I forgot to mention that yesterday we took my new Obama
portrait made by Chuck Close to be framed at El Mirador Fine Framing. I have not mentioned yet the saga of the
Chuck Close lithograph. One Sunday
morning last September when the mud slinging of the Presidential election was
particularly intense, I read a Talk of the Town article in the New Yorker that
Chuck Close had painted a portrait of Obama and a limited edition of prints and
tapestries of it were being produced to aggregate $3,000,000 of art to raise
money for the Obama campaign. I loved
the idea and was very interested in having a Chuck Close image in my collection,
so I went to my computer and found the www.donate.barackobama.com webpage with the
information on the Chuck Close Portraits.
The large tapestries were priced at $50,000 and the large lithographs
were priced at $25,000, but the smaller portraits were priced at
$5,000.00. I immediately filled in the
on line form and donated $5,000 for a small portrait. Then after I sent the form I realized I had
not saved a copy of the form and in a few weeks after hearing nothing from
anyone I became concerned that I had thrown my money into a massive re-election
rat hole. I wrote letters without much
success except for one or two notes from Adia Smith and Meagan Budick, who said
the prints were not going to be shipped until after the election. I heard nothing more until I received a call
on February 18th or 19th from Ed at an art shipping
company in NYC saying that they had received the pieces and they were being
packed for shipment and he wanted to check my address and delivery
instructions. I told Ed that I would not
accept the piece if it was not signed with an original signature by Chuck
Close. Ed said, “I will check and get
back to you.” He called the next day and
said, I have checked and the portrait is signed by Chuck Close and do you want
to sign for it.” I said, I most
certainly do.” Ed replied just as tersely, “Fine, it is scheduled to arrive by
Fedex on Friday.”
So on Friday a couple of hours after a pleasant lunch and
tour of the art in my home with old friends Nancy Scott and Marty Newhouse, the
door bell range and it was a Fedex delivery person holding a 3’ by 3 ½‘ wide
flat plywood box. I asked if I could
check to see if the item in the box was in good condition and she said, “No,
you must accept the delivery by signing and then you will have to take up any deficiencies
with the shipper. So I gathered my
courage and signed and took the print into the house and un-taped and opened
the box and then the inner cardboard sleeve and "voila", there was a beautiful
portrait of Obama that Chuck Close had numbered 130/200, dated 2012 and signed. As
good as I could ever imagine. So I am
thrilled and have begun to have thoughts of a descendant of mine a hundred
years from now at something like the Antiques Roadshow showing this print and
the appraiser saying, “This piece
appeals to many different collecting elements of the market: presidential
memorabilia, art collectors of Chuck Close and American Black History
collectors. You have a great piece of
American History.” A happy ending with
a great addition to my collection.
One of the reasons why I am so thrilled is four years ago we
were in Seattle and saw that there was an opening of Chuck Close portraits, so
we walked to the gallery where we were surrounded by larger lithography
portraits than the type I had bought that were priced to up to $140,000.00. So this donation to Obama may have been the only way I could
ever acquire a signed portrait by Chuck Close for $5,000. Was it idiocy or genius? Only time will tell? The good news is I felt like I did my bit to
re-elect Obama, at the very least. Thank
you Adia and Meagan and all the other people in the trenches who helped
Obama get re-elected.
After El Mirador we went to Sprouts Market and bought 6 lbs.
of chocolate covered raisins for $1.99/lb. using my rain check, an eggplant, three sweet potatoes, hot house raised tomatoes ($1.50/lb.), and a few
other items.
In Sunday's Journal we saw an ad for the grand opening of Total Wine, the new mega liquor store, so we decided to kill two birds with
one stone because Suzette needed to stop and buy a vacuum cleaner at Sears at
Cottonwood Mall. Even with the map in
the paper it took a few minutes of orienteering to find the store. When we walked in we were greeted by a
tasting bar tasting BV Cabernet Sauvignons, including its Tapestry meritage. The store was huge, probably over 20,000
square feet and over 10,000 different items. We took a map and started pushing our way through
the huge crowd that also had been attracted to the grand opening of Albuquerque’s first liquor megastore.
Total Wine sources many of its own products and its items
carry a yellow card on the front of their rack.
The highly rated items all carry a magenta card on their racks and some
of those are also sourced by Total Wine.
We made a promise to ourselves to only buy 6 bottles, although we ended
up buying seven bottles: a Le Pont Bandol Rosé for $17.99, a Bougrier Les
Martinieres Muscadet for $6.99, a Chateau du Retout Haut Medoc for $10.95, a
Judos Pinot Gris from Oregon for $12.99,
an Eguren Tierra Castilla Red from Rioja for $6.99 (We had eaten a
lovely lunch with Billy, Elaine and Rebecca in April 2011 at Eguren Vineyard near Laguardia, so we were
thrilled to find it in Albuquerque.), a bottle of Chateau Megyer Tokaji Furmint
from Hungary for $11.99 (the bottle of furmint we bought in Budapest had gone bad
after ten years and we wanted to try the real thing again.), and a Bougrier Loire Sauvignon
Blanc (Bougrier must be Total’s private label for French wines) We met the manager in the cognac and section
and he recommended a small production family owned calvados, so we bought a
Berneroy XO Calvados for $29.99. With
the grand opening coupon for a $10.00 discount for six bottles, our purchase
came to $104.76 and we had found a new source of wines, not previously
available in Albuquerque. Yeah.
I had thawed out two rib steaks. At 5:30 p.m. we turned on the Red Carpet
pre-Oscar Awards show and discussed dinner.
We looked at our russet potatoes and they were soft and starting to sprout
roots, so we decided to throw them out rather than plant them. We then decided to bake the sweet potatoes we
had bought at Sprouts and I wanted to make Eggplant Provencal with the fresh
eggplant and tomatoes we had bought at Sprouts Market yesterday. We either collaborate in designing menus or trade off designing menus. Tonight's menu was designed by me. As you will see tomorrow's menu will be designed by Suzette. Because I shop, I usually determine the available ingredients, so Suzette's menus often utilize PPI ingreients in a more creatve way as you will see tomorrow.
The Palmers could not make dinner because Susan is still getting
over the flu and Willy was eating with friends.
First, we worked togethr on the eggplant dish, I sliced the eggplant into 2/3 inch slices crosswise, then Suzette brushed the slices with our new California virgin cold pressed olive oil (Trader Joe's $5.99), while I sliced enough slices of the hot house tomatoes from Sprouts to cover each slice of eggplant with a slice of tomato. Suzette sliced Mexican white cheese slices with our Norwegian slicer and we covered the tomato slice with cheese. Then we drizzled panko onto the cheese and baked the covered eggplant slices in a 325 degree oven for 30 minutes until the cheese melted and became toasted golden brown in places and the eggplant and tomatoes cooked. After ten minutes of baking the eggplant, Suzette lit the grill and heated it up for ten minutes and I de-stemmed a stalk of broccoli and put the flowerets in the steamer with water and placed it on the stove. After twenty minutes of baking Suzette put the steak on the grill and flipped it at after about ten minutes, which is when I started steaming the broccoli. When she flipped the steak I checked the eggplants and turned up the heat to 350 degrees to make sure they were fully cooked. After 8 minutes I turned off the heat on the broccoli and when Suzette brought in the grilled steak in another couple of minutes, I turned off the oven, sliced the steak into lengthwise 3/4 inch slices and we plated up our plates with the beautiful food and ate a lovely dinner. The steak was delicious cooked to medium rare (white on te edge and pink throughout the rest of the meat).
I opened a bottle of 2007
Chateau de Seguin Bordeaux Superior, I think I bought at Trade Joe's or Costco, that was very smooth but lacked
character. We decided we should have
allowed it to open up for a couple of hours to see if it would gain character. It is a bit better the next night after
sitting corked overnight. We ended the meal with chocolate raisins and calvados for me and cognac for Suzette watching the Oscars for a lovely day of shopping and a lovely evening of food.
Bon Appétit
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