I love you, fog

Anybody who is familiar with West Coast climate will appreciate this.

I just spent the past 3 weeks between New York City, Washington D.C. and Philadelphia playing tourist while visiting friends. The weather was miserable. One day in Philadelphia it was dumping rain, but hot at the same time, in fact we were in the middle of a thunder storm but could not keep cool despite my being in a tank top and sandals and soaking wet! In Washington D.C., the buildings are air conditioned excessively. I believe this is unhealthy, to require a sweater to sit at your desk and then go outside and sweat instantaneously only to enter the next building and cool down far too quickly due to the cold air blasting in your face accelerating the natural process of sweating as a cooling process for the body. New York City was just muggy and hot. I could not escape the humidity, it was penetrating. You inhale and it's like you don't get enough air, it's suffocating.

I was so excited to be coming back to California, and better yet, flying into San Francisco! I had my face pressed to the window of the airplane in anticipation, turning back every 3 minutes or so to express my joy to the guy sitting next to me. You can't imagine how big the smile on my face was when we were near landing and I couldn't see a thing due to the fog, it was like you had just given me a dark chocolate mousse cake and a bottle of chilled champagne. (Maybe that's too personal of a reference. Anybody who knows me, or well, no, that's just my life.) Upon my exiting the plane and walking through the ramp connecting the plane to the gate, I had to put on my fleece! Unlike my transfer in Kansas City where I stepped off the plane and was suddenly hot, sticky and out of breath until I entered the gate, only to be shot with blasts of forced cold air from the AC vents, at which point I needed the fleece. San Francisco was naturally cold, yes! I practically ran down to baggage claim, the luggage had not yet arrived and so I bolted outside and just breathed a breath of fresh air, and then another, and another all with a goofy smile on my face.

I collected my luggage, got in my friends car and continued with this air of climate-induced euphoria as we made the drive down to Pacific Grove. As we approached the Monterey Bay, the clear blue skies turned gray, again causing this silly smile to come across my face.

Maybe I have this association with my childhood, with my family, with my friends, with memories of being a teenager or with home but fog has become something I absolutely love. The fog here is not super bad, it starts your day off fresh, cool and energizing only to burn off and give you an even more beautiful day. The landscape is made for this duality. The oak and the pine trees juxtaposed with the ocean change in color with the change in the backdrop which is the sky (or topdrop, I guess as it's the sky but that word doesn't exist.)

It's great to be home.

Famous 4th Street Delicatessen

Some friends and I were visiting a mutual friend in Philadelphia last weekend. Before I continue with the story, I have to tell you that my friends and I don't mess around when it comes to food. We are professional eaters and travel accordingly.

With that said:

The friend who is studying and living in Philadelphia took the four of us to Famous 4th Street Delicatessen (http://famous4thstreetdelicatessen.com/). He warned us not to eat beforehand, as the portions were huge.

We entered the deli and the first thing that came to my mind was that it was clean and inviting. It was a black and white checkerboard motif with photos of celebrities dining at the deli and black and white photos telling the restaurant's past. We sat down and were greeted with a bowl of "Health Salad," a pickled cabbage slaw topped with several big slices of dill pickles.

What remains of the pickles on top of a bed half-eaten bed of "Health Salad"

The waitress was not only super friendly but also, honest and took care of us magnificently. She told us what their most popular dishes were, both of which we ended up ordering: the challah French Toast and the Corned Beef Hash. We also ordered a side of Tsimmes, I wanted to know what it was and she described it as a vegetarian kind of sweet stew made of yams, carrots, prunes and raisins. It sounded great. The Corned Beef Hash came with 2 medium easy eggs on top and a side of 2 thick slices of nutty, grainy toast. The French Toast came with 4 potato pancakes. And I had bottomless coffee, which was never empty.

Mountain of Challah French Toast, this was incredible. I must admit, it was my first time having Challah French Toast and I was totally sold. Due to the soft, thick nature of the Challah, it retains it's sweet softness on the inside and adopts a thin, crisp, outer shell due to the fried egg. And of course, dusted with powdered sugar, how could you go wrong?

Corned Beef Hash with 2 over-medium eggs on top, I'm afraid to say that this photo does not do the size of this dish justice. The heaping mound of food was a good 6 inches high, at it's highest point. It was a mix of potatoes, tomatoes, onions and finely chopped corned beef. Definitely a bang for your buck, we hardly put a dent in it and had to take about 3/4 of it home, luckily the waitress had warned us and had even assured us that it would freeze well!

Tsimmes! A hot mound of cooked yams, carrots, prunes, raisins and walnuts. Caution: prunes contain pits. In the background you can see 2 of the potato pancakes

Wait until you see the pastry case. The site of the cakes was incredible. Each standing at about 10 inches high and arranged beautifully, one next to the other begging to be eaten.

On the way out, I saw a couple eating a pastrami sandwich. As my friend described it, it was more like, "would you like some bread with your meat." There was literally 4 times more pastrami than bread. That also looked delicious but there was no way we could eat anymore.

If you ever find yourself in Philly, you MUST eat here. But, you've been warned, the portions are huge and delicious, so don't eat before and don't expect to eat much for a long time after.

Behavior

So I think about our behavior as human beings in this society that we've created. Behavior, as I see it, is instinct which is then refined by religion, culture, experience, age, tradition, the way we were raised, and pop culture; which I guess could be considered a sub-category of culture but I tend to use pop-culture as my guide of "How Not to Behave," but I digress.

I got to thinking about this today when I was thinking about judging people. I was raised Catholic and was constantly told, in that environment, to not judge people. Judging is bad and there is only one judge for us all upon our death. We have all heard countless stories about judging someone based on their appearance and then later repenting upon finding out that despite their wearing rags, they have a fortune. Or treating a stranger poorly until it is revealed that he or she is some high-profile celebrity or big shot, at which point we change our behavior towards him or her, suddenly showing him or her more respect, wanting more attention or even apologizing for our "normal" behavior to him or her, claiming "I had no idea it was you!" That is bogus. I firmly believe that we can judge people based on how they treat us. I almost want to say based on how they treat others but that might be a stretch because we don't know what they are going through with other people to cause them to behave that way.

Example. If I meet somebody for the first time and they are rude to me and show no interest in having a conversation with me despite being a friend of a friend, I can judge that they are an unfriendly person, or I can be more optimistic and conclude that they are not having a good day, or that I have caught them at a bad moment. I try not to judge people on their clothes, hairstyle, job, ethnicity or education. (However, all of these things can result in great conversation topics.) I think we should treat all people with a basic respect that can then grow or shrink based on the interaction we have with them. Take for example, manners. I like being polite because I think it's a part of the refinement of our behavior that distinguishes us and it makes life easier at no additional cost to us, except maybe a smile or a kind word. Plus, weren't we all told in kindergarten to treat others the way we wanted to be treated and I like for people to be polite to me so I am going to be polite to them. Furthermore, I have found that the amount of goodness in the world is abundant and if you are just good to others, it will be reciprocated to you in the form of say a free dessert at a restaurant or a job offer or just about anything you may need in your life that other people have and can help you with.

I'm going to keep this short but my moral is to just be good to others. It makes you feel good and you would be surprised by the connections you may make or what you have in common with others. Also, we all have bad days and a little compassion and understanding could make someone's bad day not so bad.

:)