Coffee Chronicles …and Close, But Why Are We Late Again?

Whaddup Choniclers?

Day three in Phoenix, and good news: the HB slept through the night! Whatever they gave her appears to be working. Yay!

Breakfast. With the West Coast Obamas. Wait. Where again? Cracker Barrel? Okaaaay…if you say so. I’ve never been. It’s always been a place that I was happy to pass on the highway and wave at. But Mr. O was insistent—good home-cooked chow. 

We met up with them and found them sitting at a table in the corner, next to a window in the crowded restaurant. Mr. O waved and gestured wildly at us as we entered the room, “HI THERE! HERE WE ARE!  OVER HERE!”

I stared at the menu, a little worried about what I was going to order.  Mr. O suggested the Sweet Tea, “It’s yummy.” he beamed widely at me. He was a tad too cheerful for me today, mainly because of my trepidation at their choice of restaurants. The Os are foodies. A different eating place for every meal six times a day. I wondered if they each had developed a tapeworm from all the exotic places they’ve been and tried the food. 

I was starting to get flashbacks (PTSD?) from trying to keep up with Panda and his foodie “let’s-try-this-place-too” craziness. Mrs. Scrubbles tells me that he led them to a spot in Upland and one in Laguna Beach last week. She thought they were both pretty good. Hey Panda. Nice try. You can’t get good time credit unless I’m present to give you a five-star rating. You’re still on probation, pal.

I tried to play it safe: bacon, eggs, and hash brow—wait. What? Not hash browns? Hash brown casserole? Um… Paddy, the waiter, described them, and quite honestly, his explanation of this comfort food worked on me in the opposite way. As Paddy left the table, I was less comfortable with my life choices.

As we sat, and after the food came, Mr. O chatted on and on and on and on. We finished eating, and he was still talking. He was talking about this; he was talking about that. It was all very interesting, yes, because he can spin a yarn, but I was getting a bit worried. I looked at my watch a few times, hoping he would get the hint. In my head, I thought, “Isn’t game time coming up? Shouldn’t we be leaving?” Oh well, he was no rookie in this spring training stuff. I just had to trust him. 

About an hour and fifteen minutes later, Mr. O finished one of many stories, sighed heavily, leaned back, and glanced at his watch. “Sooooo, are you guys ready to head to the game?” He asked with a broad smile. 

We pushed back from the table and began to walk out as a group, with Mr. O acting as our docent, pointing out tchotchkes on the wall and in the General Store that the restaurant has in front as we walked leisurely toward the exit. 

“Hold on. Let me…” he said as he pointed to the sign of the male figure above the restroom door. I think he grabbed a magazine as he walked in.

— —

Seemingly endless line of cars waiting to get in the parking lot.

Finally, as we headed toward Camelback Stadium, only 3 miles away, Mr. O reveled us with another tale, none of which I’d heard before. Again, very interesting, but I had to wonder, “How in the world can all this happen to one person in one lifetime?” Does anyone remember the storyteller in the Tenessee Tuxedo cartoons?  Hmmmm… I wonder.

Remember when I said we were only 3 miles from the stadium? Yes, well, we drove 2 miles and ended up in a very long line to enter the parking lot. 

I looked over at Mr. O, who looked at me, and in his best Steve Erkel imitation, he asked, “Did I do that???”

We arrived at our seats right next to the field down the first baseline, just in time for the third inning.

Hey. I only have one request: Can I see a full game this week?

You know what to do!  Drink ‘em if you got ‘em!

#coffeehousechronicles