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Serendipity and Su
Sep. 20th, 2006 07:30 pmI've known Su since 1980, when she applied to be a freelance correspondent at the cooperatively owned weekly newspaper I was part of at the time. We wanted a reporter to send in news of events from a very small hilltown in our coverage area -- a hilltown the weekly paper ignored. She lived there. As it happens, I now live there too. Last night I took her out for her birthday...
( Backstory on Su -- not required reading )
We have joked about our effect on our birthday restaurant visitations. We've gone to a restaurant, loved it -- and three times, the restaurant has later burned to the ground. Other restaurants have gone out of business (which, granted, new restaurants tend to do). We jokingly call it "the curse."
This time, she suggested a pricey restaurant we went to when she took me out for my b-day. It had survived the curse. I made sure I had enough cash in case they didn't take debit, picked her up at her house, and we drove there. Mind you, we are again out in a rural hilltown with hardly any restaurants at all, and at a distance from other hill towns.
We get there ... the building is dark. Not burned down, not out of business, as far as we can tell. But closed. Maybe because it was primary election night and the owners decided everyone would be glued to the TV? (We've had an interesting Democratic primary race for governor here, and our neck of the woods is very Democratic.)
So there we are in the dark, befuddled about what to do next. I don't know the hill towns up here like Su does. She says there used to be a restaurant the next town over. It had closed, but she thought it had new owners.
Off through the dark and the rain and the fog we go, yakking all the way.
It's open. It has the requisite liquor license. (We would have settled for a beer and wine license.) We go in. We are the only patrons at that relatively late hour. We each order a drink, I pull out my present, the staff coos over us because it's a birthday (sorta -- just kind of late).
It was a wonderful place, with wonderful food, wonderful, caring staff (most lesbians, I suspect), and much less expensive than the place we'd planned to go to. And, upon leaving, I asked if they had menus to take with us... because, if we had not gone by such a round-about way, it wouldn't be far from us at all. (Think of a circle. We went three-quarters around a circle to get there. Going home was the final quarter of the circle. A cinch.)
Su likes brew pubs. (I don't even like beer.) This place has its own beer. She and spouse Chris are definitely going there.
We would never have discovered it if the other place had been open.
We got back in my car after a wonderful meal and gab, and a heavy tip on my part (more than 20%), and we both sent light to the establishment:: May you stay in business. And please, don't burn down.
( Backstory on Su -- not required reading )
We have joked about our effect on our birthday restaurant visitations. We've gone to a restaurant, loved it -- and three times, the restaurant has later burned to the ground. Other restaurants have gone out of business (which, granted, new restaurants tend to do). We jokingly call it "the curse."
This time, she suggested a pricey restaurant we went to when she took me out for my b-day. It had survived the curse. I made sure I had enough cash in case they didn't take debit, picked her up at her house, and we drove there. Mind you, we are again out in a rural hilltown with hardly any restaurants at all, and at a distance from other hill towns.
We get there ... the building is dark. Not burned down, not out of business, as far as we can tell. But closed. Maybe because it was primary election night and the owners decided everyone would be glued to the TV? (We've had an interesting Democratic primary race for governor here, and our neck of the woods is very Democratic.)
So there we are in the dark, befuddled about what to do next. I don't know the hill towns up here like Su does. She says there used to be a restaurant the next town over. It had closed, but she thought it had new owners.
Off through the dark and the rain and the fog we go, yakking all the way.
It's open. It has the requisite liquor license. (We would have settled for a beer and wine license.) We go in. We are the only patrons at that relatively late hour. We each order a drink, I pull out my present, the staff coos over us because it's a birthday (sorta -- just kind of late).
It was a wonderful place, with wonderful food, wonderful, caring staff (most lesbians, I suspect), and much less expensive than the place we'd planned to go to. And, upon leaving, I asked if they had menus to take with us... because, if we had not gone by such a round-about way, it wouldn't be far from us at all. (Think of a circle. We went three-quarters around a circle to get there. Going home was the final quarter of the circle. A cinch.)
Su likes brew pubs. (I don't even like beer.) This place has its own beer. She and spouse Chris are definitely going there.
We would never have discovered it if the other place had been open.
We got back in my car after a wonderful meal and gab, and a heavy tip on my part (more than 20%), and we both sent light to the establishment:: May you stay in business. And please, don't burn down.
