Wednesday, February 28, 2018

STILL CRAZY, AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

John Boy and Toad do The Gator at our toga party in Houston.
Just got back from visiting our BFFs in College Station. It had been so long since we'd seen them in person (though we text back and forth pretty much all day every day -- especially when we're both cooking our Blue Apron dinners and comparing notes), I did what I always do when I'm having way too much fun -- I forgot to take a single photo!

At Our House In Bahrain
One of the best/worst events of the visit occurred when they took us back to a place we had visited some time ago, Café Eccell Kitchen+Spirits. They are noted for their wood-fired pizzas, but also serve various Tex-Mex and Mediterranean specialties, as well as an infamous strawberry tart. They have a lovely, spacious bar that has added hand-made, chef-driven cocktails to their beer and wine assortment and, just recently, they added a drive-thru whose specialty tacos were rumored to be Eccellent! (It's true! Mine was like a Cuban Sandwich in a tortilla. Yum!)

Two Miracle Babies, Born Within A Couple of Months of Each Other
A Mutual Love of the Texas Hill Country
Unfortunately, those tacos aren't available inside the restaurant. However, my buddy Paula, who is the queen of investigation, heard a rumor that you could drive through to get your tacos, then park and take your bag of tacos inside, where you can sit at a bar table and order drinks and queso to go with them. So that's what we did, because that's how we roll whenever we're with these crazy buddies of ours! Being brave enough to walk in the door clutching our bag of tacos was actually the best part of the evening, though, not the worst. For that we have to back up to when we were trying to place our order at the drive-thru.

Never having been there before, we had no idea what we wanted to order, so all four of these half-blind geezers were struggling to lean out the window at once, trying to read what was in every single taco, then make up our minds about who wanted what. It took a while, as you can imagine. But that was okay, because we were the only ones in line. Or so we thought, until we suddenly heard and smelled burning rubber, just before a car went screeching past and a young man yelled out his window "For F's sake, make up your effing mind!" Then he raced over to a parking lot exit where he got stuck trying to make a lefthand turn. He was still there, waiting to turn, when we got our food. Not the sharpest tool in the shed, that boy, since just one aisle over was an exit with a traffic light and a left-turn signal.


Actually, the more I think about it, maybe that was the best part of the weekend after all! Although, it was a close tie with handing over all the baseball loot and photographs Hubby got in Cuba, for their son Coach Sanford to auction off next fall to raise money for his team. I have a feeling he will be bidding on at least one of the photos himself!


A female cigar factory worker, with cap, cleats, and glove, ready to head to the sandlot the minute she gets off work.
The sandlot that was directly in front of our B&B, where there was almost always a game going on.