Best of 2009: December 2nd

For the rest of 2009, I'll be participating in the Best of 2009 Blog Challenge created by Gwen Bell. Check it out!


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December 2nd, 2009

Restaurant moment. Share the best restaurant experience you had this year. Who was there? What made it amazing? What taste stands out in your mind?

Again, I'm torn. Anyone who knows me knows I love food. I really do enjoy sitting down to a great meal and I'm a big fan of finding some good food. I don't always mind longer drives to find food, but Graham doesn't always see the point of driving further than we have to to get dinner, so we compromise.

Just the other day I went to Wildfire with some friends for our second annual "Chrismukah" celebration. We got to eat some good food--I'm still thinking about the creamed spinach--and exchange Secret Santa gifts. My friend Sarah gave me a White Sox ornament for our tree (yay!) and Up! on dvd. It was one of my favorite movies of this year, and I'm so glad to have it for my own. Ultimately it was a great day of food (oooooh, the food!) and fun conversation. It was exactly what I needed to relax.

And again, my mind goes back to Los Angeles and my trip. We didn't eat out much, but the few times we did are still really clear in my head. I'll never forget eating Popeye's chicken on Hollywood Boulevard before iO and enjoying my first taste of Popeye's in way too long. I'm pretty sure it's my favorite fast food vice. It was a little strange to be eating some slightly greasy fast food in downtown LA in a greasy spoon with some homeless strangers, locals, and a handful of tourists vacationing on a budget.

On the morning I left LA, we went to a small diner in North Hollywood for breakfast. It was decorated mainly for the tourists, I thought, with pictures of former movie stars and some random memorabilia to make you wake up and say, "Hooray! I'm in California!" The mood was bittersweet, because my trip had been far too short and neither of us were really perpared for me to leave. Personally, the reality of how far away we live from one another really set in and I knew that in a handful of hours I'd be thousands of miles away from one of the few people who really understand me when I say things like "Le sigh," and "I hate everyone," and "I really wish we lived in Massachusetts in 1862." The food was only so-so, the coffee was enough to wake me up and remind me that I had to get my stuff together to get to the airport before my plane took off, and the sun was shining just a little too brightly for my mood. Damn that non-stop California sun.

The last restaurant moment that sticks out in my mind is our 100th monthiversary in April. We went to P.F. Chang's after a long day and we enjoyed a really late dinner. It wasn't completely special or monumental, but it was great not to cook that night and be able to celebrate being together for so long.