I have had french fries for two days in a row. Actually, yesterday it was "Belgian fries", from a place called Bel Frites, where the potatoes are rammed through a cutter by hand, one at a time, fried until soft yet white, left to rest, then fried again when ordered, and served with plain or seasoned salt and exotic dipping sauces. The fries are all that are on the menu. You can buy a bottled drink to go with them but nothing else. The fries are a bit expensive compared to the usual fries elsewhere, so I have seen two or three people sharing a cone of them. It also takes the workers a bit of time to fix them. There is nothing mass-produced about it. Yet I don't find that particularly quaint or desirable. Yesterday I placed my order and was unable to sit down to wait for it because all seven stools were taken, and the takers were taking their time. When I got my order there was nothing for it but to wander outside and eventually make my way back to my car, where I could sit down, finally.
Today's fries came from Foster's Freeze on Marsh. I think these cravings come in clusters. I have a thing, then I want it again. Sooner or later I do get tired of it. I think I have gotten tired of it this time already. That little meal, which also included a small chocolate chip malt - made, by the look of it, with soft-serve ice cream and that hot chocolate dip, which hardens on contact with the ice cream - has sunk to the bottom of my stomach and I'm regretting it. Yet I wanted it. Maybe it's good that I had it.
I came home to find Paul watching the end of An Inconvenient Truth. He had recorded it on the DVR. I have seen it twice so didn't need to see it a third time. I was reminded, though, of how essentially low-key it is. It could be far more sensationalist and the subject would have warranted it, but it isn't. I hope that's where its power lies.
