Homecoming

A sniffly Little One is curled up in my bed, fast asleep in the warm nest made by us getting up this morning. It was a full weekend, as I attended a choir reunion at my Alma Mater, and the boys made their way south to attend the culmination of two days’ intense rehearsal, an alumni choir concert. We arrived home late last night, after far too many hours on the road (think dark, rain, freeway), and all promptly fell into bed. Little One awoke with a cold.

Other than that, there were a few meals of note over the weekend: The Ram’s Head Pub in Northwest Portland, where I feted my re-found freedom (however brief) with a half-pint of cider and a hamburger and salad—said burger being made of Oregon Country Beef, the same stuff that makes its way onto our table regularly. In Salem, I opted for take-out Chinese from Kwan’s one evening: curled up in a motel room with parchment chicken, snow peas and cable TV harked right back to my college days, though a pan of half-baked brownies would have really completed the moment. I grazed on a few University-supplied meals, there were a few salads along the way, and a couple cups of tea soothed my rusty throat.

On the way home, we stopped at Burgerville. Understand that my poor, deprived children have never been to the golden arches (quick, call Child Protection Services!). Part of it is the principle: they occupy a medieval structure in our graduate University town of Freiburg, Germany, and had the audacity to prominently affix their name on the centuries-old plaster. Not to mention the doubtful quality of what they sell and the co-branding marketing strategy, often aimed at children. But dear old local Burgerville, unhip to us when we lived there, gets huge points for making their burgers from Oregon Country Beef (and slapping on a thick slice of Tillamook cheddar) and fries from Northwest potatoes, along with their commitment to using wind power and recycling their oil into biodiesel.

I can make only two admittedly picky suggestions: one, that they learn to make milkshakes as good as those at Dude’s. And if they could just convince their marketing folks to use a dictionary, we’d be set.