Adventuring with Lurker and Lady, Part the Second; Or, A Spirited Circumnavigation of the Globe

I awoke the following morning with a horrible taste in my mouth. The wines, ales, and spirits of the previous night did not have too much effect on my head, but the persistent flavor of tobacco made me feel sick to my stomach. I brushed my teeth and rinsed again ... but the taste remained. I knew that Lurker and Lady like to sleep late on the weekends, so I snuggled back under the blankets and slept for another couple of hours.

I finally decided to roll out of bed again shortly before noon. My stomach was starting to feel hungry, so I decided to sample the banana-blueberry bread I baked for Lurker and Lady. It helped to camouflage the cigar aftertaste. Just as I was starting to really get moving, fully awake, I heard Lady at the bottom of the staircase letting me know she was coming to visit.

"How are you this morning?" she asked. "I know you get up early. I hope you haven't been too bored up here waiting for us."

"No," I cheerfully replied. "I actually just got out of bed myself."

"So, is everything all right?"

"Yeah, I'm good this morning ..."

Then I remembered! Lurker and I had made a plan to convince Lady that I was offended and leaving town. I had already foiled the plan before it even got off the ground!

Since I could not move forward with the scheme, I decided to just confess it all to Lady. She was amused, but she also said that Lurker had partially given it away all on his own. When he arrived in her rooms the previous night, he told her a tale of woe about how upset he made me ... but he was inebriated enough that he exhibited a giant grin as he rehearsed the story for her. She knew that it did not quite add up!

That was about the time that we heard Lurker coming up the staircase. He launched into his routine again, but I told him that I had already failed to go through with the plan. I had actually been worried the night before that he would be so convincing that Lady would not sleep well.

We decided to get ready for the day and head out to the local marketplace for some lunch, though Lurker decided that he wanted to sample the banana-blueberry bread as well.

We had a brisk walk to the marketplace. The weather had tuned decidedly colder. On our way, we discussed which merchant should provide our meal. In the end, we opted for some Southern cuisine at Delilah's. I had a delicious turkey chop with gravy over rice, corn bread, candied yams, and strawberry lemonade. I also ate a side the macaroni and cheese, supposedly the best macaroni and cheese in the realm. It was truly delicious. I could have made an entire meal out of just the macaroni and cheese. As we looked around at the other patrons dining at Delilah's, it became apparent that many of them had been dining there regularly. They had obviously been munching copious amounts of fried chicken and macaroni and cheese!

After we finished lunch, we decided to visit a relatively new museum located near some of the city's most historic buildings. I had never visited this museum before, but Lurker and Lady both highly recommended it. Being a Saturday, the museum was crowded, so we did not have a chance to see the special exhibit about a local printer, but we did observe the theater-in-the-round presentation and browsed through the permanent collection. The entire museum focuses on the document that defines our government (even if the current king and his advisors choos to ignore it as often as not). The final exhbit consists of bronze statues of the men who signed the document, arranged in small conversational clusters throughout the room so visitors can walk around them and see them up close. The museum also possesses one of only twenty extant copies of the first newspaper that published the document in its entirety, a generous donation made by a benefactor that Lurker, Lady, and I have all met and benefited from his other philanthropic and scholarly interests.

Having engaged our minds for a couple of hours, we opted to undertake a pub crawl for the twenty blocks that we needed to walk to return to the boarding house. We needed to find some way to make it as interesting as possible, so we decided to circumnavigate the globe in our choices of beverages. Having been to an Italian franchise, a traditional Irish pub, and a genteel European parlour the night before, we decided to start our odyssey at a modern Irish tavern with an American flare. The place was lively and crowded, even for a Saturday afternoon, but we managed to get a spot at the bar. I ordered a Long Island iced tea, a drink I had been craving since the night before. Lady had a Tom Collins, though she said she could not taste the alcohol. I pointed out that is supposedly the sign of a good drink. We watched the other patrons, including an incredibly tall man we dubbed Goliath and a couple negotiating who would eat the last of the shrimp tacos.

Having made our nod toward the Irish-American sensibility, we moved along to a tavern in antique row, a tavern that specialized in Latin American and Caribbean foods and beverages. Before we even made it to the bar, I knew what I wanted: the barkeep was stunning with jet black hair combed back from his face. Lurker, Lady, and I all decided to sample the Caipirinha, a classic Brazillian cocktail which combines Cachaca, sugar, fresh lime and Bacardi Lime Mix. The barkeep chatted with us for a while, but his shift must have ended because he disappeared and a tavern wench took his place. All of the food that emerged from the kitchen looked and smelled wonderful.

We had previously decided that our pub crawl needed to include three places so each of us would have a chance to spend out gold pieces on the others. For our final destination, Lurker and Lady suggested a Mexican tavern that played an important part in their lives. They often visit that tavern to milestones at their academy and they have taken their parents there on the important occasion of first meetings. The late afternoon crowd was rather large; Lurker and I both noticed a woman wearing no undergarments as we passed her barstool on our way to end of the bar. For some reason, whenever I spend time with Lurker I am exposed to a lot more female flesh than I ever see on my own. Lurker highly recommended the sangria, so we ordered a pitcher and some chips to go along with it. We were all astounded to see many of the barkeeps balance trays of drinks on their heads.

After finishing our sangria, we decided to head back to the boarding house and prepare for the rest of the evening. Lurker arranged for us to dine at an Afghani restaurant, completing our imagined circumnavigation of the globe.