Yvette Keller

Author: Yvette

  • Black Tea with Lemon and Honey

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    Yvette
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    For the first time, I tried drinking my morning black tea with honey and lemon. The honey was a diluted buckwheat honey water (we are almost out of our honey stash and I am using up the last little bit). The lemon was a Meyer lemon, with a peel almost the pale orange of a sunset.…

  • Marvelling at a host of great characters, oh, and that Dr. Strange guy too.

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    Yvette
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    This may be harsh, but my favorite character in Dr. Strange was the Cloak of Levitation. It was decisive, powerful, loyal, and silly. Basically, the writers gave the Doctor a wearable guard dog to lighten him up. One of my closest friends is a surgeon, so I’ve seen a dog-surgeon relationship first hand: the dog is the…

  • Generosity and Intimacies

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    Yvette
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    I’ve been sick this week which means that I was productive in unusual ways. I slept a lot. Coughed a heck of a lot of phlegm out of my lungs (sorry to go literal on you there). Sat with the husband and completed year-end tax-deductible donations. And I finally managed to finish a book and a TV…

  • Taiwanese Treats: A Liquor I Like

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    Yvette
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    My lovely conspira-tea-ist friend Angela went to Taiwan for work and brought me back a boxed set of three fine Oolong Teas. There is Chinese food en route with my loving husband for dinner tonight, and since I’ve been under the weather, I decided to treat myself by opening the box, cracking the tin, and slicing the…

  • Ramen Up For Tampopo, Cowboys!

    Ramen Up For Tampopo, Cowboys!

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    Yvette
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    Tampopo is a ten-course meal of visual intensity. Watching it was like being at a feast table with a wide variety of friends and relatives. Some tell funny stories and some tell scary stories. A few are boring and others are disgusting. And ten courses goes on, and on, and on. Too much for me…

  • Put Down the Cat O’ Nine Tails and Step Away…

    Put Down the Cat O’ Nine Tails and Step Away…

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    Yvette
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    I’m drafting this in Campbell Hall at UCSB, waiting to hear Steven Johnson talk about his book Wonderland: How Play made The Modern World. I expect it will be interesting and inspiring, and it makes me realize that it is official: I have given up on trying to “win” this year’s NaNoWriMo. After the first week…

  • Why thank you! I’d like some more dog food, please.

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    Yvette
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    DAY ONE, STEP ONE: Talk to the scary people. The day after the election, in my grief and rage I implemented the first step of my “stay sane” plan. Anyone I don’t know how they voted is a “scary” person. Get rid of the scary people. Excise them from my life. (I didn’t say it was a…

  • What Cassandra Knew

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    Yvette
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    It is the beginning of week two of NaNoWriMo and I cannot think, I can only feel, and I feel horrible. Day eight technically, but it feels like Day one of being reborn in a Cowardly New World. Luckily for me, writing is not the sort of thing that requires clear thought because I don’t…

  • My first published short fiction!

    My first published short fiction!

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    Yvette
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    After only seven rejections, my first “finished” short story is published! I’m happy. It is a huge deal because my struggle is that I never FINISH anything. So this is a big win, people! Although I don’t think Roundabout Protection started off as much, I like what it turned into. I’ve heard there’s a market for…

  • The Dressmaker

    The Dressmaker

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    Yvette
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    The lights came up, the credits began to roll, and my husband turned to me and said, “I’d watch that again. Right now.” Which made us both laugh out loud. But we were used to that by then. Watching the final hour of The Dressmaker was a well-matched emotional tug-of-war, with regular intervals alternating between genuine,…