Soup with Nuts

The New York Times is running a blog on migraines this month, with several well known authors (and a famous musician) each taking a turn discussing the different ways they learned to cope with migraines and other headache disorders. The comments have been fascinating and aggravating.

In an anti-harmonic convergence, I woke up last night with my first full blown migraine in almost a year. The intense pain coupled with extreme nausea made it difficult for me to get up. Since the only available remedy at the intense pain/nausea stage is to sleep the rest of the headache off, I went back to sleep, first on the downstairs couch, then back to the bed. In between the transfer J bought me a glass of warm water and some ibuprofen as a barrier against more pain.

The headache made us late in our search of local entertainment today. We started with two stops in the Strip District. Our first stop was at The Enrico Biscotti Café for a late breakfast of pizza topped with blue cheese and cranberries, biscotti and goat cheese canolli. The smells in the cafe were amazing and I wished (not for the first time today) I had grabbed my camera to take some photographs of the reclaimed warehouse interior.

Next was a stop at Pennsylvania Macaroni Company for some cheese. Penn Mac and Trader Joe's are the two places in which J and I have to establish a set spending amount beforehand, less we go into debt buying out the cheese counter. The best part about Penn Mac (and Trader's Joe) is that all the people in the store are happy because they are purchasing good food.

On our way back we passed a table full green Pittsburgh wear, in anticipation of St. Patrick's Day. My favorite was a kelly green t-shirt with the logo “It's good to be a Penguins fan”.

Next up was a stop at O'Bannon's Oriental Carpets, to show J the “School of Fish” carpet that inspired me to give him a small fish rug for Christmas. We had a good time looking at the other carpets in the store, all of them insanely expensive, handwoven woolen wonders.

Our final stop was a walk down Carson Street as participants in the Fourth Annual South Side Mid-Winter Soup Contest. Armed with a spoon and an appetite, for five dollars and the donation of a canned good, we were able to sample the soups from twenty of the South Side's restaurants and vote for our favorite. The most unusual combination came from the 17th Street Café, a Bacon bleu cheese and apple soup that was surprisingly good. We thought we were hard core toting our own spoons until we saw a woman carrying her own spoon and mug.