With Nashville behind us we found ourselves in downtown downtown Memphis where he had our last meal in TN. A place called the Rum Boogie Café. Here we had authentic fare, fried green tomatoes, baked chicken and fried catfish washed down with the most perfect Black and Tan I ever had. I noticed that the light fixture that hung from the ceiling was covered with a bunch of tags. Tags are scripts or little blurbs marking the passing of other people like “Johnny was here 2007″. I thought it would be a perfect time to do a tag of our own marking our journey cross country from Ohio to LA.

Our goal is to be in New Orleans by night fall. I am quite excited as I have never been to NO. This will be the first time in a long time that I have been to a city that I have never seen before.

The last couple of days have been filled with laughter and good memories. I bought Aimie an iPod and spent the day at her house with a friend of ours Kellie, drinking Dortmunder and enjoying an impromptu dinner that I whipped up; sautéed shrimp and Quinoa with sautéed celery, grape tomatoes and celery leaf chiffonade. After dinner I spent an hour filling half of her computer’s memory with my music. After that ordeal and about 3 more beers we thought it time to take some shots for the photo album. And the blog, of course.

Today I picked up Scott from the airport. I took him to a place that Aimie introduced me to called Bar Louie. Tonight they were offering $1 burgers and $2 Great Lakes Beer (Dortmunder!!!!) and I thought I would invite Aimie, Kellie and Ma H for a fun night on me; it would be a cheap date.

I LUHUV Black and Tans so I was salivating to say the least; Black and Tans are Bass or Dortmunder Ale with a top float of Guinness. I thought that because the beers were composed of mostly Great Lakes that it would be 2 bucks, but when the bill came and it was nearly $100! I looked and saw that I was charged the full price of a Black and Tan. Oh well. I’ll know better next time. Anyway, it was money well spent and the burgers were half way decent, too.

I had the best time. I love beer. I love burgers and I love hanging out with these guys.

I wonder how long it will take me this year to remember to head everything with 2007? I usually get it within the first two months or so.

For the start of 07 I took Aimie to an old stomping ground of ours called the Grid, not before a couple local brews at my house. This was my first gay bar back when I was 17. Although the location has changed the name and staff still remain the same reminding of a simpler but still complicated time long before Johnny Hazzard came to be.

The music was circa 2000, but that didn’t seem to bother anybody, Aimie included. At midnight the bar dropped about a ton of confetti onto the dance floor. This pleased Aimie greatly as she shook her fists and shouted, “I love this!” Glitter, balloons and confetti are not the norm in straight bars. Only with the homosexuals can you experience such a time. I am still finding shimmering shards of confetti in my hair.

I rolled in at around 7am New Years Day, (none of your business) caught a couple hours of restless tossing and turning and began the first day of the new year helping ma with dinner. She decided to put on dinner for 25 members of our family. I am always amazed at how much prep time and work goes into an event that lasts only 4 hours. People arrived at 3 and at 6, when I looked at the clock I was shocked as I thought it had to be at least 8.

It went exceptionally well and I was also amazed at how much I did not eat. I spent so much time doing coats, getting drinks, being social, helping with little things that once it came time to eat I enjoyed the opportunity to sit still; it wasn’t until about 9 when I felt hungry and had some of the left-overs.

Today is Ma H’s birthday. I bought her a new receiver for her truck that will play CD-Rs and took her to lunch where I surprised her with Richard and Paul, two old fiends of mine. Ma befriended them both when we waited tables in Cleveland and grew quite close to them.

Right now I am toasting barley for dinner. Today is ma’s day to relax from the kitchen. I am doing dinner for my brother, sisters and the birthday girl. I do not think that I have included any pictures of my siblings so allow me to introduce them: the one with glasses is my sister, Karen, followed by Patti and the youngest of the bunch, Carmen.

Every year a part of one side of my family gets together for the annual X-mas Eve dinner at my aunt’s house. It used to be much larger, but as cousins acquired their own families the numbers lessened. Such is life and we move on.

My mother prepares two dishes every year for the feast. The first, Cioppino is a fish stew similar to Manhattan style chowder minus the potatoes. Then we have the Eggplant Rollatini. This is quite a labor intensive dish:

Eggplant is thinly sliced, dipped in an egg wash then dredged in bread crumbs. In a single layer the filets are spread on a baking sheet and broiled until both sides are brown. This requires the utmost attention as nothing can be done while the eggplant is under the broiler; a second too long can result in disaster (and a subsequent broken knee cap). The usual punishment for messing with the food is both knee caps are smashed, but then how am I supposed to carry the Cioppino downstairs? With great care I broiled all the filets while eating breakfast; a very risky maneuver. Next the filets are rolled around a mixture of cheese and herbs, placed in a shallow pool of sauce in a 9×13 casserole pan and covered with foil until needed for the final warm up. Tradition is always more meaningful when it’s delicious!

The last couple of days have been filled with good music, beer and wine and laughs with my dear ole Ma Hazzard. From the first night I have been drinking what we call out here “Black Christmas” it is normally a Black and Tan; a Guiness float over some sort of ale.

There is a local brewery here in Cleveland called Great Lakes Brewery and they put out a Christmas Ale every year. I was lucky enough to discover this hearty brew and it has become my aperitif of choice this year.

Last night we dined at my cousin Milo’s new bar/restaurant Sinergy in downtown Cleveland. It was very nice to see him and we were treated like royalty - god, I love being Italian. We drove back home sufficiently stuffed where we met up with Aimie, my oldest and dearest friend.

My regular readers may remember Aimie from my last visit home. We met in the 6th grade over some sort of hair pulling incident and never looked back. The plan was to make our way over to my cousin’s house down the road. Not being a fan of wine, Aimie raided our closet to find something more to her liking.

I think ma’s new favorite song is our beloved “Moving Into Light”; it is her #1 requested song when we are together. She REALLY REALLY likes it. It was the theme song for yesterday. The woman can certainly rock. She dances in her seat, takes over the volume control and pushes Milo’s speakers to their limit. No complaints here, we share the pleasure of loud music.