BLACK FOOD

Many years ago we lived in Mexico for a few years and we loved the Mexican food.

Not Tex-Mex, Gentle Readers.

This was wonderful seafood, great barbacoa (BBQ, for you Americans), and delicious moles.

Now those last are not those critters that dig up your lawns.

These are MO-lays!

Wonderful sauces of chocolate and coffee and spices that are layered over chicken or beef or even just tortillas.

Delicious, especially the deep dark Oaxacan mole.

We went to a Oaxacan restaurant in Guadalajara that had become a favorite of ours with a group that included a friend who steadfastly refused to taste the mole.

She said, resolutely, "I don't eat black food!"

And the mole was pretty dark.

Nothing would convince her to even try it.

Her loss, I say.

Because Judy has found a small grocery that sells bottled mole that is as dark and delicious as that we had in Mexico.

And tonight (for the second time in a week) we had it over some baked chicken.

It may look like road tar but get over it!

It is delicious.

The chicken was sauced with the mole and brought to the table with some black beans and cilantro and a combination she has perfected of quinoa and brown rice.

Oh.

Oh.

And oh again.

Is your scribe happy?

Is his tummy full?

As we say in Mexico, "you betcha!"

FRIDAY FUNNIES

When times look dark and foreboding, it's the humor that gets you through, Gentle Readers, so let us continue our time-honored tradition.

All right, folks, let's get out there and have a fabulous spring weekend and always . . . . . . always . . . . . . remember to keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

(Hey, how do you feel about our moving, huh?)

ANOTHER LEAF

So, Gentle Readers, I've been dropping very subtle hints that a change is in the offing once again for these nomads.

We have been thinking about the future for several years as we groan into our late 70's and early 80's.

Planning on downsizing, getting rid of the accumulated "stuff" of years, nay, decades.

And now, it appears, our hands are about to be forced.

We learned on Monday that the landlord of the property where we have lived very happily for three years is putting it up for sale.

That means that once again we face the ugly prospect of moving.

A realtor was here yesterday to do a walk-through and a look-see and she told us that when the word comes for certain, since we are on a month-to-month lease we will probably have 30 days to vacate.

So that means the agonizing search for a new home that we can afford and the more agonizing packing, selling or donating the detritus of ages.

So that's it, folks.

We are not, as one of you worried, plagued by new health maladies.

It's just another relocation in a lifetime that has numbered the moves in more than a score.

I'll keep you posted from time to time.

Like the tiny leaves now appearing on the redbud tree outside my window, it is yet another new beginning.

ONLY . . .

. . . time will tell.

LIFE IS . . .

. . . just one damned thing after another.

MONDAY MADNESS

DEATH AND DECONSTRUCTION

We lost a couple of good ones again.

Chuck Berry, who some (Chuck?) say invented rock and roll, dead at 90.

His voice, along with those of Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley, was in my head in the 1950's when I was a high school student.

His bizarre "duck walk", which became a trademark, evolved from an accident where he fell while playing.

Troubles with the law led to several terms in reform school and prison.

He was emblematic of the times and the trade he took up.

But it didn't stop him from writing and performing some of the great songs we all grew up with.

And this morning we learn of the death of Jimmy Breslin at 88.

A consumate newspaper reporter for decades in New York City, Jimmy told the stories of the common man so well he won a Pulitzer Prize.

A cigar-chomping, hard drinking "ink stained wretch" of the newspaper business with a knack for finding and telling a story.

Who else would think to interview the man who dug the grave for John F. Kennedy?

We'll miss them.

For the second part of my post, take a look at what Chef Judy, aka SWMBO, created for the evening meal yesterday.

It's a deconstructed (or Inside-Out) Vietnamese Spring Roll.

Shrimp, rice vermicelli, carrots, peppers, peanuts, mint leaves.

Topped with a spicy peanut sauce (unshown) it was delicious.

I know.

I'm a lucky man.