The last time I saw a person wearing their McCain “flair” (this one in the form of a t-shirt), it was when I was eating the best freaking meatloaf sandwich I have ever had.

66 Malt Shop is the place.

Go there and have root beer, or a limeade, but do order the green chile and bleu cheese burger, or this thing of beauty, the meatloaf sandwich:

I will return there again, and perhaps I won’t see that blue emblazoned t-shirt, but I will find hospitality and a darned good meal.  Thank you, Eric and Diane.  Congratulations, Obama.

A flower for my mom’s birthday, crafted with precision out of hot dairy foam by the excellent barista at Ecco Espresso & Gelato in lovely Nob Hill neighborhood in Albuquerque.

I could just have a flower, enjoy it, sip it and be done, of course, though the macchiatto was delicious.  I had to follow it up (short shelf life, ya know…) with some quickly softening and strong like it should be rum raisin gelato.  Sampling about 5 flavors like zabaglione, plum sake, ginger lime from the awesome list of choices, I finally decided on one of my old favorites, though Haagen Dazs does do a really fabulous and strong example of it.  Gelato is just much cleaner in flavor, not heavy or tongue-coating like the cream in ice cream.  I wonder if there’s a rum raisin “light” in the HD line… hmm.

Anyway, I definitely had to drink the espresso first.  Because I have my priorities, of course.  Coffee over gelato?  Actually, yes.  When its done really well, it can blow your mind.  And even if its just good, it is still comforting in a way that cold sweet things just can’t be.

Yesterday, the world and our society lost a cranky old visionary who really wanted us to wake the fuck up and realize how much power was concentrated in the hands of a few while we all just traipsed around in our lives with our gizmos and our lattes.

But that’s not about food.  So the following is, and rest in peace, George Carlin.

Why is there no blue food?

“…and don’t say blueberries, you know they’re purple!”

“Blue cheese?  No, that’s just white cheese with a bunch of MOLD in it!”

The “olive tree” part is about as close as I’m gonna get in talking about food today, sorry…

It’s old turning into new, the world flattening, the culture turning… and it makes me very happy.  It made me happy exactly FIVE months ago (check the filename on these photos – January 4th, 2008!) when the Iowa caucus occured and in a fit of jubiliation I took Sharpie to my hands to confer soundless information to anyone around who would look.

It suprised even my significant other, who had not seen me with more than a barest hint of political emotion in many years.  That’s the whole point, I think, to winning the thing in November.

Juxtapose that against my party registration which allowed me to do some strategic voting yesterday, helping to push most unsavory candidates on the Elephant side into their nominations, in order to more concretely ensure Donkey victories later on.

Ok, that and I like Ron Paul.  But I wouldn’t throw away a vote in November for a 3rd party candidate.  I’ve learned my lesson there.  Pragmatics mesh very well with voting, unfortunately for my morals and my conscience.