Meat on Stick!

It is, ultimately, the simple things in life which are pleasant.

Not that getting down to North Carolina is simple - it is not. It involves no less than four different modes of transport (not counting Shank's Pony); a Jeep, some sort of ex-Vietnam bus (I am convinced that the bus which ferried us from the parking lot to the airport had run GIs into Hanoi hotspots, or perhaps transported arms to the Contras), a Chrysler PT Cruiser with more bling than a group of chavs who mugged Mr. T and an overgrown cigar tube with wings filled with liquid explosive, made from a million different parts all made by the lowest bidder.

Still, despite the inherent complexity of getting to NC (here's a question - if I wanted to transport explosives, would I do so in the same manner as people who have already done this before, and been caught doing so? I like to think not. Why, therefore, are the airline security check procedures based on what has blown stuff up previously? Do we, perhaps, not need to think outside the box here, people?) we managed to get there.

North Carolina is very pretty - is it certainly "the South"; which I distinguish from "the North" by virtue of being between it and the Equator. These things are not difficult, people. It also appears to be the place where there are less Confederate Flags than Hazel Park and less Stars and Stripes than Grovesnor Square. Go figure. There was a monument or something there - raised by ex-Confederate soldiers as a testament to "Southern Ideals".

Excuse me? In Europe, we call such people recidivist traitors. We imprison them. We hang them. We place them in gulags. We certainly do not allow them to erect monuments. An ideological war was fought, a kind of intellectual trial-by-combat, and you lost. Get over it. Here is a late-breaking news-flash; slavery is not a good counterpart to "self-evident" truths.

However, there appear to be other Southern ideals - such as the cooking - which are better counterparts to this. Perhaps the line "All men are created equal, but some are more equal than others" was invented for this very situation; after a week of eating everything that was placed before me (and, when you go to an "All you can stuff down your throat in a hideous orgy of consumption" Southern Bar-B-Q Restaurant, that is rather a lot) I am now far more equal than I was before. I did, however, avoid putting the butter on everything.

Ultimately, North Carolina is very pleasant and friendly - everyone says "hello" and asks how you are. I am not sure if it is done to reply - perhaps not. The defintion of a bore might be Someone who, when you ask him how he is, tells you but that might also apply to a Northerner in a Southern town. I suppose I count as an Easterner. It is a unique experience.

One night when we were there, Otis (Liza's stepfather) and I lit an enormous fire and sat around it and drank Maker's Mark whiskey. It is a scurilous lie with no foundation in truth that the two of us drank three bottles of said liquor over a period of less than a week. It was that guy.

Otis and Lin (Liza's mother) are really nice people - we spent ages talking about all sorts of stuff. Otis is very much into theatrics and Shakespeare in particular. On our little Christmas night (which went on for an age as it seems a family trait to be unable to buy a single present when fifty will do) we had "Dinner Theatre"; Otis gave a sterling rendition of the opening monologue from Richard III and I did (with the help of a cheat sheet) the Battle of Agincourt speech from Henry V ("Once more into the breach, friends, Romans and countrymen, now is the band of brothers until the last sylable of recorded time" . . . or am I getting confused again?)

In addition to the fine food cooked by everyone (I think we all had a hand in something somewhere - although all I did was cut up some chickens, while everyone else made fine things, including - from Liza's grandmother - Continental-style pastries whose name I will not attempt to type or else my fingers may tie in knots) Otis and I roasted MEAT ON STICK!!!!! in the fire.

There is something primal about the roasting of meat on stick. It affirms the manliness of the roaster, and shows a strong, masculine afirmation of his dominance over the lesser things of the world (i.e. sticks and meat). Armed with a stick, meat, fire and sufficient liquor to make the bringing of such things together in close proximity a good idea, one can take on the world.

It is my firm belief that - if someone cannot roast an innocent hot dog on a length of stick, then how can he be trusted? Such a man is like the fellow with a made-up-tie, or a sock down his pants. There is something untrustworthy about a person like that.

It was not, I fear, something the ladies understood. Never mind; Otis and I roasted things on sticks. We drank beer.

Life is good.

Darknight