Monday, April 18, 2016

Cheese, Charcuterie and Crambone

Okay...I know you're probably wondering...what the heck is CHARCUTERIE...or maybe not if you're into big words. I'll get to the meaning later, but until this weekend I never heard the word, although Miji and I have added it to our daily vocabulary. We hadn't seen Miji's parents in a few weeks so we devoted our Saturday to hanging out there, at least that was the plan. When we got there to their house his mom asked us if we wanted to go to Sonoma in Santa Monica with her and Miji's tias to which I quickly replied YES! Of course Miji agreed as well since as he says "Happy wife, Happy Life" and he knows how happy wine makes me. Sonoma is this wine garden at the Santa Monica Promenade that is hip and swanky. It makes you like one of the cool kids to hang out there with all the other cool kids. So off we went. On road trip adventures with Miji's mom and his tias, Miji is always the front seat passenger so he can assist with directions or be the cool DJ from his Iphone. Miji's mom, aunt and myself are the backseat passengers. Let me just put this out there right now...Miji's aunt is an awesome driver-scared of nothing and no one. I am a big chicken to even leave past Fontana or Redlands if I am the driver, but not her, she is fearless! The trip there seemed somewhat long and I was getting a little carsick because the sun was beating down on my side and I occasionally was looking at my phone which equals carsick for me. Finally we exited the freeway and it was a beautiful sunny day, but the traffic was oh so crazy! Did it bother Miji's aunt? Nope! She maneuvered her way into the lanes she needed, made swift uturns and even managed a U-turn on PCH when the other cars did the same. It was awesomely exhilarating to say the least. When we finally managed to get to a parking lot, we ended up in the smallest, most awful parking lot there. There was only one way in and out and it was packed. Cars were honking at each other and trying to find a place. We finally got to moving when we saw an empty space...with a guy standing there to save the place for his family car that was like 4 cars back. "Oh hell no" was the thought in our head when we saw him standing there. We honked at him as we slowly pulled in to show him that space was ours. Luckily for him at that same moment the parking attendant drove by and told him he couldn't do that, so he moved-good thing for him. There were 4 of us ladies in the car as well as Miji who were hot and needed a drink! We walked along the Santa Monica Pier just enjoying the day and the beautiful scenery of the sun glimmering on the ocean. The beach is one of my favorite places to be. I could stare out into the waves forever, it's so peaceful to me. We ended up at Mariasol at the end of the pier. We ate, we drank, we laughed. Miji wondered where shrimp taquitos have been his whole life, I wondered the same...those were soooo good! We annoyed our waiter who was this little short Mexican guy with an accent named Tony-we accidentally called him Ramon once-oops! He hated us! He handed us over to another waiter named Sidney because he told us he had to leave for his other job...ya right we thought! After we were done we walked back to the car, stopped for a selfie on the pier and headed to our next stop...Sonoma!!! We got there and waited in line for a table. The host seemed like she was new to the job and after she took our name down she told us to stay where she could see us or else she would forget about us (isn't that why you took our name down?). We sat at a cozy little booth and we felt cool. Our hip young waiter named Sean came to give us our menus to which we looked for our favorite wine...Moscato D'Asti. Miji's aunt ordered a cheese and meat plate...now here it comes...the meat is also a known by the fancy name of Charcuterie. Miji and I laughed, we couldn't stop saying it, where had this word been all our lives? As we sipped on our moscato enjoying our charcuterie we saw a familiar face...it was Tony...aka Ramon! We all waved annoyingly and shouted out "Hey Tony!" he seemed to give in to the fact that he was cursed with us for the day and he may as well have fun in the process. He became our friend and checked on us when Sean was busy. We wrapped up our evening in Santa Monica pouring off what was left in the wine bottle and heading back to the car. As Miji played DJ on the way home, he also played us old Tom and Jerry cartoons with Jerry's Uncle Pacos singing "Crambone". If you haven't seen it before, we highly recommend it. We got dropped off at home and I took two aspirin because after even a few drinks I knew I would feel hangover-ish if I didn't. I laid in Miji's arms that night and we laughed as we reminisced about the beautiful day we had with family. I drifted off to sleep with thoughts of Miji, Cheese, Charcuterie and Crambone...

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