I have been looking for Italian sausage for a while now. I couldn’t find any in the regular grocery store and I couldn’t find any at the butcher. Finally, I noticed that down the road from where Flo works is an Italian grocery store. I stopped in one day and, lo and behold, they had Italian sausage! (which, incidentally is not called Italian sausage in Europe – it has a name, but I can’t remember it, let alone spell it) Well, I didn’t have money that day, so I didn’t buy it, but I sent Flo by to pick some up for me. They were closed. Next day: closed. Next day: closed. You get the picture. When he finally went and they were open, they’d moved their retail business (read: sausage) to another location and were only selling wholesale (read: olive oil, wine and pasta). Harumph.

Then I remembered there is a weenie-teenie Italian grocery store down the road from where I work. Some of you may remember my having mentioned it as the store where the Echterdingen wannabe-thieves finally managed to break into. You’ll be relieved to know they now have video surveillance. Anyway, we stopped by day before yesterday and he had one chunk of sausage left. Well, after a confusing conversation between two German-as-a-second-language speakers, he decided I was too dumb or something and only talked to Flo, which I found extremely offensive. Then we couldn’t pay with a debit card so we had to go down to the ATM (with me sputtering the whole way there and back about how offensive it is to ignore your customer completely). When we came back, he wanted to explain to me how to cook the sausage. Like, who would specifically come to him asking for this if they didn’t know how to cook it or what to do with it? Hello? I finally got too annoyed and said, “Yeah, I grew up with it too.”

Then he thought I was Italian, so we had to explain I’m not Italian, but American, but have Italian background. Then he wanted to know which one of my generations of ancestors came from Italy and where exactly and what their last name is.
“Es-puh-zee-toe” I said. “From Salerno.”
“Ooooh! Es-pah-zee-toe! Typical Napolitaner! Oh, you (to Flo again), you did a good job, marrying an Italian.” And then he was my best friend.

Here’s what it looks like when you buy Italian sausage at the Italian grocery:

As we drove away from there, we saw a little old man riding his bicycle through town. Then we noticed that over his glasses, he had on science lab safety goggles! How adorable is that?? I said he must not like the wind in his eyes and Flo answered, “Yeah, or he’s just a Chemical Brother.” Ha! (If you don’t know what a Chemical Brother is, click on their name and you can hear a snippet of them from Amazon.)

Other bit: If you are NOT a supporter of Hilary Clinton for president, you may enjoy this amusing opinion piece from the NY Times – The Audacity of Hopelessness by Frank Rich

And a piece: Where don’t bagels come from? I say it that way, because I know where they’re not going to (Germany) but where are they not coming from? According to Wikipedia’s bagel entry, they originated in Austria, but I gotta tell ya, if the valley poopers (as Germans call Austrians) invented bagels, they are not exporting to their oh-so-friendly northern neighbors. I’ve found English muffins, French toast, Italian sausage, Spanish chorizo and who knows what else, but I cannot find a good ole New York (Austrian) bagel. And to be honest, I have my suspicions about the veracity of said Wiki article. Any good New Yorker knows Jews invented bagels in New York.