What's In It for Me?

It's funny how the prediction of snow makes different people react different ways. It's meaningless to me, because I know it's not going to change my plans of going out. Others, not so much.

I got a message from a friend around 1ish asking what I was up to for the afternoon and since I hadn't quite formulated a plan (having only been up for a couple hours), I drew a blank.

She, on the other hand, was already looking forward to a cozy evening at home with her boy and wanted to go score some mitten-making yarn before the first flake fell. Wow. Not the first thought I'd have if I were going to stay in with a guy.

Unbelievable as it sounds, she was inviting me to go to a yarn store with her. As you might guess, I don't frequent yarn stores...or craft stores or anything along those lines. Why would I? I don't do anything crafty. She sensed my hesitation and mentioned that the yarn store was underneath Pearl's Cupcakes. Okay, at least now I was paying attention.

Still, a cupcake is a small diversion when a friend is planning to browse yarn and talk to other knitters while I listen to my hair grow, so I said yes as long as we began this fun-filled adventure with brunch. Wisely, she agreed.

Presuming that the post-parade crowd had cleared the area by now, we decided on 821 Cafe for eating. The place was pretty packed, but it wasn't too long before two stools opened up for us after a girl came in to buy a piece of art for her boyfriend and then relinquished her stool (he'd admired it at breakfast earlier so she'd come back to score it before it sold).

The show of intricately-drawn bird images by artist el Camino was the subject of discussion by many in the room as person after person pointed out their favorite (the cardinal! the owl!), probably tempted by the reasonable $40 price tag.

Brunch was an everything bagel with sun-dried tomato cream cheese, capers, sliced tomatoes (suspiciously red and flavorful ones at that) and red onion. Friend mentioned that a bagel is the equivalent of five slices of bread and I asked her what her point was. Staff of life, right?

And then we were off to the Avenues, an infrequent destination for a non-shopping type like me, via Grove Avenue. Surprisingly for a Saturday afternoon, the hordes of joggers, stroller pushers and other assorted people who usually take over that street rather than use the sidewalk were absent.

Of some note was the guy riding a unicycle and walking his German Shepherd on the sidewalk, as unusual an example of multi-tasking as I've seen lately. He'd never be able to do that with a sniffer like a beagle, let me assure you from years of experience.

Walking into Pearl's, I gravitated to the counter to see what flavors were available today before being dragged downstairs to the subterranean yarn shop where I had no business being. I tried to feign interest but my mind was upstairs. After what seemed like hours of "yarn...blah, blah...yarn...blah" friend chose, paid and I was free at last.

That Pearl Gone Cocoa cupcake (chocolate cake with white icing and a mound of coconut) that had reduced me to tears on my last visit was tempting, but it is December now and there was an eggnog cupcake just asking to be experienced.

We'll call that my way of dealing with the prediction of snow.