Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Saturday mornings with Ace

     I've done a whole blog on my brother Ace before, but I thought this habit of spending nearly every Saturday morning with him would provide enough fodder for a whole blog.  Think Tuesdays with Morrie as you read it......

     For the better part of a decade, and maybe longer, I've had breakfast Saturday mornings with my brother Ace.  I say "maybe even longer" because I don't remember when or why we started to get together for breakfast and it may have been an irregular occurrence at first, but at some point it
evolved to an every week event.  I could argue that it is necessary so that we could catch up on our respective weeks', but since we talk every day, all we really do is recap everything we have already discussed, but we do it over a couple of over-easy eggs (over medium for me) and a few cups of coffee.   We both have marriages that span a couple of decades and I'm not sure that this habit isn't responsible for a portion of that success.  We don't really care, you see, when we repeat our story or latest work frustration multiple times to each other, but I bet it gets old to our spouses sometimes.  That's just one reason we get together.

     Where do we eat each week?  Most weeks he comes over my way and we walk over to the Hall Diner.  We occasionally switch it up and go to his diner in Gorham, or shoot up to Sweet Sue's on 5
My regular breakfast
and 20, but 4 out of 5 weeks we dine in Hall.  The food is good, the pricing is reasonable and the crowd is comfortable.  When we walk in each week, the atmosphere resembles Cheers when Norm walks in the bar, well, except that they don't serve beer, and we only hear them call our names in our heads.  In the middle of the diner a few tables are pushed together and the usual array of farmers and locals sit there, solving the issues of the day.  We grab a booth against the wall, close enough to be included in their conversation if we want, but far enough away to give us a chance to catch up too.  When the waitress comes over to see if we want coffee, my brother Ace always greets her
Ace's breakfast
by the wrong name but inquires "Right?" at the end of it.  He's never right, and I can't remember her name now because I've heard her called a different name for years now.  I do remember that my brother takes cream in his coffee, but even that I failed to notice for the first decade or two (think glacier-like learning).  Our orders rarely differ, 2 eggs, sausage patties for me, bacon for Ace, rye toast and potatoes.  I prefer well done hash browns, and Ace normally gets home fries with peppers and ongions. 

     We rarely finish breakfast in less than an hour, it's not that the kitchen is slow, but we do slow play our coffees and stretch out the time we spend both together and at the diner.  We have to make sure
the regulars are all accounted for, you see.  Sometimes we do order other things, but honestly I'd rather do 2 extra workouts a week just to have this 1200 calorie breakfast every Saturday.  As I had said we have tried the diner in his town, Gorham, but it closed for a while and the new owner eliminated the waitress position, so I don't like it as well.  I think Ace thinks it's a toss up so he acquiesces and comes to my town.  I will say that my brother in law (He's married to She-Who-Shall-Not Be-Named) claims that the chef in Gorham is "The Egg Whisperer" and that he makes the best omelets, but I've tried them and they are fluffy, which is an adjective that I like to use to describe my pillow, but not my eggs.  It's all personal preference, so if you like fluffy eggs, you now know where to find them.  We will try Sweet Sue's, it's a huge meal for a cheap price and it puts the "greasy" in Greasy Spoon (that's a good thing), however, a few years ago they changed the coffee and the current blend is simply weak, which is an unforgivable sin in my
book for a truckstop style diner.  We like the Hall diner because they get it all right, they even pre-heat the ceramic coffee mugs so that your coffee comes out piping hot.

     After we finish breakfast we walk back over to my house and generally spend 5-10 extra minutes in the driveway talking.  My wife thinks it is so we can wake up the rest of the house, which is not the intention, but nevertheless is sometimes the result.  That's the end of this week's missive, no deep points, nothing to ponder, and I'll finish with an invitation.  If you ever find yourself driving through the sleepy little hamlet of Hall at 7 am on a Saturday morning, and you see two middle ages guys walking, deep in conversation, feel free to follow us over and to join us for a tasty breakfast.  It's a great time, if you don't mind 2 guys talking about themselves for an hour. 
    

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