Blessed are the Chickens

If you can arrange it, I highly recommend attending a church where one of the members has an organic farm.

That way on Sundays you can pick up a little bread, a little wine, some forgiveness and absolution, and a dozen or so fresh, free-range eggs.

Not a bad way to start your week.

By Request

If you happened to listen to NPR this morning - or last Sunday - they've been talking about doughnuts. They even had someone who wrote the history of the doughnut or something doing a live online chat. Seemed like a sign from above.

"Ode to the Krispy Kreme"

(Or, how Southerns know way too much about where and when to get food that's bad for you.)

A while back I regaled a few willing readers with a tale of woe about how Krystal no longer makes vidalia onion rings. At the end I mentioned that one of Nashville's Krystals has a particularly onerous drive-through and how one night some friends and I almost became ensnared in said drive-through while trying to find an open doughnut store.

Confused? Intrigued? Hungry? Well, one very kind reader requested the rest of that story and I thought it only polite to oblige. (That'll teach her!)

So picture, if you will, a Saturday night and two friends - let's call them "HE" and "SHE"- and I went to a late movie in Green Hills (a neighborhood on the west side of Nashville). We got out of the movie around 11:00, and as we were leaving the theater, HE said he wanted to stop at the Donut Den to pick up some doughnuts for the next morning.

The "Den" is SUPPOSED to be open until midnight. But, as we found out from my last trip to Krystal, sometimes the universe disappoints. And sure enough, the Donut Den was CLOSED. (When I tell this story to people from Nashville they always scrunch their brow, become distracted, and start to mumble "but why would the Donut Den be closed?!?")

So, we pull out of the "Den" and onto the street. HE says that now that he can't get doughnuts, he really, really wants doughnuts. SHE and I say that now we're hungry too because of all the doughnut talk. (And no, the movie was not a late night showing of Laser Floyd). Someone - it was during the summer, I believe, so it was probably me - reminded us all that Krystal was up the street just a little further. Being a valid option when it's late and you're hungry for something to clog your arteries, we tried that. When we got to Krystal the line for the drive-through was almost out to the street. Decisions had to be made. And the rest of the conversation went something like this:

SHE: That's a long line. I don't want to sit in that line.
HE: Well, I'm not going in.
ME: No. Me neither. But we don't want to get stuck in that line - you get halfway and there's that retaining wall and then you're trapped. We could be there forever.
SHE: I can't get stuck in that line. I'll go insane.
HE: And I really wanted doughnuts. Krystal doesn't have doughnuts.
SHE: Maybe the guy at Donut Den was just taking the trash out or having a smoke and locked the front door until he got back. Maybe we should try again.
ME: But if we do we lose our place in line.

[silence as we all take a moment to ponder the options]

HE: WE COULD CALL THEM FROM THE CAR!
ME: Excellent. I'll call information. [dials 411]
OPERATOR: Nextel 411, this is Yolanda, what listing?
ME: Nashville, Tennessee. The Donut Den on Hillsboro Pike.
OPERATOR: Thank you. Here's your number....

[ring... ring... ring... ring... ring... ring... ring...]

ME: No answer.
SHE: Hey, the line moved.
HE: Damn it. I really want doughnuts. And now Krystal sounds disgusting.
SHE: Well, we knew that already.
ME: What about Krispy Kreme?
HE: It's not open.
SHE and ME: It's open 24 hours!
HE: Only the Nolensville Pike (on the south side) store is open 24-hours, but it's closed for construction - they're rebuilding it.

[Drive-through line inches forward]

ME: Rebuilding! But it was so cool - all retro with the Formica and chrome counter. They're keeping all of that, aren't they?
HE: No. It was all only held together with 50 years of grease. I heard the fire marshall said to level it.
SHE: What about the Elliston Place store (downtown-ish)?
HE: No. It closes at 11:00.
SHE and ME: How the hell do you know that!?!
HE: I have a friend that lives in Bellevue (The west side. Waaaay on the west side. Like Memphis.) whose claim to fame is how one night at 10 'till 11 he made it from Bellevue to the Elliston Place Krispy Kreme before it closed AND didn't get stopped by the police. He's very proud...
ME: I'm gonna call, just to make sure.
HE: I'm telling you - it's CLOSED.
SHE: Hey we're moving again - and we're getting closer to the wall. Hurry up.
ME: Well maybe since the other store is under renovation they're open later.
HE: I'm telling you. They close at 11:00.
ME: Let's just find out. What else are we going to do?
SHE: We're gonna get stuck in the damn drive-through if you don't hurry up.
ME: [dials 411]
OPERATOR: Nextel 411, this is Yolanda, what listing?
ME: [covering the phone and whispering loudly] Sonofabitch! It's the same woman!
HE: [starts giggling so hard he's about to pee himself]
SHE: Who cares! Ask her for the number. There are only three cars ahead of us before the wall.
ME: [speaking in a lower tone to disguise voice] Nashville, Tennessee. Krispy Kreme... On Elliston Place....
YOLANDA: Uh-huh... Thank you.... Here's your number...

[ring... ring... ring... ring... ring...]

ME: No answer.
HE: Really?! You don't say...
SHE: Two cars. TWO CARS!
ME: Maybe the Krispy Kreme on Nolensville is open again.
HE: Did I not just say that it was closed?
ME: Fine. But there has to be another Krispy Kreme in the greater Nashville area.
HE: Where?
ME: I don't know. Kentucky? But it doesn't matter though because I don't want to call information - it will be that same woman again. You call.
HE: It probably wasn't the same woman. How do you know if it was the same woman?
ME: Her name was Yolanda. What are the chances?
HE: True. But she won't know who you are and she probably gets a lot of doughnut-related calls this time of nigh ---
SHE: ONE CAR!! THERE'S ONLY ONE CAR LEFT BEFORE THE WALL - THEN WE'RE TRAPPED. CALL, DAMN IT!!
HE: HURRY!!!
ME: Alright, alright! [dials 411]
OPERATOR: Nextel 411, this is Yolanda, what listing?
ME: [covers the phone again] You've GOT to be kidding me!!
HE: [giggling AND snorting]
SHE: THIS IS NOT FUNNY! We've already been sitting here for how long?? I don't even like Krystal. I HATE Krystal. I DO NOT want to be trapped in the Krystal drive-through. Do you understand me?!?

[Keeps ranting while I talk to information]

ME: [full of shame, not even bothering to disguise voice] uhhh, yeah. Nashville, Tennessee. Krispy Kreme on Nolensville Pike.
YOLANDA: Y'all are in serious need of some doughnuts.
ME: I KNOW. I'm so embarrassed. I thought I was calling some big national Nextel call center.
YOLANDA: No girl, I'm in Nashville. The only one here tonight.
ME: That's hilarious. We're in Green Hills and were going to go to Donut Den, but it was closed.
YOLANDA: [probably scrunching her brow] It was CLOSED?!?
ME: I KNOW. So we're in the Krystal drive-through as back-up, but we don't really want Krystal, plus you know, there's that wall, and we don't want to get stuck.
YOLANDA: Oh yeah. I know what you're talking about. And all those drunks in line. Takes forever.
SHE: THE LINE IS ABOUT TO MOVE AGAIN! SEE - PEOPLE ARE TAKING OFF THEIR BRAKES!
HE: [uncontrollable giggling and snorting]
ME: [covers phone] Just wait here a second. [uncovers phone] I KNOW - so, then we were going to go to the Krispy Kreme on Elliston -
YOLANDA: Well, I thought it closed at 11:00, but I didn't know if I should tell you that or not.
ME: It's okay. Someone else in the car knew it would be too but I was hoping that since the one on Nolen --
SHE: WE HAVE TO MOVE FORWARD IN LINE - PEOPLE ARE GOING TO HONK!
ME: [covers the phone] No they won't. Just a second! [uncovers the phone] I'm sorry about that, Yolanda... I was just thinking that since the Nolensville store is under construction that maybe Elliston would be open later.

[car behind us honks]

HE: [no noise coming from him, just convulsions of laughter and small tears streaming down his cheeks]
YOLANDA: Honey - the construction is finished! They reopened Friday at midnight.
ME: I KNEW IT!

[car behind us honks again]

SHE: I'M GOING. TO KILL YOU. [does the mom-style awkward backwards reach from the driver's seat into the back to try to smack me and/or take my phone]
ME: [dodging and weaving] Nolensville reopened last night! Thanks Yolanda!

[SHE immediately whips the car out of the drive-through and back onto the road]

YOLANDA: Y'all have fun! Bye!

We drive over to the south side of Nashville to the newly-built Krispy Kreme. The drive-through line is out to the street.

SHE: Dear God, not again...
HE: [not fully recovered, speaking through gasps as he tries to catch his breath] There... Is... A... Krystal... Down the road... A little... [reverts to fits of laughter]
SHE: So help me...

This line is moving much faster though, so we wait. And as we wait you can see the people in line ahead of us pointing at the inside of the new store. No doubt talking about what it looked like for so long. The "Hot Donuts Now" sign lights up while we're waiting. People from inside their cars can be seen raising their arms and cheering. A car horn honks in enthusiasm.

When we get to the speaker box back of the store, there's a banner over it that says "Welcome Home." We order. We get our doughnuts. We start to eat them before we're done paying. Before we get halfway back home we're well on our way to a blissful sugar coma.

HE: You know what you should name your Chinese kid?

[puzzled pause as we try to figure out what he's talking about]

ME: What?
HE: You. You were talking at dinner about how you plan to one day adopt a little girl from China.
ME: Yeah...
HE: Well, I know what you should name her.
ME: Please don't say Krystal.
HE: [snort] No.
ME: Krispy Kreme???
SHE: Oh, you're appalled at Krystal, but you offer up Krispy Kreme as a viable option.
HE: Nooooo.

[Long pause again, then...]

ALL: YOLANDA!

Summer Lovin' Week 6

No Title Necessary

It would be nice to say that this photo was taken on a two week stay in a rambling old beach house. In reality it was taken during a four-hour stay in beach chairs my mom and I bought at the Piggly Wiggly. But that's just fine. It was what we needed and, let's be honest, the beach is wasted on someone like me in the summer. The thought of putting on a swim suit makes me break out in hives and by 11:06am I start to get too hot. I'd much rather hide out in the mountains in July and August and then creep down to the beach in November, or January even. What can I say? I'm a circus freak. A good PR person would say that I just enjoy the serenity and isolation of the beach in late autumn and winter because it allows for more introspection and creative thought. But circus freak is probably more accurate...

The photos were taken on the Isle of Palm, just outside Charleston, SC. My job's annual conference was in Charleston this year. I had a nice suite for the week that I wasn't really going to get to enjoy so I invited my mom to come along and enjoy it for me.

The schedule during the week went pretty much like this:

7:00am - Start Work
7:00pm - Stop Work
7:05pm - Leave Hotel in Search of Food
8:30pm - Work From Room While Watching the Olympics
9:00pm - Michael Phelps
11:00pm - Stop Work
11:30pm - Sleep

God bless Charleston and it's totally walkable downtown with a restaurant every 1/2 block. It made eating dinner soooo much better than Room Service Chicken Pasta Whatnot that I would have ordered every night like I have the past two conferences.

Thursday - the last day of the conference - I was finished early so we went for our first trip to the beach. It was lovely. We walked along the water's edge until we worked up an appetite, got our flip flops all mucky, thoroughly soaked our capri pants from the knees down and let my hair go all Rosanne Rosannadanna in the humidity.

We spotted what looked like a restaurant just up from the path to the beach so we decided to check it out. Downstairs it was your typical touristy beach bar/restaurant - The Banana Cabana - with life preservers and fishing nets tacked to the wall, patrons drinking unnaturally green alcoholic beverages, live music from a guy who looked suspiciously like he might subject me to a Jimmy Buffet song at any moment, and a menu with all kinds of deliberate misspellings and inappropriate apostrophes, like "cap'n's fish 'n' chip's."

The menu for the upstairs restaurant featured various freshly-prepared seafood and locally-grown produce with artfully worded descriptions of the daily specials. It looked delicious. And fancy. At least fancy for Rosanne Rosannadanna and her mucky flip flops and wet capri pants. And after running around and catering to every whim and whine of 200 conference attendees and one boss for four very long days, the mere possibility of climbing the stairs to a maitre'd who would look down his nose at us, ask the dreaded "do you have reservations?" and, if we're lucky, give us a table by the bathroom, was just more than I thought my ego could endure. Oh but the alternative... fried things in plastic baskets... the threat of a "Cheeseburger in Paradise" sing-a-long... Room Service Chicken Pasta Whatnot was starting to sound like a viable alternative to the decision before me.

Thankfully my mother is much more brazen than I am when it comes to some things. Stops people on the street to ask for directions. Strikes up conversations with total strangers in line at the grocery. Makes friends with hotel housekeeping. For me this strategy usually ends in disaster, but she usually winds up learning a more interesting route to her destination, the best out-of-the-way restaurant, or getting extra toiletries without even having to ask. So, we march up the stairs, are greeted by the greeter guy, and she immediately asks "are we too casual?" He looks sort of confused for a second but says "absolutely not." We get a seat by the window with a view of the ocean. It's all simple and elegant and casual and not a bit pretentious. And the food... holy-moly. Shrimp and grits with Andouille sausage and heirloom tomatoes that literally melted in my mouth.

The next morning we headed back out to the beach where we waded in the surf again (above), followed silly birds around, read for a bit, and I fiddled with the fancy camera from work and took lots of morning-sunlight-on-ocean photos.

And four hours at the beach worked out just fine. Hopefully I'll get to go back to the beach this winter... you know... for some introspection and creative thinking... but it was nice to be on the "real" beach in summer with the rest of the world like a normal person. Well, as normal as you can feel with Rosanne Rosannadanna hair...

Summer Lovin' Week 3

"Lord of the Rings No More"

I'm not slacking. Honest. I made a very legitimate attempt at taking a couple of different photos this weekend. One was of lightning bugs. Enough said. The other was of a trip I only dare to make once - maybe twice - during the summer. To Krystal. Please don't judge.

If you live north of the Mason Dixon Line you are perhaps unfamiliar with the "wonder" that is Krystal. (Please note - it's not "Crystal" as in something pretty and sparkly. No, no. It's "Krystal" as in "we've changed the spelling to be more like a strip club.") Up North your closest equivalent would be White Castle. So you get the picture: little mystery meat burgers that you purchase by the sackful and eat late at night when your judgement is impaired. Very popular with college students and rednecks. A friend of a friend, who is a police officer and works the night shift on Saturdays, gets the majority of his DUI arrests just by observing the behavior of folks waiting in the Krystal drive-through. Like shooting fish in a barrel.

I have been known to eat at Krystal every once in a great while, but usually only in the summer. Why? Because in the summertime Krystal makes onion rings. Vidalia onion rings. But only in the summer. Why? Because Krystal is ALL ABOUT seasonal cooking with locally-grown vegetables, of course! But seriously, I have no idea why. I just know that once or twice, between June 1 and August 31, I will suffer the tragedy that is Krystal because somehow (and most of me doesn't really want to know how) these onion rings are de. lic. ious. And to top it off? A frozen Coke. Because that's just always yummy.

So late Saturday afternoon I was starving and - have I mentioned? - had been ripping out my living room ceiling all day and I thought that if ever there was a legitimate excuse to go to Krystal, this was certainly it. I scrubbed some of the black soot from my face, put on a ball cap and a giant pair of sunglasses and ran to my car hoping no neighbor would see me.

The drive-through was just as I imagined it would be. The car in front of me had a woman in the driver's seat in a tank top with a cigarette dangling from her lips as she ordered for herself and the free-range toddler who was busy trying to climb out the passenger seat window and/or breathe clean air. When it was my turn I pulled up to the speaker. The voice from inside said "Whaddayawant." I glanced at the menu and felt a small sense of panic. "Ummm," I said fearfully, "do you not have onion rings any more?" "What!?" said the voice from inside. "On-ion-Rings" I repeated. "No," they answered indignantly, as though I might as well have asked for flan.

I was crushed. But luckily - and you have no idea how luckily - I was at the Krystal on the east side. Not at the west side Krystal near my old apartment. Because at the east side Krystal you can get out of drive-through if tragedy strikes. The west side Krystal has a retaining wall around the back that creates a drive-through-point-of-no-return. And if, while you're waiting, say a fryer catches on fire, or someone passes out at the wheel before making it to the window, you are trapped like a rat with nothing to do but ponder your poor life choices.

It happened to me once and I vowed that as God as My Witness it would never happen again. A few years later it did almost happen again in a late-night, post movie race with two friends to find an open donut store via cell phone while waiting in the west side Krystal drive-through as back up. I won't bore you with the details as I'm sure you've had enough of trans-fat-related lore for one day. But, just to warn you, I might have to resort to telling it if yet another photo shoot goes awry. For now I will only say that it does have a happy ending. And that it will be titled Ode to the Krispy Kreme. See!? More interesting already.

So here's to yet another week and to the end of July. Summer's point-of-no-return, if you will. Here's hoping the rest goes by enjoyably. Or at least without incident. (And, if you happen to have your own source for vidalia onion rings, please call me...)

Candy Corn is a Gateway Drug. And Other Weekend Epiphanies...

My Weekend:

Football. It wasn't enough that our game wasn't on national TV like it normally is/should be, or that we had to play the "brunch game" at 11:30 (How can you be expected to get a respectable amount of tailgating accomplished before kick-off?). But then our defense and special teams had to just lay on the field like roadkill. Grrrr... At church on Sunday one of my favorite people (Ned) and I had a heart-to-heart about the state of Volunteer football ('cause that's what you talk about in church on Sunday in the South) and he articulated perfectly what my subconscious has known for a while:

Good-hearted, honest, loyal, kind, supportive people don't always make the best coaches.

It breaks my big orange heart, but it's true. I LOVE Phil Fulmer. There's no better example of a Tennessee Volunteer. He LOVES our state, our school, our team and each and every one of those players and coaches like they're his brothers and his kids. But lately it seems that love and devotion have become blinders, and promoting too much from within, being too slack with young guys who need more discipline, and sticking too much with tradition instead of trying new things on the field, have started to take it's toll. To every yin there's a yang and we seem to have reached the yang portion of the program. I'm not saying that we need to fire Phil and hire some vile, disgusting, obnoxious, rude, tantrum-throwing, snake-in-the-grass just because they win football games (yeah, that's right, I'm lookin' at you, Visor Boy). But something needs to change.

As you could imagine, about 30 seconds after the clock ran down, I needed an outlet for my misery that didn't involve chocolate, martinis, pasta, heroine or expensive shoes. So my SIL and I found salvation at the next best thing...

Target. Why? Because there were a lot of household items that I needed? No. Because - as all good people know - when the world is crazy and out of control and doesn't make any sense, you go where everything is clean and orderly and pretty and affordable. I've joked before that if I had all the time and money in the world I would go back to school to get a degree in film and my first student film would be a remake of Breakfast at Tiffany's titled, Diet Coke at Target.

"The only thing that does any good is to jump in a cab and go to Tiffany's. Calms me down right away. The quietness and the proud look of it; nothing very bad could happen to you there."
- Holly Golightly

So, that's not really a revelation from this weekend, but I'm right, no? We pushed our happy little red cart around until I felt better and along the way a few happy items happened to fall in said little red cart: adorable black tweed ballet flats, a pre-treatment stain stick thingy, dog treats, cereal, a frozen pizza, yogurt, diet coke (duh) and yet another bag of...

Candy Corn. Ahhh candy corn. I don't really even like candy (all other dessert-related items, yes, but sugary candy, not so much). Like crisp, cool air, changing leaves and college football, those cute little striped kernels are a sign of fall, my favorite season. But, alas, they are not without a dark side. I was snacking on candy corn Sunday evening while organizing kitchen cabinets and with every bite I slowly started to feel that sense of dread. You could almost hear the screeching of the violins from Psycho tuning up in the background... that impending anxiety... THE HOLIDAYS. And like candy corn, I love the holidays, but they too have a dark side. There's so many things to stress about - money, travel, shopping, decorating, entertaining, family drama, AND ESPECIALLY food. And that's when it hit me -

It all starts with the damn candy corn.

Those tiny little innocuous bits of sugary autumn goodness are fine, but all they do is give you the courage to move on to the seemingly innocuous, but actually evil, little individually wrapped trick-or-treat candy bars. And that leads to:

Thanksgiving and stuffing and casseroles and pumpkin pie and apple cobbler because what? They're FRUIT! And VEGETABLES! What's the big deal? Look - you can even see their pictures on the food pyramid. How bad could they be?!? So now you're emboldened and ready for:

Christmas. You've already been so good only eating tiny candy bars and fruits and vegetables that you eat the cookies and cake and other things you couldn't otherwise justify. Besides, if all else fails, you just have to ask,"WWJD"?!? Because I tell you what he would do - it's his birthday! He'd eat the cake. And before the sugar high can wear off, there's:

New Year's Eve. Otherwise Dick Clark would have been out of a job a long time ago because everyone would be too depressed to leave the house. But we're not done yet. You can't have sugary without salty, so to cap off the holiday season, God gives us the first of two National Observances of Salt:

New Year's Day College Football Bowl Games (and then later the Super Bowl). Chips and dip and laying on the couch, taking the stress of the last few weeks out on referees and the teams that are keeping your team down in the BCS poll. Good times.

Is there a Halloween Candy Wing at Betty Ford?