Pickle Sandwich, Part 2

Two years ago I drove 45 minutes for a pickle sandwich from Elsie's, a local restaurant in Haddon Township, NJ. Recently Don learned about another place selling pickle sandwiches, this time to Giovanni's DILLicous Pickles. Unlike 2020, this time Don wanted to try it, too.

We drove 30 minutes to Crydon, PA, a stop on the SEPTA train line.

Giovanni has the same basic concept as Elsie: hollowed out pickles jammed with the makings of a hoagie sandwich. There a couple of differences, though. Giovanni opens indoor dining, so the pickle juice stays in their restaurant instead of ending up in my car. Giovanni has a bigger menu including a pickle pizza (cauliflower crust with pickle slices on top of tomato sauce -- I actually want to try this next time), and pickle boats (best as I can tell, open face pickle sandwiches). Elsie drizzled a sauce on top that was lacking at Giovanni. I did like Giovanni's chips. 

Both places are Gluten Free and Keto-friendly.

I'm inspired to try the same concept with the massive amounts of cucumbers we are likely to receive from the Farmers Market this summer.

Don and I are planning to go back. It was different enough to merit the half-hour drive. Their hours are better than Elsie's, and having a place to eat it is a plus!

The Second Anniversary of COVID

Just before the world shut down I visited Elsie's in Haddonfield, NJ for a pickle sandwich. With hindsight I could feel the world shutting down, though it wouldn't happen in New Jersey for another two weeks. I was feeling an urgency to get out of the house on my own. That weekend (February 29, 2020) I drove 45 minutes for a pickle sandwich. Around that time I went into New York City to see a friend in a show. I also drove to New Brunswick to go to the Cornelius Low House, and to Princeton University to hear a WWII spy talk. I had to get out of the house while I still could.

This started as a post about pickle sandwiches, but quickly morphed into COVID. I'm going to take the detour and make the pickle sandwich story the next post.

Where do we stand two years later?

After a scary round of the Omicron surge where in New Jersey (for example) we went from 1,000 cases a day in late November to 30,000 cases A DAY by the New Year, we are back down to under 1,000 cases a day in early March. Gov. Phil Murphy and President Joe Biden have declared us done with Covid, done with Covid restrictions, and time to move forward.

A month ago we returned to in-person jury duty.

A couple of weeks ago the library reopened to the public.

Last week Town Hall reopened to the public.

Tomorrow schools switch to being mask optional.

In a week and a half Ashley and I are traveling on a mother/daughter trip.

We've eaten out. We've returned to live theater. We've moved forward.

I hope (and pray) the virus has, too.

Time will tell.

Tim Tams

It all started with this picture:

A quiet afternoon in front of a roaring fire with a cup of tea, a book, and a couple of speculoos cookies brought from Belgium by our exchange student. 

Andrew, a friend from my year in Belgium, insisted I needed Tim Tams instead of speculoos. Insisted as in asked my preferences and shipped me a box from his home. Did I mention he lives near Sydney, Australia?

Meanwhile, I looked online. They do sell Tim Tams at the Acme in Hamilton, NJ (only one town away). They even sell knock off Tim Tams.

According to Andrew, no, these will not do. (I bought the box from Acme anyway.)

Andrew put the package together and lovingly mailed it from Australia just before they were deluged with record rain storm (they are fine). The kind where in three days it rains as much as it normally rains in one year.

The package waited in Los Angeles long enough we wondered if it would actually make it New Jersey with all of the boxes of Tim Tams unopened, and all of the "proper" tea bags. 

The box arrived on Monday. I'm a little busy with a four-letter word: GALA, and wanted to give the box its due reverence, so I waited until Sunday to open it.

We started with the Dark Chocolate Mint. They are AMAZING! I did the slam. Don did not. I forgot to follow Andrew's key piece of advice: put in the fridge first for optimal results. Thankfully, we have more to practice with. We are pacing ourselves.

Now Don and I are figuring out local treats to hand to him when we get together in a few months at Niagara Falls (Covid, please stay away!!). I won't spoil his surprise here, but it will not be Pork Roll (or Taylor Ham).

Thank you, Andrew. To have you care enough to ship treats from around the globe even though we have not been in the same hemisphere at the same time in over 30 years means a lot to me.

Sometimes it is enough to just BE there

A couple of weeks ago we visited Don's Aunt Elva for possibly the last time. At 105, this is not the first time we've wondered if this is our last visit, but somehow this one felt like it might truly be the last one.

His aunt remembers hearing the factory whistles signally the end of World War I in 1917. She remembers going to Rider College before World War II (we realized this is her 85th reunion year!). She remembers working in a bank as her children were growing up. She remembers a mutual friend bringing brownies to work one day in exchange for learning her middle name (I shared the story with the mutual friend who remembers it as if it was yesterday).  She remembers family gatherings from when Don was a small child. She remembers holding Ashley as a baby, and where Ashley is attending college.

Up until this visit we could talk to her for three hours without repeating a conversation. This time was a struggle.

Covid has been hard on her. It kept her (and many others in vulnerable health situations) isolated. She was separated from her family and other visitors in an effort to keep her healthy. 

Many staff still caught Covid. It has proven to be impossible to quarantine away.

When restrictions were lifted a year ago, armed with our new vaccine cards, Don and I took a "vaxication" to visit her. Last month we went back.

Conversation was hard. We don't know how to work her hearing aids. I could go on. We split our visit into before lunch and after lunch. When we returned after lunch, she was napping. She looked so peaceful. We were so tired. We sat next to her, and took a nap, too.

Sometimes the best we can offer is simply being there. Letting her know we care enough to travel 6 hours to see her. She doesn't have to entertain us. We don't have to entertain her. We just need to BE.

Skip the Line

Four years ago I wrote a blog post about a New York City entrepreneur named Robert who formed Same Ole Line Dudes. It started with waiting on a line for a friend so the friend could buy the latest Apple product, or sneaker, or some other highly in demand product (I've heard similar versions of the same story from different people, in the end the product does not matter, my 2018 post is probably closest to what really happened). The friend was able to get in time in time, but suggested he sell his good spot to someone else. He realized people will pay money rather than stand in line for a long time. Especially in New York City.

He shared this story with us in 2018 when we were standing in the Hamilton ticket cancellation line. Normally we don't object to standing in long lines. In the back of our minds, though, we wanted to support his business.

Throughout the pandemic I followed him on Facebook. I saw during the pandemic he morphed his business of standing in line for Broadway tickets to standing in line at New Jersey DMV when in the summer of 2020 you had to get in line around midnight if you wanted a chance at getting in the door to renew your license in person. Then the shift was to standing in long lines for COVID tests. 

Fortunately we have returned to standing in line for good theater tickets.

I read a post saying they were standing in the Rush line to get same day tickets to the latest hot Broadway hot ticket: "The Music Man" starring Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster. At the time, orchestra seats were going for about $800, but Rush tickets were $49. 

After a little bit of debate, we did it. We booked Same Ole Line Dudes to stand in line for us for three hours ($80 because of the sub-freezing weather + $49 for each ticket, two ticket maximum). We connected with him just after noon when he purchased the tickets and saw the show at 3 pm. We were very excited to have Robert himself as our Line Dude. He sent us progress texts before, during, and after.

You can tell by the tent he knows what he is doing.

We certainly could have gone into NYC three hours earlier and stood in line ourselves. After sitting in our seats and talking to the person next to us who had stood in line, I almost missed the camaraderie that happens in those situations -- when you chat with the others in line, get to know their stories, smile as you see them sitting in their seats, and all that. At the same time, it was nice to leave at 9 am to get into the city by noon instead of 6 am. It was nice knowing someone has figured out the system. It was really nice supporting him. Later Don sent him an electronic tip equivalent to a couple of cups of coffee.

Thank you for a great experience.

Good luck signs

While walking around New York City last month Don found a Susan B. Anthony dollar coin and ten pennies.

I found a euro cent coin.

He had been stressing about something that happened to the car just before we boarded the PATH train. I took his find to mean the day was going well.

I took my find to mean there is hope I'll get back to Europe again.

Since then I've found a dime and a couple of pennies. I'll take good luck where I find it.

Spoke Too Soon

On January 30th I posted Enough Already! complaining about how I can't take any more.

As the saying goes, "if you want to make God laugh, tell her your plans." Two weeks after writing that post I went for my first colonoscopy. Everyone (I mean everyone) says "the prep is the hard part." 

Everyone lied.

The actually colonoscopy was not a big deal. I was asleep for it. The prep was not too horrible as I went with the newly FDA approved pills over the goopy drink. I even did it during a virtual board meeting, and stayed up most of the night to finish.

The day before the procedure, several days into eating a low-res diet (read: pretty much the opposite of the low carb meal I normally eat) the doctor's office called to say my insurance refuses to cover the endoscopy, too, so he is just going to do the colonoscopy.

Other than he hit my triggers -- I was highly anxious about the procedure, the anesthesia, the recovery. I was hungry from not eating much that day to make sure the rest slid out that night. I was tired from the stress of the procedure. That I snapped at him. The next morning when the hospital staff kept confirming with me that I was there for both an endoscopy and colonoscopy I snapped. When I saw the doctor on the operating table I complained again. He actually told me we didn't have to go through with the procedure.

Of course I went through with it.

Two hours later when I woken up. Yes, TWO HOURS. The same doctor yelled at me to put on my mask because we were in a hospital and complained he was not behind scheduled and that I need to repeat this in three years. 

I fell out of the bed after he left because I couldn't function after the anesthesia and wanted out of there like a bat out of hell.

I wrote him a letter of complaint.

According to his notes which were finally uploaded to the patient portal a few days later I was sent home with guidance as to what to expect. I confirmed with Don, I was not sent home with paperwork.

That was supposed to be the end of the hard part.

No, the hard part continued with pain in my stomach for over a week. My best guess is I was healing from the polyps that were removed during surgery. Is this normal? What should I do about it? Who should I talk to about this? How long should this last?

Two and a half weeks later I'm still waiting for results from the biopsy. The website says to allow three weeks and not call. They'll upload the results to the patient portal, and will only call if it is cancerous.

No reply to my letter of complaint, or answers to the questions posed in it. Do I still need an endoscopy? Is there a non-invasive option? Is it normal to be out of it from the anesthesia for four additional hours?

What is next? He has already said he doesn't want to continue to accept my insurance, so I know I won't be seeing him again.