Long Island Living, day 2 (East Coast Trip part 2 of n)
I ate a canoli today. A canoli, and some chicken Parmigiana. And a brownie. And I think I also had two bagels, but probably just one. I definitely had some garlic bread. I almost ate some Sicilian-style pizza, my favorite, but I didn’t want to spoil my appetite. I love being on vacation.
I can also safely report that Target stores on Long Island are almost identical to the Target stores in the Seattle area. The only exception seems to be the people inside the two stores: In Seattle, you don’t see too many three cart pile-ups with women screaming at one another over merchandise, or their place in line, or whatever seems to be at hand and up for argument. I think I prefer Long Island for its scenery and esprit de corps, which is how a Frenchman might describe the sense of righteous indignation that seems to be on display at Long Island supermarkets and outlet malls. The way many people here strut around reminds me of the feathers of a male peacock, but with more of the shrill peacock noises to go with the plumage.
Speaking of peacocks, I wore one of my favorite T-shirts today. It’s a drawing of Richard Nixon with the word “dick” spelled out below it. I like this shirt because it’s so literal in one way, and so accurate in another way. Both of my grandparents loved it; I think it took them by surprise, actually. They quickly caught on to the joke, adding their own ribald humor whenever I walked into the room (”Well, well, looks like you’ve got your dick on!”). I wonder if their children realize this bawdy tendency simmers below the surface of their completely demure, grandparently exteriors. In this regard, they are more like peahens: unassuming, quiet, but clearly more intelligent than the peacocks.
On two occasions, my rental GPS unit has steered me wildly wrong as I have tried to locate a hotel and a wine store on Long Island. Both times, I ended up in residential areas that clearly lack hotels and wine stores, but that have no shortage of New Yorkers who enjoy staring angrily at rental cars with New Jersey license plates. Such plates come in handy when I need to cut people off while driving down the parkway, but they do nothing to help me slip into the Smithtown beaches undetected. I was at one of those beaches just long enough today to hold the skeletal remains of a raccoon or opossum before I had to leave. It was an interesting day.
Actually, it was a very peaceful, uneventful day, and that’s exactly what I look for when I’m on vacation. I am also trying to decide on a wine for Wine Blogging Wednesday #37, for which the theme is “indigenous grape varieties.” The idea is to find a wine made in the location where the grape was first discovered, or where the grape varietal calls home from an ancestral perspective, and that is, I assume, made only from that type of grape. For example, the Symphony grape was developed at UC Davis for the Central Valley in California, so if I can find a Central Valley winery that makes a Symphony wine, I’m on the right track. It would be ideal to try said Symphony wine in the Central Valley, especially if I can find another Symphony wine as a point of comparison. Since there do not appear to be any Seattle native grapes, I’m probably out of luck on the location element of this challenge.
So, quite soon I will be seeing my other set of grandparents for dinner, and then my wife and I will be heading down to Virginia Beach for a week of sun, sand, and Sauvignon Blanc. Or, more likely, thunderstorms, tar, and tobacco smoke. Either way, VA Beach is our next big stop during Summer Vacation 2007.