Summerlove

I am sitting on my balcony right now eating a sugar cone of Breyer's cookies and cream ice cream. I have been thinking about this cone ever since the weather got really, really hot and by god, it is really, really hot.

All around the city new hot-weather treats keep popping up for our attention, gelato chains have sprung up like chicken pox on a 6 year old, I can't even count how many frozen yogurt places have appeared, each with their own "recipe", and water-ice, that hometown Philly favorite of mine, seems to want to try to stand in my way of a decent walk home from work, no matter what route I try. But none of these can really compete to that once ubiquitous ice cream. These days, if a parlour does not include singing attendants or 40 different items mixed in, it wont open. This is a shame. I fear my kids will grow up dreaming about tiny spoonfuls of gelato when the weather gets warm. If this happens, what else could go wrong? At the Rita's around the corner from me, they have gone against the water-ice unwritten code that says you MUST have cherry, chocolate and lemon. Usually, I am promised, at best, strawberry and mango. What gives? With all of the slow food, 100 miles foodies around, how come we can't get a basic, and amazing, ice cream places where I can get my sugar cone fix.

As a kid, we were promised that if the weather was hot, and the family was feeling relaxed, a trip to the local 31 flavors was in order. My dad can eat a chocolate sugar cone like a champ. My folks would take my sister I to the local dairy and where she would always get a cone of bubblegum ice cream. There is something about competing against the heat, trying to beat the melt, and stop that sweet, creamy sticky ice cream from getting on your hands. There is something amazing about the almost ingrained tongue dexterity most humans seem to have to work a non-uniform mound of ice cream into a perfectly formed cone with just their tongue and their determination that speaks to us a people.

On this day of 104 degree heat, I applaud you ice cream cone makers and consumers of America.

carrot

I will try my best to reiterate this anecdote, as told to me by my then super pregnant sister who has since given birth to the awesomist niece in the world who will one day care for my tired, sick, aching, smelly, pain in the ass, aging body. This one is dedicated to you Sadie Pearl. I can't wait to assign you chores!

My sister's water broke Tuesday morning and she and her husband made their way to the hospital. The call went out across the Kohn family grapevine with my mother and father sharing the news like Edward R. Morrow to the greater Philadelphia Jewish community. They stopped over at the local deli to pick up my sister a corned beef sandwich, her one request as she had been abstaining during her pregnancy, and drove as fast as two confused grandparents to be can be expected to drive from Philly to New York. Shockingly, they did not get lost going into the city and made their way up to the hospital room. I don't know what the trip from the parking garage to my sisters room was like, but I have a feeling it involved my mother proudly boasting about her granddaughter to my sickly people. She is a ray of sunshine in an otherwise painful world right?

She burst into the hospital room and, in her frantic way, attempted to keep herself busy. Since she couldn't physically give birth or act as mid-wife, she did the next best thing, she tried to feed people. I am guessing that she was in such a rush to get out of Philadelphia that she didn't have time to actually pack real food, so she sat down, pulled out a bag of whole carrots (not baby carrots) grabbed the vegetable peeler that she also seemed have packed and began to peel carrots in the hospital room. I forgot that New York 2010 reverted by to shtetl life. I will have to remember to supply her with a bag of potatoes and beets for the next birth.

gymfail

I am failing terribly at trying to uphold a tough-guy image at the gym. A few months ago I almost fell on my ass trying to put on a pair of long johns. This AM, while I was trying to get my towel from my locker (which was surrounded by a pride of juice-heads), I accidently pulled not just my towel out of my locker, but a pair of Cathy's lacy black panties which had attached themselves to the towel in the dryer. The upward thrust of the towel caused the hidden underwear to detach themselves mid-air and fly into the center of this group. I tried to give a look like "Sup dudes, yeah, these are my chicks. Yeah, I have seen her naked" but I think it read more like"hey pals, I swear I don't wear these (I totally wear these)."

Sherry Kohn For President

My mother is running (unopposed) for Democratic Committee person in our home county. I honestly had no idea that this was an elected position. I hope she remembers that with great power, comes great responsibility for graft and petty larceny. If you think that George Bush mumbled words, wait until the Bucks County Currier Times has to spell my mothers made-up Yiddish words.

If our history books tell us anything, now is the time that my mother will have that affair she has always been threatening my father with. Most likely with one of her junior staffers. Sorry dad. That is what happens with you marry a politician.

What do you think the best campaign slogan for her is:

Sherry Kohn "A Brisket in Every Pot"
Sherry Kohn "I Am So Proud of my Children"
Sherry Kohn "That's the Story"
Sherry Kohn "My Future Daughter-in-Law is Chinese"
Sherry Kohn "No Running in Hallway"

The first Mr. Chung-Kohn

This past Friday, Cathy agreed to let me become her first husband. There was an opening and my credentials were stellar. With Rahm Emmanuel already married, both of the most qualified Jews on the DC market are taken. Sorry ladies.

Cathy's father, in an act of filial understanding, told her that he would be ok if we were married by a "Jewish Priest."

Luckily, my folks rescheduled their trip down to DC to this weekend, where, if all goes according to plan, the entire Kohn clan (Sherry, Lee Kohn, Rebekah, Alex) will go out to lunch with the entire Chung clan (Mr. & Mrs., Dan, Andrea, Audreybaby). No doubt, there will be awkward silences followed by loud Jewish aural blasts from the Kohn side of the table. That is how our people ROLL. We are heading to a Korean restaurant. I have told my dad I will have a print out of directions to the nearest burger place where will go IMMEDIATELY following our lunch.

People keep pestering me about how I popped the question. In order to save myself breath, here is how it all went down:

Friday night was a cloudy, wet, overcast evening. I had spent the afternoon talking with Cathy's folks and convincing them that:

A: I would be good husband material (Qualifications: I can cook a mean kim chi kugel, I learned the four questions at an early age, and, at my bris, I hardly shed a tear and lifted my foreskin triumphantly, clenched fist raised towards the sky.)

and

B: It would be unwise for me to take 10 pounds of marinating Korean short-ribs home with me.

I had a ring burning a hole in my pocket and nagging voice in my head saying, "Stop being a bitch. Ask her now."

I knew Cathy did not like public spectacle, so, I would have to go low-key. My being a romantic, and a lover of the movie Meathballs, I was pushing for something that involved long distance running and camp. However, the weather wasn't working in my favor. My sister tried to get me to hide the ring in a sausage, but we all know that Cathy loves sausage more than she loves me, and we would have never seen the ring again. I was thinking of hiding the ring in a pile of vintage clothes, but Cathy would have seen it and sold it at the store for $40 (plus tax).

So what did I end up doing? You know what, I don't think I am going to tell y'all. Next time you see me, just ask. The breath is worth it and the story is cute. In the end, Cathy shed a few tears and said yes. Or I think she said yes. All I know for sure is that there will be sausage at the wedding (beef) and that all guests will get a 10% discount at the shop.

The visitors

My folks are coming down on Saturday. If anybody is curious as to what they look like in person, keep your eyes peeled to the area around 14th and T. If you are focused, you will probably catch my mother and I speed walking to some destination unknown and Cathy and my father slowly trailing a block or two behind, eating french fries.

Blueberries Hill

How I miss summer. I can't wait to get back on the road in the warm weather.

I secretly recorded this short clip of Cathy last year when we were staying in a little cabin on a low-bush blueberry farm in Maine. This is my own version of Watergate, except the only thing I am exposing is my lovely girlfriends digestive habits. No doubt, this is the end of a long and lovely relationship.

We would wake up every morning, pick enough blueberries to make you sick, and eat them with milk and granola. It was heavenly. Cathy did not want me to post this and says "if I (cathy) don't become queen of dc because of it then you are at fault." Sorry dear. I will make you a crown out of paper clips and gum drops.

The recording is low, so turn it up. For those hard-of-hearing, the text is as follows:

(footsteps)
Cathy: Let's go down, er, want to go up the to the hill first? Er, no, Let's get berries.
Cathy (whispering): (mumbles something that can't be made out, I wish I knew what she said. Any ideas? )
Me (laughing): ok
Cathy (whispering): And then we'll get more on the way back.
Cathy (whispering): And then I'll poop in my pants.
Me: Classy
Cathy: mmm-hmmm