Oddities and Obsessions

My Big Fat Greek Spread

I've discovered there's no place in the middle when it comes to olives. People love olives or they adamantly, for sure, no doubt about it, can not stand them. I've never heard anyone say, "Olives? Oh, I can take them or leave them."

I'm one who loves them. As long as they are not from a can. Don't call me an olive snob, though.

I grew up on black olives from a can. My dad and I could eat a can together at one sitting. We never had to share. My mom and my brother were from the "can not stand them" camp. Now, though, I prefer them from a jar or from a bin in the deli case at the grocery store. Any color olives, with pits or without, stuffed with almonds or garlic or feta or jalapenos – I'm there.

Coffee Fix

My husband and I managed to miss the whole coffee craze. Up until a few years ago I had never had a full cup – try to restrain your horror – and he would have one only when desperate for caffeine. If it was past 10 in the morning he'd move right past a morning cup and reach for a Mountain Dew instead. All that changed one fateful trip to New England where we were introduced to Dunkin' Donuts. Sure, we knew they made good donuts, but apparently their pastry treats were not the reason for the lines cascading out the door. It was for their coffee, which we didn't hold high hopes for.

For all you DD fanatics, we weren't stupid, we just live in Southern California and we aren't privileged enough to have a single store in our region. Back then if we wanted to "Run on Dunkin" we had to drive 7 hours to Arizona. Coming from a region dominated by Starbucks, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and Seattle's Best, we had pretty low expectations of a "donut shop" coffee. Wow, were we wrong. From the first burning sip – coffee is hot – to the last we just couldn't believe how delicious it was. Or understand how they kept it hot for sooooo long. We had found our java heroin and there was no going back.

Giving Back - On My Way Home

christopherstreetsign Last night as I was walking out of the 1 train on Christopher Street headed home, I saw out of the corner of my eye an elderly woman with a walker who was asking where to find the PATH train to New Jersey. As I passed, I overheard someone tell her that she had to circle back to 14th Street to connect. Knowing that was wrong and headed to the PATH myself, I looped back and stepped in telling her it was in fact in the other direction, that I was headed that way, and would she like to go with me.

As we very slowly crossed Christopher Street dodging shoppers, drag queens, and people hustling to and fro various holiday celebrations, she told me that we were destined to meet and that I was her "angel sent from heaven." She went on to tell me a string of rambling tales including one about her evil landlord, who was trying to cheat her out of money. The conversation kept getting nuttier as she bounced from topic to topic. She told me that her now deceased husband had contracted polio in La Isla Mujeres "doing the Hemingway thing" and that Mrs. Roosevelt ("not FDR") had offered her a job in Washington, DC; but she did not want to live there. She said that she had been homeless (which I believed) and that her people were aristocracy from Latvia (it was plausible). At one point, she started yelling and screaming about the "Fascists" and I thought to myself, "What I have I gotten into and what am I going to do with her?”

Oddities and Obsessions