Juanito Told Lupe

It’s nice to have one food you are so good at making, you become “known” for it. People expect it whenever they come over for dinner. They ask for the recipe but, if it truly is “your thing,” they can never duplicate it. For me, that is guacamole.

(Side note: I was walking through the Camas farmer’s market yesterday and saw a sign for “Fresh Guak.” That k just about killed me. Once an editor, always an editor, I suppose.)

I’ve been making this guacamole for the better part of a decade now, and have it perfected. I stumbled upon a recipe from Who Song & Larry’s, a local Mexican food joint, in the newspaper one time. I was a big fan of their guacamole – which they make fresh for you, table-side, while singing an outlandish guacamole song to the tune of “Woolly Bully.” You can only imagine. The lyrics go like this:

Well, Juanito told Lupe

About a thing he saw

It was green and squishy

And they ate it all.

Guacamole!!

Guacamole.

Guacamole (squish, squish), guacamole (squish, squish), guacamole.

There’s more, but I trust you get the picture. There is a video clip on YouTube if you’re that inclined to hear the rest. Corny song aside, I really liked Who Songs’ guacamole, so I saved the recipe and made it. It was pretty, pretty good, as Larry David would say, but I gradually modified it over the years. Today, I’ve achieved avocado perfection. Juanito and Lupe would be proud. So I make it for potlucks and parties and dinner get-togethers when we have people over. In true rock ‘n roll fashion I’ve even made it on the road, at other people’s houses, though thankfully nobody was waving a lighter in my face while I was dicing up onions.

And I’m happy to do it. I could probably make it in my sleep at this point. I’d share the recipe, but because it’s “my thing,” you won’t be able to duplicate it. Trust me.

Tara’s thing is deviled eggs, by the way. What’s yours?

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Speaking of Larry David, I finished watching “Curb Your Enthusiasm” over the weekend and now I kind of don’t know what to do with myself. Eight seasons worth, 10 episodes per season. That means I just completed 80 episodes of Curb (though I’m not sure if you’d call it “binge watching” as this was spread out over a few months’ time…is there an official equation for determining what constitutes a binge watch?), and as predicted by all who encouraged me to watch, loved it. Like, freakin’ loved it (because, hi mom!). Almost without exception, it’s brilliant and hilarious and sarcastic and dark. All positive factors in a sitcom. I’m on the fence as to whether it’s better than Seinfeld. I mostly find the idea ludicrous and sacrilegious, but then I think about Denise Handicapped and the awkwardly inappropriate question of whether a Chinese baby has a predilection for chopsticks and the prostitute Larry hired simply to take advantage of the carpool lane and the idea doesn’t seem so farfetched at all. I’d say both series are close – it’s almost a toss-up for me – so if you’re a Seinfeld fan looking for something similar but have never checked out Curb, I highly recommend you do so.

Now.

Seriously, what are you waiting for?

(Other than to finish my blog post, of course.)

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(And leave a comment.)

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Did anybody take advantage of Prime Day on 7/11?

Up until this year, I knew nothing about it. I was never an Amazon Prime member, so why would I? But I am now (the ability to maybe-binge watch 80 episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm alone was worth the price), so I actually started paying attention this time around.

I ended up buying a brand new Kindle Fire 7 tablet for an impossible-to-resist price of $20. It was marked down from $50 to $30 that one day only, and ordering through Alexa would give you a $10 Amazon credit, so I jumped all over that. And I had no desire for a tablet before that day, but I gotta admit, it’s nice to have around. I gave my old MacBook to Audrey at the beginning of the year, reasoning that I could always bring my work laptop home if I needed to do something. (Like writing a blog post at 6:30 p.m.). It’s worked out fine, but it is nice to have a tablet with a screen that’s big and easy to read. So, good job, Prime Day! You have made me a convert!

And to think the previous most exciting thing to ever happen to me on 7/11 was a free Slurpee…

Tara also bought a tent on Prime Day. She got a lightning deal that saved her $40. Great timing, as we have a camping trip coming up the end of next week. It’s quite a haul, five hours away and north of Mount Rainier, but we’ve got a great spot right next to the river and are looking forward to a couple of days spent hiking, exploring, and kicking back in front of the campfire with a cocktail in our hands and not a worry on our minds.

No doubt Tara will want me to make guacamole.

I’ll offer her a trade if she brings deviled eggs…