Happy Hot Dog and Vanilla Ice Cream Day

No, not together. That would be gross . . . or would it? Yes, it would.

Yesterday we went out for lunch to celebrate or bemoan the leaving of Peffin, our L1 tech, aka the person who keeps me sane at work by taking care of our mice for me, aka the only other person in the lab studying L1s (thats what I study fyi). Which means that as of the day I return from my vacation my life is going to become significantly more ridiculous and crazy and unorganized and there will be many more mice stories I am sure. For those of your who do not like the fact that I work with mice, pretend I raise them as pets for orphan children. And the fact that they happen to have balls that glow under UV is just an added fun feature.

So anyway, we went to lunch at Cafe Beau Monde, a creperie in . . . what is that Queen's Village? Which is of course very far away from where we work. Our reservations were for 12:30 and we arrived at 1:10 after a 45 minute bus ride on the 40. But whatever, that's where she wanted to go, Nina offered no resistance, so there we went. And it was very good. I hadnt been before because it is usually crowded ont eh weekends when we would normally go crepe-ing. If we normally went crepe-ing. Which we dont. But if we did . . . anyway, I hadnt been. The menu is very confusing and obviously not vegan friendly since these are crepes we are talking about. I had a chicken, broccoli and cheddar buckwheat crepe. It was excellent. And folded into a square! I am not sure how they did that. magic would be my only guess. Nina decided she wanted dessert and since she didnt want to eat dessert alone (because the calories dont count if you force your employees to eat some too?) she forced all of the girls at her end of the table to also get dessert. So I also had a mixed berry wheat crepe. It was also excellent though totally unnecessary. All in all a good experience. Except that Nina insists on calling them pancakes. And it kinda wants to make me scream. Just a little bit.

For dinner I made kale with mushrooms, tomato, onion, garlic, serrano, oregano, marjoram and rosemary and served it over fried polenta. I love kale. It is so versatile and cheap and nutrious all at once. We finally watched No Country for Old Men. I totally get it now though. It was awesome. I mean I am not sure how much I "like" it. But the acting was superb. The direction and the writing was excellent. Really. Tommy Lee Jones was made for that part, or the other way around. Josh Brolin played Llewelyn perfectly (a long way from Brand Walsh in the Goonies). Javier Bardem will haunt my dreams. Really just all around perfect.

Our night was interrupted a bit by some drama. My mom's friend Heidi called me around 7 to ask if we could please help her son who had no money, no cell phone, no house keys and was walking home (8th and Reed) from 44th and Baltimore (about 4 miles) and it was over 90 out with 70% humidity. Confused I said of course. So he arrived around 7:45 with 2 black eyes, one comopletely bloody eye, the other just badly bloodshot and a huge bruise on his face and sweating profusely. So apparently he was riding his bike on the 4th down South St. and was hit by a woman opening her car door and fell on his head. She was nice enough to drive him to the emergency room and he had a huge head bruise and then the blood sort of drained down his face . . . horrible. Let's just say horrible. And his cell phone was destroyed in the accident as well. So that was part one and explained the no phone, but nothing else. So part two is that he went to Arizona last week (for an unfortunate reason) and when he got back on Saturday the airline had lost his bag. And his house keys were in his bag. Now he lives with housemates but the dont get along and kind all sound like jerks. And he doesnt have a cell phone and they dont have a landline. So Sunday he went back to the airport to retrieve his bag at the same time that they were delivering it to his house. However his roomates do not answer the door. So he didnt get it. And then Monday the bag was supposed to be delivered by 3:30. So he waited until 6:30 and then left. When he got home there was a note from 7:15 saying his bag had tried to be delivered (roomates were there, didnt anser the door again). Tuesday he had to work at his internship and so went to work and then walked home. Heidi was supposed to mail him an old cell phone to use in the meantime but he couldnt get into his house. So he walked to his friend's at 44th and Baltimore. His friend never showed up. At this point he had spent all the money he had on him. He called Heidi collect to have her call the friend to no avail (his cell was off). So after waiting for several hours he decided to walk back home. Hence the call to us. So we gave him several glasses of cold water as he recounted his tale. We tried to feed him but he wouldnt eat anything. We let him use our phone to call the airline. They told him to call the courier service. The courier told him to call the airline because they were sending it back to them. So he called them back and they told him to call back. So we waited. About a half hour later they said that that they thought they would probably get it around 9. So we continued watching our movie and hydrating him. At 9 they said that they had it, so we got a carshare Mini and drove down to the airport and he got his bag. Then we brough him to a friend's place (right down the street from Beau Monde ironically (full circle, full circle)). Of course when we get there, is she there. No. But she was on her way. So we gave him money for a cab and wished him luck and told him to call whenever he needed help (even collect). So hopefully things will start working out for him.

In better news, Noah, the guy I work with who's father just died. His wife had their second son on Monday. William "Will" Silas Goodman. 10 lbs, 4.4 oz, 22"!!!!

So far we have some interesting herb poll results. One vote of cilantro as least favorite and 2 for cilantro as most favorite. I really wish I knew who you were! Sigh, oh anonomous voting!

Ok, a pretty easy puzzle today I think. The cleaning crew at the motel always found small change on the rugs. One day they found a pile of coins worth $4.40, with equal numbers of quarters, dimes and nickles. How many of each did they find?