With Mom out of the house, and the cold pressing on the doors and windows, I decided to take it easy this weekend. Quiet and content, I haven't had a weekend alone in a very long time. Most Saturdays of the recent past have been spent sitting on Martha's couch watching movies from my instant queue on Netflix. She'd get home around 7, and then we'd watch more movies, or grab a bite to eat. Those weekends are nice. Great even. It's nice to go down there and chum it up with the locals for a few days and then beat back to Raleigh on Sunday and do laundry and sit on my couch.
But this past weekend was going to be a guy weekend. I was going to go to Lowe's and look at locks for the doors on the house. Maybe even buy some and drag the drill out of its closet. Screw some deadbolts and chains. Maybe even one of those industrial strength hotel door latches. Maybe a couple slide locks for the top and bottom of the door. Dredge some wood out of a wall and bore screws and throw instructions away. And after that, maybe I'd go to Circuit City and threaten to buy a large flatscreen TV and hook it up and watch the Time Warp guys blow stuff up, or watch some football games with the sound way up, or turn it over to Discovery HD and watch a stream run in high definition. Watch some salmon swim upstream. This was to be a guy's weekend. I had three bottles of Orangina (my recent drug of choice), a pint of Ben & Jerry's and some pizzas. I could sit around and scratch myself and make Tim Allen grunting noises.
Instead, Martha came up. She got out of work early on Saturday, and drove up to see me. I had spent the day watching movies and cleaning up the room after a long week at work, coming home and throwing my clothes on the floor before heading to the shower to wash the flour from my face. As soon as she got here we threw our coats on and headed over to Circuit City. If you haven't heard, and are wondering why that's my new favorite place, they're closing. So, everything is being liquidated. And that means sales. And that means cheap flatscreens. Throwing the dreams of going to DC in March to the wind, we walked in and browsed through the options. I have a new credit card, and the limit was well within the range of buying a TV that night. But, as she tends to do, she talked me off the ledge of irresponsibility. I can't imagine how poor I would be if she weren't around. Actually, when she wasn't around I spent some exorbitant amount of money taking some friends to dinner, and regret it to this day. They could have paid. Well, they probably couldn't afford it, but I had fun, and the food was awesome. I digress. Martha looked at laptops because she refuses to buy a Mac for some reason. Haven't quite pegged that down. Can't put a price on quality. So, dipping in and out of the herds of consumers, we ducked out early, and headed to the grocery store. Martha got a bottle of red, and I got a can of white. Cream of mushroom soup, so not so much white as mushroom colored.
I made Swedish meatballs once home, and it went over well. Apparently, when love is in my heart, I can cook. If it was anything in a sauté pan, forget it, but baking meatballs and heating a sauce is well within my culinary range.
We ended the night by watching Sunshine and eating our dinner. We discussed family as I baked off some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. I was running some test batches to find the correct baking temperature and time on a standard oven. I never can seem to get it right. These came out crunchy, so I need to up the temperature, I think.
Oh, and Sunshine; if you haven't seen it please do. It's all I want to talk about these days. I can't
believe it wasn't more popular when it came out. It has an amazing cast and the story is incredible. And the soundtrack is beyond words. Just the right blend of all of those aspects. If you liked Event Horizon, this is the thinking man's Event Horizon, minus black holes and ghosts.
Sunday, we had a plan. We were going to eat well and have cultural experiences. One of those experiences fell through. Durham was the destination, and the Intergalactic (yep) Jewelry and Bead show was in season. But we needed sustenance first. Earlier in the week I had been reading an article in the News & Observer about the hot new restaurants that have made the grade in the Triangle in 2008. Watt's Grocery was at the bottom of the list because of price, but held its own on food quality. Everything is either locally grown, organic or fair trade. So, you don't have to feel guilty eating there, and it probably tastes better than Pizza Hut's new organic, fair trade pepperoni pizza. I had their signature breakfast of two free range eggs, on-site smoked thick cut bacon, a made from scratch biscuit, homemade raspberry jam and hash browns. The portion sizes were responsible for a small restaurant. I didn't want to be too full and have a miserable, gassy day. I was full, but not stuffed when I left. They also had fresh squeezed orange juice which is very good (but how can you screw up orange juice, really?) and their sweet tea is some of the best I've ever tasted. In fact, it's a close second to the Vortex's honey sweetened iced tea. Martha had the bowl of grits, which looked excellent for being grits. It was covered in cheese, an egg and avocado. Some of the other options were bacon crumblings and green onions. I highly recommend checking out Watt's Grocery the next time you're in the Durham area.
And I'm glad breakfast was good because we were about to have our hearts broken. We drove downtown and parked, paying two dollars for a lot that should have been free over the weekend, but they had a sign saying there was an event going on. Indeed, we thought there was an event going on. The Marriott, as the paper said, was going to host the jewelry and bead show from 10 to 5. Martha was psyched, but as we walked further and further down the halls of the Marriott's conference center we grew disheartened. There was no bead show. There were no people, and when we checked with the quiet front desk attendant she simply said, "No." We walked out, and tried several calls to local events coordinators to no avail. We walked back to the warmth of the Marriott lobby where we were greeted by a doorman. A creepy looking doorman with the skin of a red head and pale blonde hair. His facial hair blended seamlessly with his skin tone, and his voice was that of a young, fresh Tom Waits. He informed us that the newspaper had been wrong and the bead show was the previous weekend.
Close to tears we both went back to the car. Now, Durham, it was war. We drove off, with the hope that somewhere something cool was happening. We had some six hours to kill before the central purpose of the trip, which was a play by the Paperhand Puppet Intervention troop.
Chapel Hill was calling us both. Namely, A Southern Season was beckoning with its warm, soft, thin-veined hand and we answered. Not before checking out Trader Joe's. Martha was not impressed as Oscar Wilde was not impressed with the Atlantic Ocean. I purchased a chocolate shake from Evo's, and enjoyed the hell out of it. It was so rich and pure chocolaty. After leaving Trader Joe's we drove on to A Southern Season and picked out utensils for our future home. Teapots, spatulas, pans, wooden plates, etc. They were having a sale of 15-75% off the entire stock of the store. We didn't buy anything. After Southern Season we walked through the mall and dropped in on Cameron's. They had some cool stuff, but nothing too cool. The coolest thing was probably the skirt with Obama's picture on it. Martha was close to buying it.
Dinner rolled around and we wanted to experience Fishmonger's. I've lived in North Carolina for approximately 13 years now, and I've probably known about Fishmonger's for 12. Never been. Never tasted. Not even at the Taste of Durham festival a few years ago when it was right across the street. Oh well. This weekend was it. We walked in, frozen from the cold, and preceded to stay just as cold inside. It's not very well heated, being a very authentic shoreside seafood restaurant. Martha had the sampler platter of crab legs, clams and peel and eat shrimp in Old Bay seasoning. I had a pound of clams. They were massive. Heavy to pick up, even and I'm a pretty strong guy. We also had fried jalapenos, which ended up being the downfall of the meal. We ate them, and they were fantastic, but our waiter, as well as the rest of the wait staff refused to refill either of our drinks. Martha got a second cup of hot tea, but between us we had one iced tea and one water. I needed more. My mouth was on fire and the ranch dressing wasn't helping. I had to stop eating them and wasted a good portion of the bowl, which I wouldn't have done could I have subdued the pain a bit. Oh well, the food was good, and the atmosphere was
inspiring.
Onto the end of the night, we saw the new Paperhand Puppet Intervention show, The Hungry Ghost. It's the story of what happens to the greedy in the afterlife. This would be Martha's first foray into the PPI experience. Altogether, I would say this isn't the best first show to go to. It was heavily reliant on shadow puppetry, which I enjoy and am impressed by when I see it done well, but it can get laborious sitting in a room staring at three little circular screens for an hour and a half. The scene stealers were two life-sized, greed-seized humans that were full-body controlled. They were contorted and blown out of proportion to symbolize their greed and gluttony. Very well done. I enjoyed the story, but can understand how the first-time viewer might be bored. We'll have to go to their summer show when it's outdoors and more visually capturing.
I had a great weekend with my girl. Guy time is every night these days. I sit in my room and watch Batman cartoons. I get to do what I want to do. When Martha comes around I get a glimpse at what life will be like once I've given up some of that freedom to co-habitate. I like what I see so far.
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