Uh-oh...

... things seem to be excalating.


pray for us.

After that last post...

... Mosby the Cat wants it known that she is not too happy with the lummox in any case.

I think she is gunning for him. They had a rare face off the other day. The lummox didn't know what to make of it. A little gray creature, staring at him!

The little lummox has come down with...

... fleas.

It seems to have made him a little testy.

A Cuban sandwich shop has opened ...

... right here in the middle of Wilkesboro! Run by real Cubans! It's called Havana Dreams and Carmen has been waiting breathlessly to give it a try. So on Wednesday we went over for lunch. Walked in and saw a man who by appearance, body language, and talk was clearly Cuban. Soon he was joined by another. Walked up to order and the proprietor said he was a real Cuban, from Santa Clara, Carmen's hometown. I told him I had brought my very own Cuban with me. Counting the lady waiting tables, and some other family members, there were at least seven Cubans all in one little room, right in the middle of Wilkesboro, ground zero for Anglo culture and Protestantism.

Carmen had a media noche sandwich and I had pan con lechon smothered in mojo. It was all very good. We both recommend it. Especially since they serve real Cafe Cubano.

Good stuff. I reckon we will hit it once a week or so.

unfortunately since we like it so much it will probably go out of business in three months. Same as every other thing we have liked here in Wilkes.

Update: There is a web page so you can check out the menu. They are only open 7-2 (or until customers leave) on weekdays.

Our favorite restaurant in that ...

... steaming, bug ridden port city to our south, and one of those little grace notes that makes a stay there close to tolerable is the Vizcaya on Dale Mabry. It's a tapas restaurant and very Spanish. Most times we go there is usually a large table of old Spaniards chatting in Spanish, drinking lots of vino y cerveza, until it is time to retire to the porch for cigars.

Carmen and I went there this trip, but no Spaniards except for a small party in the corner. But two other very large groups in a very small restaurant. We had to wait a few minutes for a table but it was worth it. We never order an entree, only tapas. Four of them usually do us fine for dinner.

This time we had our usual half pitcher of sangria, plus camares fritos (my favorite), vieras y chorizo (scallops so good that Carmen says that next time she is not sharing them with me), langostinos tapas (huge shrimp), and mozzarella con tomate (translate it yourself). All with some of the best Cuban bread in town.

If you are ever so unfortunate as to find yourself in this port city to our south, you can just barely survive it IF you make it over to this place. The lunch menu, btw, looks just as good but considerably cheaper.

A trip to the land of Ikea and the discovery of Ikea books ....

... Carmen and I went by the new Ikea store down in that pestilential swamp I call the unnamed port city. Very clever store scientifically designed to separate you from your money.

Many of the furniture displays with bookshelves were stocked with brand new books, many of them recent bestsellers. I was wondering how they kept them from being simply walked off with until I read some of the titles:

Liv für Liv, a detective novel

Samira och Samir, about two Iranian kids.

The books were all in Swedish. Who's going to shoplift any of those? I did notice a few copies of Tom Jones by Fielding, but who in the benighted swamplands of the unnamed port city is going to wade through a blocky 18th century classic of English lit? They're safe.

Consider the economics. It's brilliant. They buy up large quantities of first run books to stock all their stores, giving an enormous boost to the Swedish publishing industry and making it possible for it to survive with what otherwise would be tiny print runs by American standards. And Ikea enhances the Scandinavian aura of the cheap Chinese made knock offs they sell. Perfect.

But what do they stock on bookshelves in their Scandinavian stores?

I think they get those books from Hungarian publishers.

Conversations with Máeráed ...

... a few weeks ago I was with Máeráed out on the deck of the Mellow Mushroom, sometimes called "Máeráed's Personal Pizza Palace," when a friend of mine, who by coincidence was the first human (other than the two people involved) to learn that Carmen and I were engaged. By an even greater coincidence Máeráed's mother was the next person to know. Anyway, this friend comes up and sees me with Máeráed and says "Your grand daughter?"

"Oh no," I say, "a faux niece."

To be friendly he turns to Máeráed, who had turned seven two months earlier, and asks "Well, you must be, what, eight?"

I'm almost eight," Máeráed pipes up.

Then she glares at me when I burst out laughing.

A bit later she grows bored so takes me off to the grassy area alongside the Mellow Mushroom. We sit down and began to chat while we select ammo for our weekly "Twig Hurling Fight." In response to something important we are talking about she says "I'm not really your niece."

I say "I know, but I am your best friend."

She mulls that over for a bit and then says regretfully "Well, not my best friend."

"OK, then who is your best friend?" I am expecting her to say Nelson, or Magalee or one of her other school buddies.

"My teachers."

"YOUR TEACHERS!!?? THEY CAN'T BE YOUR BEST FRIENDS!!"

"Why not?"

"Because they're PROFESSIONALS!"

'Oh."

I began to feel as if my leg is being pulled. Thus I learned that it is best not to call a notional niece a "faux niece" if she is there to hear you. Especially is she is clever enough to know exactly what 'faux' means.


btw, have you read "The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie" yet?