May The Stars Light Your Way
Runs with knives.
Wendy & I just got back from an astounding trip aboard the Chandrilla Star Line’s Galactic Starcruiser “Halcyon” at Walt Disney World’s Hollywood Studios in Orlando, Florida. We cruised June 4-6, 2023. It was an entirely amazing experience throughout! We’ll post much more soon, including…
It has been a really long time since I updated this site. But, even though it has appeared quiet on here, it has been anything but quiet in our lives. In one of my most recent posts, I indicated that Wendy & I had gone…
Wendy & I have added two new inmates to the asylum.
Meet Toast and Truffle! They’re litter-mates and were born May 28, 2023 or thereabouts. Toast is the Siamiese-looking male, and Truffle is the female void-cat. My friend Abby helped come up with Toast’s name — and Toast & Truffle share a birthday(-ish) with Abby!
They were part of a litter of four, two of whom were born completely normally.
And then there are these two…
Due to a genetic problem, Toast & Truffle were born without fibulae (the smaller of the two bones between the knee and ankle). They also have only three toes per back foot. They’re seal cats.
Wendy & I drove to Indy to meet a veterinarian who rescued them in Chicago. Our original intention was to keep only one of them and re-home the other, but we discovered that they’re very bonded to each other, so we decided to keep them both.
They move really well and are learning to navigate stairs. The other cats are completely non-threatened by them, so it’s been a pretty smooth integration.
Welcome Truffle and Toast!
I’ve lost two of my most significant Chef-mentors in the last 7 months. Chef Jean-Robert de Cavel in December 2022, and Chef John Kinsella, CMC earlier this week. Chef Kinsella was the force that shaped me from a newbie into a culinarian. His stern-but-mean-but-compassionate-and-angry leadership…
Hello, and welcome, Halcyon Family! (don’t miss bonus video below!) Thanks for checking out Under the Tusken Sun, the hot new fantasy romance by Sienna Starfall published by Spicy Bantha Publishing. Enjoy the first chapter here, and may the stars light your way! To see real books,…
Jean-Robert de Cavel, the Chef for whom I worked for over 14 years, passed away on December 23, 2022. He was 61 years old.
I worked with him at an event on November 19, 2022. This was the last time I saw him. Fortunately, the photographer at the event captured two pictures of Chef and me. These are precious to me.
Rest in peace, Chef. It was always a pleasure to work with you.
On 2023-01-16, I joined 1300+ people for a mass of Christian burial in honor of Jean-Robert. Among that group, a bunch of us (the estimates range from 150-300) were dressed in our chef whites to honor the chef. During the service, one of Chef’s good friends, Mr. Dennis Spiegel asked all the chefs in church to reply to his call of “Order in!” with “Oui, Chef!”. It wrecked me.
It happened a couple more times outside the church, and I sure hope that someone recorded it. ALL of Cincinnati heard us. #ouichef
What a busy week/weekend for the Vogel household, especially for me (see below), but we made sure Wendy was busy and had a great time on her birthday weekend. On Monday, September 12, 2022, I started a new job that I am absolutely loving so…