Mary Chung's, Rodney's, Hillel and Me

Finally, FINALLY, Hillel and I were able to hook up on a night when Mary Chung’s , in Central Square, was open -- they’re only shut one night out of the week so, naturally, that’s usually the only night H and I can get together.
We met at Rodney’s beforehand -  a used and rare book sellers. Meeting there, I’d sorta forgotten, is a sure fire way to fall into a serious fold in time, only to awake 6 hours into the future, dazed and toting a sack of 20 books -- everything from that collection of Sherman Alexie poems you’ve been looking for since ’91 to that Martin Millar you’ve been keeping an eye out for since god only knows when (I’m still hunting ‘Dreams of Sex and Stage Diving’  -- no luck yet).

Okay, so we pry ourselves outta there -- him without so much as a slim volume of essays. Me? After much painful winnowing, I narrowed my haul to four books (JUST four -- the pain, oh the pain of it all!):

Lark and Termite -- Jayne Anne Phillips (LOVED her collection of short stories -- Black Tickets. They spoke to me on a molecular level)
Splitting -- Fay Weldon
The Physics of Superheroes - James Kaklios
Teapots Transformed -- Leslie Ferrin (a wild collection of way cool sculptural type functional teapots)

As we strolled down Mass Ave we passed a new, to me anyway, all-things-used shop, Boomerangs. They had jam packed bookcase after bookcase sitting just inside the shop window. Utterly cruel, I tell ya, seeing as I’d just shot my wad at Rodney’s.

In any case, at Mary Chung’s the hostess showed us to a cozy red vinyl booth toward the back. This being the absolutely ideal place for keeping eyes peeled for:

1) Stray elderly Whitey Bulger foot soldiers out to settle old scores (and steal awesome book finds from random art babes).

2) Black clad ninja warriors, just up from Chinatown to avenge themselves (while also making off with my tome bonanza) and snarf a plate of Dun Dun Noodles.

3) Hot babes, voguing past random, book buying art honeys (in hopes of snatching up a paperback while my eyes were busy elsewhere of course).

Now we’re all cozy and cruising the menu and, naturally, running up against our usual food issues. Hillel’s a strict vegetarian (me, I’m a lazy ass veg -- I’ll eat fish) but that’s not it. See, Hillel has odd and serious vegetation prejudices. He does NOT like eggplant.

Mon dieu, how can this be? Mein Gott, what is wrong with this boy? Marone, what’s an aubergine lover to do?

How can he name himself a righteous vegetarian and not be simply mad about Yu Hsiang Eggplant, Chinese Eggplant With Basil, Baba ghanoush, Baingan Bartha and please, don’t you dare forget Pizza Melanzane!

Mind you, Jen is like this too. She approaches major hurl fits when I ask her to throw an eggplant on the grill for me.

Sheesh, the two of them -- they’re like me when it comes to lima beans and brussels sprouts. If god intended me to eat them, he would have made them purple or, at least, a MUCH darker shade of green. Or maybe they’d actually be dark Belgian chocolate. Yep, I could go for that.

Hillel and I compromised and got the Yu Hsiang Bean Curd.

Sigh. My revenge here is that the comments feature is still busted so neither can refute the charges or poke fun at MY strange appetites. HEY, sushi is SO a good breakfast food! And a ten AM craving for seaweed salad is NOT weird!

Hmmph.

Werewolves of London -- Warren Zevon