December starts tomorrow - how frightening. Time is not just flying. It's hurling toward infinity at light-speed these days. Last week, Seattle kindly gave us two sunny days, one with a view of the elusive Mt. Rainier, so my family got to see that it does exist after all. From the Bainbridge ferry to Pike Place Market to multiple museums, the Chittenden Locks, Nordstrom's, Microsoft and the Space Needle, we covered a lot of ground up there. A "Meet the Fockers" situation was avoided and the families together enjoyed a great deal of turkey, salmon and sugary sweets. Nice to be spoiled as always - and then, ah, back to work here in stringy old L.A. I already have the stockings up by the stairs and the holiday CD is playing. All we want for Xmas is -- a housing crash. Yes, Virginia, there really is a bubble.

Happy Turkey to anyone still checking in on this blog from time to time! Akhil and I are packing up this weekend for our east-meets-west Thanksgiving extravaganza in Seattle, departing Tuesday night. My parents, my brother, Akhil's brother and wife, all of us descending on Medina, Wash. for our first-ever blended holiday, Pacific Northwest-style. A momentous event!

We just got back from doing our regular househunting chores -- and I'm slightly happy to report that it's true, the prices seem to have capped out for the moment, as you've seen the media report for most of the country. BUT, here on the "affordable" east side, they still managed to jump up according to the "six-months-ago-plus-10-percent" formula these slimy agents are using into the $720-750k echelon for 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom homes -- in bad school districts. So, we are seeing a lot of one-bathroom offerings just under the 700k mark (we refer to this as the "pain threshold"), though nothing yet has tempted us to make any offers. The interest rate plus holiday slump would make it seem likely that we'd find something next month SOMEwhere, but we'll see. You'll be sure to hear if we make any headway. And you'll certainly be happy to hear the end of this rather LONG story, for sure! Two years ago this weekend we were just getting into our Round-the-World trip, having landed in Auckland as our first stop. Two years later -- here we are, same old digs! Pushing on.

Post-hunting we had an amazing chicken and mozzarella with sundried tomato spread on ciabatta sandwich at this fairly new gourmet deli, wine and cheese shop in Montrose that I have to recommend. It's called Gouda and Vines, on Honolulu Ave. They've got some tasty-looking stuff in there. We'd love to see the place succeed so give it a shot. That's all from the SoCal trenches for this week. We're Seattle-bound.

Here's a helpful tip, just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday: Don't put potato peels down the garbage disposal. I found this out the hard way this week. Lo and behold, there were posts galore all over the Web to this effect as we scrambled to the computer to find out what to do about the glutenous particles spouting out of our sink. What did we do before the Web?

I must express my excitement at the news this week that Kendra and John have announced that they are coming back to the left coast! More details to come later lest I let the cat out of the bag too soon. For now all Akhil and I can say is, Yippee!

My friend Mark's book "Edison and the Electric Chair" came out in paperback this month (hardcover came out last year) and I saw it for the first time today at B&N. Check it out -- good gift idea for those with morbid fascinations, perhaps? We're proud of you, Mark!

Not only is it voting day, it's also Todd's 32nd - happy BDay Toad! That time of year already, is it? Amazing. I'll miss all the calls from John McCain, Dick Reardon, Ahhnold, of course, etc. as we move past another set of props, another ballot. They certainly keep you on your toes out here.

Heather's back in Calif., so last night we took her to a weird French restaurant called "Taix" on Sunset Blvd. The food was good, don't get me wrong, but the decor was that curious, old, art-deco-ey, your great-great-great-aunt-born-in-1897's-parlor-kind of style, dark, with flowery carpet, flowery wallpaper and flowerly sconces, old black and white photographs and renaissance paintings, with long windy hallways. Plus it might be haunted. We liked the roast chicken with burgundy sauce and the steak-frites, but I bet Heather will ask us not to take her there next time.

Sooo, yes, it seems, the housing crash is upon us -- it may be slow moving, but we can smell it coming, in the air underneath the "shady trees" in the "easy-care yards" of the "perfect starter carports" with the "loads of potential." House-gazing was among the weekend's slew of activities, which included two movies with short, yellow-haired, bespectacled, notorious and charismatic title characters: "Chicken Little" and "Capote." Capote is mesmerizing. Philip Seymour Hoffman is superhuman in this movie. It may give you nightmares, but it is a fantastic film -- flaw-free. Chicken Little? Well, kids only. Nice animation and some funny creatures, but the story's not for people under seven.