Marianne's sister Janet Blair came out to have breakfast with us this morning at the restaurant that’s part of this campground. They had a great buffet, a style that I’ve never seen: you go up to the buffet table and pick up your bacon, sausage, French toast, potatoes, grits, bread, fruit, and whatever else I may have missed, then take it back to your table where the waitress gets your egg order and a couple of minutes later brings it. I like my eggs sunny-side up and Marianne likes her scrambled. In most buffets you’ll never find sunny-side up eggs because they just don’t do well on a buffet table. And the scrambled eggs at most buffets are either the consistency of dried cement or a color that’s only good on Easter eggs. Maybe more restaurants should pick up on this trick.
After breakfast Janet walked with us back to our trailer, where she bonded with the dogs. She thinks she needs a dog, and we’re trying to convince her she does. Her daughter, Maggie, is off at college so she has that empty nest syndrome. Now all she’ll have to do is convince John that he wants a dog, too.
We took the Interstate roads from Aiken all the way to Charlotte so the trip was uneventful and we didn’t get to see as much of the countryside as when we take the back roads. But then we’ve been this way before.
We checked into the local KOA, got our site, and called Nikki. Within thirty minutes she was at our campsite, bearing gifts. For a belated Mother’s Day gift, Marianne received a pretty necklace which she wore the rest of the day. And I got a “Germany” World Cup soccer T-shirt for Father’s Day. Since it was Nikki’s birthday three days ago, we gave her our gift.
Then Nikki took us to a German restaurant, The Waldhorn, to watch Germany play in the soccer World Cup. What a treat! It was like actually being in Germany, since many of the patrons and staff were German. I proudly wore my new T-shirt. Cheers of “zicky zacky, zicky zacky, oy, oy, oy” were echoing off the walls every time Germany scored. Happily Germany beat Australia 4–0.
The only thing we did wrong is we ate sandwiches for lunch before we got her, the restaurant put out an all-you-can-eat buffet that was to die for: all of my favorite German foods, plus some of the best desserts on the planet including Schwarzwalder Kirsch Torte, if you have to ask what that is, you’ve never had it, because once you’ve had it, you’ll never forget what it was.
After a liter of beer, we headed back to the campground to pick up the dogs to go to our niece’s home for a barbecue. Janet and Mike Caponi live in a great house which Janet has been adding touches to since we were here for their wedding this past Labor Day. Janet is an interior designer for a large architectural firm in Charlotte, and the daughter of Marianne’s older sister Chris. Mike also reminded me that he, too, was integral in doing some of the interior design.
Just as we got there, the heavens opened up and it rained pretty hard. And like most rainstorms I’ve experience while traveling the South on this odyssey, they are over within a half hour or so.
Also there was Nikki's boyfriend, Cory Clinton. They've been dating a couple of years now, so it looks like they've passed each other's muster. I like Cory even though I have to look up to him. He's tall. I guess I now know what it was like for Jack Till, Marianne's dad, when he kept meeting me.
Our dogs really enjoyed being at their home, especially since Janet has a rather large cat, Lil. And Lil has toys, and if you’ve been following this blog, you know that Molly and Coco just love cat toys, especially those little fake mice stuffed with catnip. It drives them just as crazy as it’s supposed to do with cats.
When Mike went out to barbecue the hamburgers and hot dogs, our dogs dashed out with him. But they didn’t stay on the porch for long; they went down the flight of stairs and started running around in their large fenced yard, which had become very messy with the rain.
When Marianne tried calling them to come back up, Coco bounded up all the stairs but Molly was overwhelmed by the sheer number of them, and just stood at the bottom, giving Marianne that “come help me” look.
They were both soaking wet, but we came prepared with our own towel, and dried them off the best we could. Back in the house they went hunting for the cat toys again.
Just before we started to eat, we were joined by Nikki’s workmate, Melissa, who occupies the cube next to her, and her boyfriend Daniel. We all sat down to eat our fill of cheeseburgers, hot dogs, and corn-on-the-cob. And for dessert Janet spoiled us with her own fresh-baked blueberry pie with ice cream. How can anyone stay on any diet when you’re continuously tempted with such good food?
The evening was topped off with Janet and Mike telling us their bag story. Don’t ask, you don’t want to know.
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