MATTHEW LARSEN

My Aunt Pat retired a number of years ago, and her and my uncle built this place in Negril, Jamaica. I think it was always their dream to live there, and I’ll be damned if they didn’t actually make it happen. They sold their house on Long Island and now live at Valentine Villas, a four unit private villa on a sandy beach. It sounds quite lovely. My mom went there for a mini-vacation. I think my cousin is going down there too this week.

Meanwhile, we’re supposed to get snow up here in not-Jamaica. Luckily I finally got the tire off the snowblower and it should fixed, inflated and ready in the nick of time. I’m sure the barbershop will be open, no matter what the storm brings. It’s like the USPS that way.

Being a landlord is really something. I’m learning that it’s not necessarily a ‘big’ responsibility… it’s more like a ton of tiny responsibilities. Team Larseam is up to the challenge though. Our place IS pretty awesome, after all. We continue to hang up pictures and things like that and it feels like home more every day. Our friend Brittnie and her husband Kurt got us this wonderful framed scene that we hung above the piano. It’s actually made out of papyrus and was brought back from Brittnie’s recent trip to Egypt. It really blew my mind that she did this for us, not to mention the unbelievable party she coordinated (and cooked for) in our honor.

Both Kristen and I are really lucky to have wonderful people in our lives. It really amazes me every time I stop and think about it.

Kristen and I went to Cafe Lebanon today for lunch. It was delicious as it always is. She posted some pictures, in fact. Working in downtown Springfield is often a drag, but there are some pretty good places to eat. We don’t go out to eat for lunch THAT often, but yesterday and today we did. Actually, yesterday she took some pictures of our trip to Rein’s Deli. Those pickles are garlicky. And delicious.

On February 29th and March 1st, I’m playing at P.A.C.E. for the 5th Anniversary Celebration Taste of P.A.C.E. I’ll be performing 2 songs each night. It should be a fun show– basically a ‘review’ of all the music, theater, dance, comedy, etc. that’s been on the P.A.C.E. stage for the past 5 years.

I remember walking around the Easthampton Fall Festival with my cousin Steve Biegner and meeting Sonia for the first time. She suggested that we stop in and soon after we booked ourselves a Smokejumpers show. In the very early days of P.A.C.E., the rooms weren’t separated and there were folding chairs only. There were three risers and that was about it. I think we played a few shows with me on piano, Steve Biegner on guitar, and Adam Bach on bass. We each had our own little 4′x5′ riser. It was fun times. We used to document these things in our livejournal, but I haven’t read that in years.

Between Smokejumpers shows, Northernly shows, Steve Biegner shows, and my own performances at P.A.C.E., I really feel like I’ve made a little dent in the P.A.C.E. stage. I’ve seen some really wonderful shows there too– Haunt, Stephen Brodsky, Mark Schwaber, The Low Anthem, David Berkeley, Swing Caravan. So I’m psyched that I’ve been asked to play this event, because I get in for free to see everyone else playing and performing on those nights.

Also, Steve Biegner and Julia Suriano are the leads in the upcoming production of West Side Story, so some sort of tidbit of that will be happening I imagine.

It’s always great when someone takes a classic idea and puts a new twist on it. Not in a lame way, but in a creative and intelligent way. Ursa Minor Vehicles sells a kit to convert a Honda Element into a VW Westfalia-type weekender camper for about $4,300.00. The Element is a pretty versatile, ugly-but-charming kind of thing, but this takes it to a whole other level.

I’ve always wanted a VW camper van ever since I was a little kid and my neighbors had an orange one with a white top and brown plaid seat cushions. Between noticing that friends who owned VWs were spending a lot of time and money repairing their VWs and getting older and camping less– I kind of became a Honda fanatic. I’ve had 2 Accords with over 200,000 miles on them and Kristen’s Fit is a pretty good camping car if we do decide to go for a weekend here and there. But the idea that I can revisit my little kid dream and mix it up with my love of Honda’s practicality is pretty intriguing.

Some would argue that they couldn’t imagine an uglier car than an Element. Those people might say that an Element with the camper top tops an Element without.

This past Wednesday, Kristen and I stayed at the Sheraton in Boston’s Back Bay. My mother was nice enough to let us use her reward points, so we wound up staying in a pretty awesome suite on the 24th floor. For dinner, we went to Brasserie Jo. I had the steak frites. Kristen had the Chicken Coq Au Vin. Absolutely delicious. Seriously. Though I knew I would enjoy it when they brought each of us a baguette. I cannot express how much I love bread. It was nice to be able to chill out in Boston the night before my appointment on Thursday at Dana Farber.

It was a regular checkup of all my Hodgkin’s related stuff. I wasn’t looking forward to it, especially since my recent PET scan showed a slight enlargement of a lymph node in my neck. For weeks before my appointment I was pretty worried that a recurrence may have been on the horizon. Luckily, after they examined the scans at length, they determined that it wasn’t much of a cause for concern. They’re repeating scans in April just to be on the safe side. I could have just had a sore throat that day or something like that when I had my first PET scan. I can’t tell you how relieved I was.

In general, these regular checkups and doctor’s appointments are strangely more difficult for me now since they’re less frequent. I guess it’s the whole ‘out of site– out of mind’ mentality. When I go to these things, I’m reminded of all the difficult things I’ve been through. Now that I am so happy and in such a good place in my life, it’s easy to put those things out of my mind mostly. Anyhow, it was Kristen’s first visit to Dana Farber, so I’m sure it was weird for her but also good to get a new perspective on my health-life.

I’m just glad we got to offset the not-so-fun stuff with the hotel and the fancypants dinner the night before.

Oh, and on our way home, we stopped at the ‘rich people mall’, the Atrium in Chestnut Hill. We strolled around places like Restoration Hardware, Pottery Barn, J. Crew, Anthroplogie, and other such stores. And of course, there was a Cheesecake Factory, so we wound up eating there for dinner. It was surprisingly delicious.

Oh, and Kristen picked up a TheKnot magazine, which had 800 wedding dress ideas. But what will I wear?!