, we drove to a Chinese restaurant called Formosa in town.  As you would expect, nothing else was open in town, not even Amherst Books, on December 31, when we first arrived.   I was a little bummed out over the closure of the store, but this was not unexpected at all.  

We didn’t stay too long this time with Michelle and Richard when we returned to their house after dining at Formosa, since we thought they had had enough of us by that time.  So we said our goodbyes and arranged to meet Tuesday morning at Tandem Bagels on the road back to New York. 

Instead of watching broadcast television, this time I was able to register my Netflix account on the television in our hotel room Monday night and was able to watch Joker once more starring that inestimable actor Joaquin Phoenix and Robert De Niro.   

The next morning, we set the alarm for 7:45 and checked out before 9 to drive to Tandem Bagels, which was on Russell Street, a ways down from our hotel.   It was only about 2.5 miles down the road.  We walked into the airy establishment and ordered breakfast.   I must say that the bagels here were very good, so good that we took home a half dozen of them to have later.  Michelle and Richard came in a little after 9 and we had a short but sweet breakfast with Michelle and Richard.    We then walked out to the parking lot and said our goodbyes to our Amherst friends.

As we drove back to New York, we made a pit stop at Grey Matter Books, which was close to Tandem Bagels.   However, the store was not open at 10, as we got to the place at that time, and Elliot immediately displayed his impatience by announcing he was leaving.   Of course, I would have waited at least another 10 minutes to see if the store would open by then.  

I got my wish to go to a bookstore, though, anyway when we stopped off in Larchmont to go to the Harbour House Coffee Shop ( we stopped here for breakfast on December 31 on our way up to Amherst) for a bite of lunch and we were able to visit J. Anderson’s Books, on Chatsworth Avenue, a block away from the coffee shop.   I did buy myself a book at this independently owned bookstore:   Anderson Cooper’s book about his forebears, Vanderbilt:    The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty, which he coauthored with Katherine Howe.  (I took it out of the library at least twice and thought it interesting.)   I will now add this book to my ever-expanding list of books that I need to read before I expire. 

We made no other stops after Larchmont and we got back to our neighborhood at around 2:40 p.m.   I should have decided to stay home since we were traveling for most of the day, but I preferred to attend my gay men’s book discussion group meeting at 6:30 the same evening.   This time I did read the book, Other Names for Love, and I was curious to hear what the other members had to say about the book.  So I headed out about 4 and took the subway to West 4th Street. 

I was amazed over how many guys attended the meeting: 29.   Since it was January 2, I had expected many absences, but I was wrong in my assumption.  Not only were there as many regulars at the meeting, there were at least three or four new members attending for the first time.   As for the discussion, I couldn’t have asked for a more erudite analysis of a book.   I don’t know what many of the members do for a living, but I must say that I’ve been impressed with the intellectual mien of the members ever since I attended my first meeting, way back in April of 2022.

After the discussion, I did not go to Julius’s with a group of the guys.  I knew my physical limits this time.    So I walked directly to the subway with another of the members whose name was “Jack.”   We talked briefly before his train, the A, pulled into the station.

So that’s where we are, folks, with the beginning of 2024.  Let us hope for a better year than the last one.   But we all know this is basically only a pipe dream.   The rate of violence in this country is unrelenting.   In 2023, there were at least 627 mass shootings in the United States so far, according to the Gun Violence Archive.   I don’t see any change in the numbers of mass shootings here.    Do you? 

Stay safe and be well.