FEBRUARY 2010

My wife and I have this morning routine. We take our son to school every morning Monday thru Friday and then we go to the bakery and have breakfast. Two eggs over hard with bacon. Her's crispy and mine not so crispy. We sit in the same window seats every morning and enjoy our breakfast and watch the world go racing by. That is our time to relax and talk about things from yesterday or what we have for today. It's our little "window on the world." We see "old so and so" go by and we see people we haven't seen in weeks or months come by. Mainly we just people watch as they sit at the stop light in front of the window.

Oh yeah, I forgot we have two chocolate covered cake donuts also.

It was last week one day during the bitter cold we had when I was drinking my coffee and eating my donut when I told my wife what a wonderful feeling it must be to be the person that makes donuts. Just knowing you bring a smile to every persons face that comes in contact with your donut would be enough to seem fullfilled. It was at that time that I thought of all the people that bring a smile to my face.

First there is the manager at the Sealy Whataburger, Kelly. She runs THE BEST Whataburger in the world. I know that because I have eaten at almost every one of them, including Pensacola Beach, Florida where they have the little vibrating light thing to let you know when your order is ready. How come we can't have those in Texas?

Then there is the lady at the local mexican joint who lets us sit in the back corner booth at lunch. Each time we go there she trys to seat us somewhere else, but each time I just start walking to the back. She never says no, she just lets us go.

Next I'd like to thank every rancher in the US that raises those ribeyes I love so much. I'm a steak and potatos man. And green beans, brocoli, Ranch Style beans, salad with ranch dressing and Velvetta Shells and Cheese man also. It would probably be easier to state what I don't like. I don't like much of any kind of squash, maybe fried on occassion. I don't like lima or butter beans and really don't like Pork & Beans. Other than that, sign me up.

In case you haven't noticed I love food. I love to eat and eating makes me happy. My waist is still smaller than my length so I'm doing pretty good so far I think.

Mocha Grande With Extra Chocolate, Please

Well it's official, Ol' Big Al' is a bonafide "Yuppie". This "friend" of ours has gotten my wife hooked on some kind of concoction called a Frappuccino. I had to "Google" it just to know how to spell it. Seems like the only place you can get them is McDonalds and Starbucks. It's a kind of cold coffee. I can't think of anything worse than cold coffee, but for some reason she loves `em. Well the other day we were in Brenham and she wanted to stop into Starbucks. I thought maybe they might have a hot chocolate or something so I went in. About as close as they had to hot chocolate was something called a Mocha Grande. The lady said they could put extra chocolate in it for me, so I said sure. Part of a truck payment later we were walking out with a Mocha Grande and whatever it was my wife was having, plus a piece of raspberry crumble cake. The cake deserves its own article it was so good. The Mocha Grande with extra chocolate was so nasty I swore I'd never go back for another one as long as I lived.

Starbucks was exactly like they are on tv. There was a bunch of people sitting at tables on their laptops on one side of the room. The other side was filled with "soccar moms" drinking their afternoon coffee. It was freezing outside, so I had on a black felt hat. Definately not the place for a middle aged cowboy wannabe with his brand new boots he had just worn out of the store down the road because his old ones had holes in the soles.

What brings people back to coffee and cake for $9.95? I guess maybe that's their little window seat on the world. They can slow things down and just "be" for a few moments each day.

Just being,