What's there to blog?

A friend visited Seattle and brought back some really good chocolate from a shop and roaster (?) that's apparently across the street from my favorite pub, the fake-dungeon Brouwer's Cafe. If you think all chocolate is the same - full of processed sugar - then stop by Theo Chocolate or visit its website. I hear you can also get it in Whole Foods although I haven't checked. We were drinking beer last night when she brought out the chocolate. I was sipping a Dogfish Head Raison D'Etre, brewed with green raisins, but it wasn't doing much for me on its own. You're supposed to pair like with like in beer, so I pulled out a bar of the coffee chocolate bar (cacao: 65%) and all of a sudden the fruity flavors in the beer came flying out, like monkeys from my butt. It was perfect, and I was quite happy, although I realized around midnight that the chocolate was almost certainly saturated with caffeine, so I took a walk around my normal jogging route. The weather has been pretty muggy as summer peters out, but it was perfect at midnight. A good and perfect gift.

Next weekend is the first New York visit since Christmas. Jeremiah will be there, visiting the girlfriend, and I'm bringing S with me to meet the West Coast crue. Then S and I are setting up my roommate with a cute girl from her small group. They're both really into China, so we're hoping for a Chairman Wow moment. And the next day, I'm headed for a joint visit to Oregon and Seattle. The folks are gracious enough to loan me the car for the Seattle leg, so I can actually get around the city short of taking three or four buses a day. The possibility of a caffeine overload from too many cafes in a few hours is code orange.

I should be cleaning, but I just finished watching Showtime's Dead Like Me on Netflix loan and am headed out soon. It's a weird show - I mean, dead people who become grim reapers and while droning through their ghoulish work, learn about life, love and heartache. Plus it's set in Seattle, so I always try to pick out the neighborhoods (I think it's shot in Vancouver like everything else but a few spots look familiar). Shows like this are a good conversation starter in mixed company for what people actually believe, and which society tells us not to share, unless it's some shallow cultural thing like beads or curry. There's a gigantic new Hindu temple in this small Georgia town, and the NPR segment on it never bothered to discuss the congregants' beliefs - it was all about culture and food. What a bunch of BS. What are we afraid of?

Anyway, I'm off.