Fancy-Pants Dining, Haircuts and Mr. President

Practically in my back yard is a large culinary college that is listed in the top five in the USA. Every year our senior hall has a popular event where they’ll bus 100 of us (25 at a time on four consecutive days) down to their 5-star style restaurant. This week was my third year going and I’ll keep going as long as I can still spoon food into the biggest orifice in my head. The ambience and food are to die-for and out of the norm for my dining experiences. We sat at tables of six and the conversation focused on the food, the dessert cart and the chefs that came out to answer questions about unidentifiable flavor profiles in the dishes and how they were prepared. I had the “Caribbean Adobo Braised Pork” with sofrito and pineapple sauce and for dessert I practically had an orgasm devouring the tiramisu cake in an eatable chocolate dish served with a scoop of coffee ice cream on the side. Each time we go, we tour a different part of the college and the bakery was on slate this week. After lunch we went on a mystery side trip that turned out to be a tour of the fire department and its regional-wide training center. They had a “house” with moveable walls that can be filled up with smoke so the firefighters can’t see where they’re going. I swear they must have picked the cutest guy in the department to do the talk and tour. Dimples and tiramisu in the same day? It doesn’t get much better than that. 

I got a new hair style this week---breezier and easier for a spring that includes more showers now that I’m going to the gym three to four times a week. It seems like the longer you go to the same stylist the more they get into auto-pilot-cutting your hair and then you end up with a helmet head. At least that happens to me. So I searched for a photo to bring with me and when I showed it to the stylist she said, “That’s not going to work.” I didn’t expect resistance. “Why not?” I asked. “Because It’s longer than the cut you have.” Say what? I couldn’t believe it but I wasn’t about to argue with a lady holding a pair of sharp scissors. “I’m not married to that photo,” I said. “What do you suggest?” Instead of answering she asked me what I was trying to achieve and I told her I wanted to get rid of the bulk on top and be able to towel dry my hair after a shower and be good to go. Boy short. “Well, that’s not going to happen,” she replied. “As thick as your hair is if you go that short it will all stick straight up and there’s not enough jell in the world to make it lay down.” “So what should I do,” I begged, “walk around with a helmet in my arms so it looks like I have a good reason for having helmet hair?” She talked and I lost interesting in listening. Finally I ended her monologue with, “Why don’t you just surprise me.” She did. She gave me a cut that to my untrained eye looks like the one in the photo I brought in! “Magic mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?” Well, I didn’t get the answer I wanted but my new cut is definitely ready for the sultry summer days.

A week or so ago a blogger friend, Bella Run, recommended signing up for The Word of the Day at Dictionary.com which I did and until yesterday I hadn’t received a word that I’d seen before or thought that I’d use in the future. Then an email came with this word: mumpsimus. “1) adherence to or persistence in an erroneous use of language, memorization, practice, belief, etc., out of habit or obstinacy, or 2) a person who persists in a mistaken expression or practice.” Who does that remind you of? Hint: He lives in a big white house. Oops, zip my mouth and slap me silly. My blog is in a controversy free zone. At least I’ve been trying to keep that way lately, but this past week has been a good week for those of us in The Resistance so I’m sticking my neck up like a periscope on a submarine. Feel free to take a potshot at me if you think the world is being unfair to Mr. Mumpsimus, if you don’t think Voltaire, the French philosopher of ye olden days, knew what he was talking about when he warned, “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”

Speaking of The Resistance, I had lunch with my oldest niece over the weekend, an early birthday treat on her part. I love that woman! We talked about the Russian entanglements in the White House, the failed Trumpcare bill, the second Muslim ban that's been blocked by several district courts and I got caught up on all things family related. We each had to drive a half hour to meet in the middle and as I drove home after lunch I couldn’t help feeling wistful that we can’t do it more often. I miss having people around who’ve known me longer than a minute and a half---who knew me when my brain and my tongue worked at the same speed and who can fill in when my memory fails me. Magic mirror on the wall, why can’t I age like smooth-as-silk Jamaica Rum instead of Hire’s Root Beer that’s gone flat? ©

The haircut

My dessert

A hard choice that came in second

The Guy Land Cafeteria

After dropping Levi the Mighty Schnauzer off at the Doggie Foo-Foo Beauty Spa where haircuts cost a dollar short of a fifty dollar bill I had time to kill before my appointment at Bargain Cuts for Humans. Oh, boy, you know what that means! Yup, the Guy Land Cafeteria is located in between the two places and I hadn’t had my breakfast yet. 

Did you know you have to have a strategy for picking out a seat in the Guy Land Cafeteria? (So named for all the elderly men who fill up the place in the mornings.) A woman can’t pick a table too close to “guy tables” or she’ll look like a hussy. So I claimed one in the center of the place with lots of empty tables surrounding me. Hey, what better way to test your sex appeal with the geriatric set than to see if an old dude will come long and pick a table next to you, forgoing the prime real estate along the windows that take up three walls of the place?  As I spread orange marmalade on my sour dough toast---did I mention this café is a no dieting zone---a guy with a pot belly eyed me over the top of the sports page and a retreaded stud-muffin ignored me while reading a paperback. Clearly, neither one was impressed with my feminine wiles. 

Soon a woman and her teenaged son came into the place and took the table across the aisle from me. I wasn’t going to get any action from them unless she was a lesbian and he was into aging cougars. Not to worry. They took out their cell phones and off they went into their own little worlds---one to Facebook and the other to Candy Crusher. What is it about Candy Crusher that's so mesmerizing? I swear it must send out secret cult messages. Half the world seems to be hooked on it while the other half, like me, is afraid to go there and find out first hand.

I had forgotten to pick up a straw when I went through the cafeteria line so I went back up to the end of the line where I waited as a man was getting his silverware and napkins. 

“What do you need, darlin’?” he said. 

“Just a straw.” I replied.

 “One or two?

One or two? Okay, it’s been a long time since I’ve decoded guy talk. Was this his way of finding out if I was alone or with someone else? And just as I got puffed up pleased with myself, thinking this old guy was flirting with me I remembered that some people actually need two straws---one for pop and one for water. Dejected, I sat down and eventually I watched as a 50ish year old guy with a lot of hair and a cool swagger came in . Did I mention hair is in short supply at the Guy Land Cafeteria? He took his time making his way to the back of the restaurant stopping at tables here and there to talk to dinners and I thought, oh boy---yes, again. It was an ‘oh boy’ kind of day---Oh boy, someone wearing pants is going to stop at my table and start up a conversation! Image my surprise when he turned out to be the manager on his way back to his office. 

By then it was getting closer to noon when the elderly set all seemed to leave in unison to be replaced by the Village People, working class guys in uniforms. Policeman, firemen, construction workers, a couple of biker dudes. The only thing missing was the cowboy and the Indian chief. Sadly, all my food was long gone by then and I wasn’t about to go back up for pie. Though I must confess I thought about it. I was in the mood to goggle men in the prime of their lives. No more breakfast at the Guy Land Cafeteria for me, I decided as I walked out the door. I’m switching to lunch.

 

After my haircut and a little shopping, I picking Levi back up. He looked better than me. I still have hair hanging in my eyes. Darn hair dresser is still growing out my bangs. I kind of like them though. It feels like I can hide behind my hair and that came in handy with today's adventures in people watching. On the way home I had to I stopped at Starbucks where, on haircut days, Levi expects to be treated to a pup-uccino at the drive-thou window while I get one of their half price happy hour delights. But, darn it, my favorite barista was missing from action. He can always be counted on to flirt with little old ladies. Translation: He’s just a super friendly college kid who likes people and is not afraid to treat woman of all ages exactly the same…just like my husband used to do. <Big sigh.> ©

Another $100 Day

My new haircut.

Every so often I have what I call a $100 day. It happens when I schedule Levi for an appointment at the doggie foo-foo beauty spa and me for a haircut on the same day, with lunch and shopping in between dropping off my schnauzer and picking him back up again. On the way home we stop at Starbucks where he gets treated to a free pup-a-ccino and I get a caramel macchiato. It all might sound like a yuppie way to spend the day until you picture me driving around with a bag full of poop in my cup holder. I had walked Levi before dropping him off, his first one of 2015, but the park was technically still closed for winter so there were no trash contains available to leave the poop behind. Trust me a plastic bag does not mask all the smells that come from inside and I was afraid to put the bag of poop in the trunk for fear I’d forget about until I found a cop standing next to my car with a search warrant on the suspicion there might be a dead body inside. Could happen if it was summer.

When I picked Levi up one of the “stylists” was shaving a tiger cat into a lion cut. I’d never seen anything like that in my life. The cat was like a bean bag, so relaxed and seemingly unaware that two people were pulling it every which way but off the table as one was shaving it down to the skin. The  pom-poms on its feet and tail already were perfectly shaped and the long hair on its neck and head had already been blow-dried and brushed. Poor pampered baby. Who does that to an animal who loves to groom itself as much as cats do? Now you know why I call the place a foo-foo beauty spa. They are known as the best in town. If it was a clothing store, it would be Macy’s compared to my hair salon which would be J.C. Penny’s. 

The place I had lunch was new to me and is one that specializes in breakfasts. I had seen an interview on local TV about the place and their famous red velvet pancakes. I didn’t order them because I couldn’t bring myself to put that much red dye in my body and risk the gods of chronic hives crying out, “Oh, boy, thank you!” The omelet I had was good but I probably won’t go back because the way the place was set up it didn’t lend itself well for customers to have conversations with one another like a place down the street that I call the Breakfast Only Café or even the Guy-Land Cafeteria. Secret revealed: I don’t go out to lunch just because I’m hungry. Sometimes I just want to hear a human voice that doesn’t come from an electronic devise. 

During my travels through my $100 day I stopped at Lowe’s and ended up with an unexpected tear in my eye. Crap! It was such a simple thing, a split second that changed my good, the-sun-is-shining mood to a sad reminder of the past. A man in my age bracket cut in front of me to get a cart from the cart lineup then he realized what he did and he said, one word---“oops”---and went on his way.  “Oops” was without a doubt the most frequently used word in my husband’s very limited, post-stroke vocabulary. Sometimes it was a one word apology and sometimes it was a one word comical punchline to something someone said. Talk about fifty shades of grey, Don could do fifty of shades of the ‘oops’ word. The sad reminder at Lowe’s didn’t last long; I went directly to the paint department where I picked out some paint chip samples to bring home. I don’t plan to paint anything anytime soon but paint chips are like happy pills in my world. I have two shoe boxes full of them. Crazy, I know, but don’t most people do something that others wouldn’t understand without reading a dissertation on quirky habits?

If I spend enough time in the car, like I do on $100 days, I’m sure to hear a song that has me changing the station with the speed of a crow plucking out an eyeball. Okay, I’ve never seen a crow do that but if it was inclined to disfigure a person I know it could do it pretty fast. Anyway, the song is Garth Brooks’ That Summer. It’s about a eighteen year old who gets a summer job on a ranch and a widow with “leathery skin” who teaches the kid all about sex---you guessed it---that summer. I’ve written about this song before but today it reminded me of a story about widow who lived in my cousin’s neighborhood.

It was a story told by some grown adult men I know who in their younger years were introduced to sex via a line formed outside the widow’s bedroom door where she took them (and others on) one at a time. Boys from twelve to sixteen and they talked about the experience like it was a fun coming-of-age event in their lives. Can you image that happening now? The woman would be sitting in jail and the boys would be testifying in court about how they are scarred for life. What happened to her? Parents got wind of the whole thing, talked to the police but all that happened is parents were told that "boys will be boys" and to keep their kids away from her house. Times sure change.

I don’t know how I can finish off this post so that the ending ties back to the beginning unless I say the widow from my cousin's neighborhood missed her calling. She should have been $100 hooker. ©