Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Brown County Story: Part II

The summer has come full circle. I spent some of June's first warm days in Brown County, Indiana, and enjoyed the cooler days of Labor Day weekend there again. It was a perfect mini-break to separate my last day of work and work from the this month of preparation for heading to bell'Italia for grad school.

Climbing Browning Mountain and hiking part of the Knobstone Trail in the Hoosier National Forest made my head stop swirling around grant reports and workshop plans. Well, walks in the woods did part of the purging...an angry bee stung the top of my head without warning. It hurt, but it was like a slap in the face from nature. "Stop thinking about last week and old jobs! No more 'to do lists' for now! Enjoy this!!" I scratched my head and let the soft wind and new wildflowers fill my thoughts.

Later, wine and dessert were the highlights of dinner at Story Inn. Tasty food, if somewhat overpriced and over-lauded, hit the spot after the hikes, but it was the rich wine that made my head stop itching (ironic, isn't it?). In keeping with the theme, an over eager kitchen runner kept over filling water glasses and then stealing silverware before I'd even had a chance to use it. She did spill a useful secret though. "The desserts here are excellent. They make them almost every day!" Hmmm...almost every day? She grabbed the dessert spoon another staff member had just given me and skipped away.

Because the head waitress was friendly and because of my second glass of wine, I answered her question without any polite embarrassment. "Would you like to hear about our desserts tonight?"

"Sure. Which ones were made today?"

She answered just as freely. "The peach cobbler. It's served with the best vanilla ice cream I've ever had."

"Deal. And could I trouble you for another dessert spoon."

While waiting for fresh cobbler, I listened to a Russian couple play a soft piano and violin duet in the restaurant's corner. It's usually all but impossible to make a sequel that's at least as good as the original, but this Brown County Story: Part II was even sweeter than the first.

~Corrie

2 Comments:

At 1:19 AM, Blogger Corrie said...

sounds like you had quite a story-book visit to brown county! (how long can we go on using story puns? quite a bit longer, i'm sure!) miss you, bella, and it was great to talk to you today! can't wait for you to come here! by the way, i'd say this is actually brown county part 3: don't you remember the mini trip we took 3 years ago before MY move to Italy? now that's full circle! :)

-Jackie

 
At 2:19 PM, Blogger Corrie said...

Oh, that's right! How could I not remember the "prequel" to this Brown County Story? The stelle magnets, the non-cheese buffalo farm, the strange soda fountain shop in less-than-impressive Columbus... What great Stories. (Stll funny!)

~Corrie

 

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