The Little Things

Man,

So last week was my friend Jake's birthday. It was also the birthday week of three other volunteers, but the day of the event I am about to describe happened to be Jake's birthday. He and I work in veggie prep together and he is about as Leo as they come. So naturally, he wanted a haircut on his birthday. Leos are ALL about the hair. He keeps his hair really short already, in a buzz cut, so I didn't quite understand the inspiration at first but nevertheless.

We had both been let off of work early that day. I was feeling good by the time I got to lunch, having had a noon class and a shower/whirlpool (out of my normal ritual, I know) and I ran into him there, as well as our fellow volunteer Misha, whose birthday had been the day before. She volunteered to drive him to Pittsfield, a town close by, so he could go to his FAVORITE barber shop. How you find a favorite barber shop within two months of living somewhere, I don't know, leave it to a Leo...

I needed to buy some lotion so I tagged along. Prior to this, I had a minor sugar craving and purchased a cookie in the cafe. Sort of a 'healthy' (it was natural and was made with whole wheat flour) but indulgent cookie all at once (definitely made with butter and sugar, but probably a natural sugar of some sort like agave nectar--definitely not white sugar). It was delicious. As we drove out to Pittsfield, Jake wanted some cash, so we pulled off at a gas station with an atm sign. He came back to the car with a bottle of water, some cash, and bazooka joe bubble gum. So I had a piece of gum with not only white sugar, but also artificial flavoring and coloring, preservatives, etc. I know this sounds really silly to all of you readers out there, but by this point I had a nice little buzz going and was feeling faintly nauseous.

The barber shop was very cool, nestled into a small building, sharing the space with a little tattoo shop. It was definitely a dude's barber shop, kind of retro and modern, full of tattooed dudes giving some nice precision buzz cuts, maxim magazines on the cushy leather bench, black and white tile, and huge ceiling fans blowing at full blast. The dudes looked really serious about what they were doing. There was one female barber and she was the one who took Jake. He normally had a favorite guy, and old guy, but to the disappointment of Jake he wasn't there that day.

After Jake's head was buzzed with a #2 and his beard, hairline and eyebrows were styled, we were ready to go. Jake wanted next to go to King Cone.

Little did I know, King Cone is a serious soft serve ice cream shack. We tumbled out of Misha's old blue grand am (which feels like a canopy bed from a horror movie set in the 19th century by the way, all she needs to do is take out her stereo and put in some strange chandelier) and examined the ice cream options. Misha marched right up to the lady and had her cone, white chocolate and black raspberry twist, within the first breath I took. Jake and I got vanilla dipped in a coconut coating. Small size, which was probably the equivalent to a large at Dairy Queen. I saw some guys with larges, and I was amazed that those towers of ice cream were hanging on--they were as vast as Montana.

Holy shit. This was definitely the most delicious soft serve I have ever had in my life. I had no idea that this sort of thing had the room for foodie-ism or was worthy of any connoisseur type attention. But this was ridiculous. The coating was made with some sort of awful delicious partially hydrogenated oil and had little flecks of toasted coconut in it. The ice cream was smoother than silk and white as snow. I don't think I have had a normal poop since.

We listened to some Gang Starr, Biggie and Tupac on the way back as we munched the terrible treats and sang along. When we got back we were due for a volunteer "off the mat" meeting, which tend to be pretty serious and heartfelt by the way. I don't know about Jake and Misha but I felt pretty nauseous and hyper during it. When I looked over at Misha she looked really dreamy and meditative, and Jake looked really tense and had his arms crossed over his chest.

Anyway, so that's the story of how my sugar addiction has come back, and that is a slight thing that I'm dealing with right now. I'm eating a piece of chocolate as I write this. It has dried cherries and chiles in it, hot damn.