Entry Seventy-Eight

Oh of only things could be as simply wonderful as French Onion Soup.

Okay, I'm stopping now.

I am, however, still in a funk. Just not a French Onion Soup funk.

Maybe the fact that I was so close to getting some tonight and it didn't happen is part of that.

No. Can't be. I'm not that dependent on food to make me happy. Especially not savory, melty, oniony, hot, delicious, mouth watering French Onion Soup.

Maybe I have a problem.

Maybe that problem lies elsewhere and I am tying it to French Onion Soup.

Didn't I say I was stopping?

I think it was the text I got last night. I think I am missing home a little bit this week. In a weird way. In a way that is different to the way I was missing home a couple months ago. This is a deeper longing for the small things. Especially the small things that I loved about Missouri in the spring.

The evening drives with the windows down. Spring Thunder storms and finding the perfect place to watch the lightning. The smell of the flowers growing in peoples yards.

I miss Bob Evans. I know, I know! I can't believe I made it this far without missing that place. In Rhode Island it was a month before I began to long for the food and miss working with the people there. This time I lasted 4 and 1/2 months. I am so proud of myself.

I miss the university ward and it's security. I miss knowing that I would be able to go to church every week.

Out of all these things, what I miss most of all really is what I have missed all along and that is home.

But that longing has decreased and I can't decide if that's good or bad.

Everyone is figuring out what they are going to do after this. And here I am, procrastinating as usual.

Who wants to commit to something? How many people find happiness when they do that?

That was a rather down remark and I apologize.

And then this post ended just as it started: with no idea where it was headed or why it existed.

Entry Seventy-Seven

Hah.

I laugh.

I also cannot help but find the most mundane activities dangerous.

I also constantly ask people their medical history if they complain of eye pain or stomach aches.

Then I laugh again.

What is this place doing to me?

I am morphing into a new person with the old person still hiding deep inside. Maybe not deep. Maybe it's more like I am shedding off a thin exoskeleton layer of the person I used to be and the new me, who is still much of the same me, is emerging.

I don't like this metaphor.

Anyone else got a better one?

I've got three words. Three and that's it. I am in word poverty.

Those words are as follows: French.

I bet you weren't expecting that. I mean who would ever chose to have the word French in their word bank? They do have good food which may or may not elude to the next couple words.

Onion.

Well there is the food I was talking about. But Onions aren't really exclusive to the French. I bet most of you (who ever you are) know the next word. So lets all say it together.

Goog.

Hah! Fooled you! There is no way that you would have thought of that word. I didn't even know it existed until I decided that I was going to look up other ways to say "spectacles" in slang terms. But seriously. That's not the third word in my word bank. "Goog" is worth at least 50 words and I would be much richer if I had it.

Soup. That's what I was really going to say. Soup.

French. Onion. Soup. Three words that, alone, mean little. Put them together (Frenchonionsoup) and you have a word that makes no sense at all and is worth virtually and actually nothing in terms of words. Put those words next to each other but keep them seperate (as in French onion goog, I mean soup. French onion soup) and you have the most amazing thing ever invented in the food universe.

French onion soup has now officially replaced pizza as my favorite food. Don't worry though, Pizza. You are still my favorite breakfast leftover.

I am obsessed. I have now had French onion soup in 3 different locations in New Hampshire. I can tell you who has the best soup and who has the cheapest out of these three and I intend on exploring the French onion soup galaxy further. I think French onion soup only occupies a galaxy. As much as I love it I doubt that it fills a universe.

You have The Puritan Backroom Restaurant in Hooksette (it might actually be in Manchester but who can really tell?). Their soup is middle in the price range but ranks first in quality. You get a delicious, well seasoned and well portioned crock. The atmosphere in this place is also great but you are more than likely going to have to wait for a table. Even on a weekday. This place is insanely popular.

Next you have the Corner View Restaurant in Concord. Their soup is the most expensive but it also comes in the largest crock (even if it is only sloghtly (I did mean to type sloghtly. It's a smudge less than slightly. Yes, I did mean to type smudge. A smudge is an atom smaller than a smidge which is a word that Blogger tells me doesn't exist. And yet "Blogger" does exist. Of course that makes sense.) larger than the one found at The Puritan. It's very good but almost too much food in one sitting. The service there is mediocre.

Last there is the French onion soup at 99. Being a chain, you can't expect all that much. I mean, chains always taste rusty and are way too hard to chew. I have lost too many teeth. Anyway, their soup is good but not the best. It's whats to be expected is what I am really trying to say. You can get it in a cup or a crock. Putting it in a cup makes it hard to eat because you're trying to drink it the whole time and all that happens is the broth seeps around the cheese and you don't get any onions or bread. And the crock is huge. I mean, a whole crock pot of French onion soup? Killer. It's worth the money you pay though. (I'm sorry. I know I need to stop with the word play, it's just too fun. That's why it's word play and not word work).

And why have I taken you on this goog, I mean soup, peregrination? (Do you wonder if that word is tied at all to Peregrine falcons? Because I do and I have no answer.) Because I have nothing better to write about. That's not true but the truth is the other things I could write about would bore you much more than the soup talk.

Great, now I want to have a talk show called "Soup Talk" in which each week we learn about a different kind of soup and ways to make and prepare it.

I love soup. I would also love to have a talk show about pie but I don't know what I would call it. Who wants to tell me their ideas?

I love pie and soup.

Also, from now on I am going to type French Onion Soup with all three words capitalized because if French has to be capitalized, the other words need to feel equal. And so they will be. Someday.