One Should Always Eat Foods In Season

Best grits joke I’ve ever heard was about a couple crisscrossing the nation, whose journeys took them to the Deep South.

Having traveled all day, they bedded down in a motel in Evergreen, AL. It’s tiny town, just off and barely east of I-65, and south of Georgiana. Perhaps you know exactly where it is… but chances are you don’t. So, here’s a map link to help you out. Or, if you prefer, here’s a pic.

So the next morning, as they were checking out of the Sleep Inn motel, they asked where they could get breakfast.

“Shoney’s is just down the street,” replied the Desk Clerk. “They have an excellent breakfast buffet that’s to die for!”

The couple thanked her, walked out the door, got in their car, and headed the few hundred feet down to Shoney’s.

As they walked in and were seated, they took a few minutes to look over the menu, and while talking among themselves, the waiter walked up and took their drinks order.

“I’ll be back in a few moments to take your order,” he said as he turned away.

When he arrived at their table, with their orange juice, water, and coffee on a service platter, he started placing their drinks on the table and asked, “Have y’all decided? Our breakfast buffet is always popular, or you can order from the menu, or a la carte.”

Curiously, the couple’s better half replied, “What’s on the breakfast buffet?”

He began naming off the items. “Well, we have cheese & regular grits, oatmeal, 2 types sausage – link & patty – chicken fingers, bacon of course, dirty rice, biscuits, plain & sausage gravy, cantaloupe, strawberries, honeydew, grapes, and cottage cheese.”

“Wow! That sounds like a lot to choose from!,” exclaimed the couple’s better half, as she shut the menu and handed it over to him.

“Yes ma’am, we do our best to have quite a variety of items to offer, and if there’s an item that you want that’s not on there, we’ll do our best to get it for you!” He smiled broadly as he delivered his short dietary soliloquy. The gap in his toothy grin gave the couple a heartwarming, and down-home feeling.

Cuss…tomer Service, With A Smile!😄

You gotta’ feel for the folks on the other end of the phone in corporate Customer Care / Customer Service for various companies. Sometimes, they catch Hell. Seriously, they do.

Folks may sometimes call up mad as a hornet, irritated – for whatever reason – and then proceed to “take it out” on whoever answers the phone.

It’s a DIFFICULT job, to be certain, but someone’s gotta’ do it.

So… hat’s OFF to those unsung heroes of business enterprise!

Now, let’s get real… real hard, and really real.

Most folks, I would presume, don’t walk around with a chip on their shoulder. They’re not constantly engaging or berating themselves with conflicting internal dialogue, or hearing voices in their head. In other words, not only are they sane, they’re moderately happy, satisfied with life, and things in general. While there are occasions in which they become dissatisfied, angry, or upset, those very same sane people communicate, and collaborate with others to make others aware of problems, so that solutions and corrections to them may be made.

Of course, few would suppose that

Ten Great Tips for 2011: #9

Happy Wednesday, also sometimes known as “Hump Day”!

Why “hump”?

Well, we’re half way over, and the middle is sometimes called the “hump.”

Yeup…

Hold on, baby… Friday’s comin’!

And you know what this means, don’t you?!

It’s time once again for our weekday installment of… Ten Great Tips for 2011!

Without further ado, ladies and gentlemen… on this 19th day of January, I give you #9!

What a Great Day!

Wow!

You’d have thought it was my birthday or something!

Today was one the best days!

I started out to work, but after my arrival was notified that I could take the day off. Not too bad so far, eh?

Then, I went to a Krispy Kreme Doughnuts shop, ordered a dozen glazed on the half shell with coffee, and read the newspaper, checked in on FaceBook, and swapped messages with friends locally and abroad.

Then, I went to the

Thanksgiving Carp (or should it be “crap”?)

My Thanksgiving this year was unremarkable.

I said jokingly – although with serious intent – that I should’ve gone to the homeless shelter to eat. At least that way I would’ve had some turkey, dressing and traditional food!

The ironic part of it all, was that I bought enough groceries to feed an army: 25 lb turkey, 20 lb ham, 10 lb pork tenderloin, 7 lb of three types sausage, 2 lb slab-cut bacon, mushrooms (shitake, portobello & white), onions, leeks, fresh spinach, cream, genuine maple syrup, pecans, walnuts, tomato paste, salad dressings, cheeses, and much, much more (over $300 worth)! The meat is now residing in the freezer, while the other perishables are in the refrigerator’s cooler drawer.

Perhaps it was my Matthew 22:9 moment. The well-read will recall that is the parable of the feast taught by Jesus Christ, in which the king made ready a feast but the invited guests didn’t show up. So, he commanded his servants to go out into the city streets, highways and byways and bid all to come to the feast.

My roommate is “vegetabletarian,” wasn’t invited anywhere by anyone she knew, and I didn’t get the invite from my folks because they were invited by my brother’s in-laws (Clifford & Jolene) to their place. I thought that was kind’a ass-holey of them, not my folks, to not invite me. I’m the elder of two, have neither spouse nor children, and don’t lead a secret life. Which is to say, C&J and all the gang know that. I guess they gave me the great big “FUCK YOU” this year.

But oh, dear LORD… don’t let ’em think for one moment they might be “dissing” me – their artificially nice world would cave in around them. But know what’s weird? He’s a Baptist-turned-Independent “holiness” preacher.

See what I mean? At least if I ate with the homeless folks, I’d have been around some folks that would’ve taken an interest in me.

As it was, I enjoyed the fellowship of one human being – my roommate and her dog Atticus – and one other… Mr. Jack Daniel’s whiskey.

Okay, enough carping.

So, the first turkey I had this season was at – of all places – a Chinese restaurant, the Sunday after Thanksgiving! Oh yeah… I also had some of my favorites: octopus salad, raw oysters, shrimp and kimchi, along with some beef – cooked, of course (though I’ve eaten it raw… yum! *LOL*).

I had a couple of laughs that day with my waitress and the folks at the table next to mine. I’m a personable fellow, and I like to laugh and smile.

Folks that know me, know that.

In retrospect, I suppose it all worked out for the best… though I still think it sucks.