Howdy Dear Friends & Family!
It's still going on! (as far as I can tell)
Just turned 67 on the 1st and I am grateful to still be going on too!

I have this favorite place to eat.
Actually, I have a few but this particular place is way up on the list.

Stonehouse used to be in a real house made of stone in Asheville NC. The chef, Dan & his esposa, Deb left a successful booming business there to "cook for people" instead of corporate no-faces who sent lackeys to pick up their massive fancy orders.

Though it's on the main drag, it's a little hard to find or rather it is easy to drive right past (makes it mysteriously European). The new Stonehouse in Franklin on Rogers St. is a cuchina - a kitchen.

Yes, they feed people but it is not a restaurant in that each patron is in direct contact with the chef and there are no salt & peppers, no ketchup bottles, no Texas Pete on the counters & tables. That kind of place.

Now then - the food is totally unique & most excellent! The portions are huge. Everything is fresh & made in-house - the breads, the pasta - everything is as good as one can make it.

They close Mondays to go to market and depending on availability, they shop the freshest & best and of course because of this extremely particular buying, the menu varies from week to week.

The day menu is on a big chalk board to the left of the kitchen when you walk in. The night menu is on 2 other boards one on the back wall and one on the cooler facing you.

This provender is not only delicious but actually very good for you!! Power food! Amazing that they came to my little town. I love the place & Deb & Dan. Real artists who have made themselves a local niche to our benefit.

Fresh breads daily, killer pizza, all that good stuff - it is the real thing right here in river city.

1st time in there I had an unbelievably good chicken sandwich (click the photo & drool) on their home made focaccia. Dan was going from patron to patron asking how it was.

I knew that he knew it was fantastic so when he made the question to me I was biting the sandwich in my left hand while I flipped him off with the right. He laughed his ass off!

He got exactly what I meant. "You know this is great - don't need my opinion". We've been fast friends ever since.

Too bad it is Monday. I'm getting hungry thinking about the place.

A total mom & pop operation, They do everything themselves and so have somewhat restricted "open" hours (because they are so busy with prep).

Monday is market day. Tuesday thru Saturday lunch from 11:00 to 3:00. Thursday & Friday evening dinner from 6p until - tapas - small pick & choose, mix & match killer plates of Dan & Deb's culinary art.

Saturday nights are for booked parties and sometimes invitational wine tastings. I've done a few - big food & chatter fun. Always very social and even if he's as busy as can be, Dan can offer an opinion on anything.


Last Friday I was there a tad after 7p where I met my friend Pamela who is just off her walker & hobbling effectively having slipped in a newly cleaned shower & busted her knee big time.

We are dedicated dinner pals and both really enjoy a good meal. She's spent years in the orient and knows some far eastern cookery so we began our dining association hitting the oriental joints.

Once we found Stonehouse and everything fresh and right in front of you it became a preferred no brainer.

We each had a "nice" salad - Deb's salads are a grand mix of fresh stuff with noticeably pleasing variety in bite & chew - reds, golds & greens and optional Bleu Cheese. Total Yum!

Then we split a single order of stuffed pepper (I thot it was totally yummy, Pamela found it a little bland) and we each had the braised lamb in cherry sauce with Arugula & onions - zowie! I couldn't imagine it before I tasted it!! Fantastic!

This is not fast food - it is all done fresh so there is lots of conversation among the patrons. The room is hot with all the oven & stovetop work going on so they keep the screen doors to the street open. Business 441 goes right past the front patio.

After the salad & pepper but before the lamb, I noticed the summer air had gotten cooler, the outdoors had turned considerably darker and sand & leaves were blowing west down the 441 pavement at a pretty good pace.

We welcomed the temperature relief and noted there must be a thunderstorm nearby. Didn't see much rain at all.

We finished our meal & conversation @9p and after a nice hug, Pamela & I went our separate ways (until the next meet).

I drove into a beat-up world.


Many trees down some with chunks of leaves missing. A lot had happened out there in a very short time.

I heard sirens and saw no lights on in many stores. A strangely different scene coming out than when I went in. There were no tornado reports but it was one heck of a wind that blew bunches of trees onto bunches of wires.

Drove back to the house wondering what I'd find on my heavily wooded property.

Winding up to my place, there had apparently been a tree down blocking access across the road but someone had already chainsawed it out of the way. Thanx somebody!!!

I got to my house and was so relieved to see my colored LED's were still lit up on the outside. There were leaves & small branches & related debris all over my deck and yard.

Went in the house and everything looked OK. I boiled a cup of water & made tea and sat down to watch a video and at exactly 10p everything went out without a click - just immediate silence everywhere.

My neighbor's generator kicked on automatically and I figured since the power had just now gone off after all the wind was finished, that it would be back on in moments.

Nope.

A hour of guitar went by and I had nothing else to do in all this quietude so off to bed. The lights coming back on and anything I had left plugged in would wake me so.....

I slept thru to dawn, no power but plenty of kind of soothing night noises - several varieties of crickets & other summer night bugs with my neighbor's generator as background hum. Yawn!


Then I remembered the fish! Uh-Oh.


I have grandfish.

Son Byron & Wife Taylor are planning a big move from Arkansas to Eastern NC. They are serious fish keepers and brought their brood to my place (about halfway) for safe keeping until they settle at the new digs.

Just this last week.

We have 3 Betas - each in separate big glass containers. Two Clown Loaches (rhymes with roaches) A Tiger Barb (sounds bad-ass, no?) and a big sucker fish (Pleco) who likes to stay stuck vertically on the tank side in the big aquarium.

Maybe 2 other silver guys but they're usually hiding..
The smaller fishtank has Goldfishes & a skinny white bottom feeder (Weather Loach).

I've got several types of fish food for each type of critter with written instructions stuck to each package. Plus treats & vitamins & water conditioner. Can't messup the feeds or I'll kill the little finners so I'm very careful.

The tanks are well equipped with several air sources each, cool places for fish to hide comfortably & fresh greens growing. (I think the guys in the big tank enjoy uprooting the plants - I stick em back down in the gravel almost daily.)

Taylor left pages of very detailed instructions so I'm doing OK. All the waters must be changed at least weekly and then individual particulars for each variety.

Kind of neat - I can't sprinkle goldfish food on the surface - we don't want the goldies gulping - so I hold a pinch of fish flakes under the surface and when they notice, the three come up and start "bumping" my fingers. They got no teeth so it's amusing. Kind of like when you swim in a lake and the brem "pop" you every so often - only way smaller.

A big part of the written instructions was what to do when the power went out.

No power, no electric air pumping. The individuals must be transferred to separate 5 gallon buckets with just a few inches of tankwater. This gives each of them lots of surface area air exposure.

They were already a pretty excited by the power outage and change in environs and so they were a bit hard to catch. No nets - that could damage their delicate exteriors. I had to siphon a portion of tank water into each bucket and then coax the individuals into a cup for transfer. Works ok.

On siphoning: Gasoline certainly tastes worse but I think it is an antiseptic. No telling what and how many bacteria & germs I mouthed getting that routine started. yuck. I gargled Listerine & brushed vigorously afterwards.

I got the all the buckets ready and caught the two biggest goldfish (they're surprisingly tuff little guys) and transferred them.

I was starting to go for the Pleco - the large sucker type. I was warned he would "fin" me if I wasn't careful. My X has a lifelong serious scar from being finned by a catfish so I was going to be very careful.

Got my large 1 gallon plastic bag ready, began to approach him gingerly and a miracle to the rescue - the pumps started pumping.

Glory be & Halleluiah! One grateful fishkeep here.

Now, with electricity again flowing, all I had to do was the regular weekly tank chores. You drain the aquaria (again siphoning - eaugh!) to about 20%.

During the siphoning you stir up the bottom a bit to catch all the fishcrap you can.

The Pleco loves to hang/stick vertically to the tank sides. But he gets really grumpy and flappy with the others when the water gets shallow.

Two tanks and 3 Jugs fulla Beta. And BTW water is heavy. A 5 gallon bucket weighs very close to 40lbs. Two of them, I decided, is stupid to try to carry at one time.

After all that choring, I have to admit the residents of all the water homes were noticeably happpier (?) (the way they swim & hang out with each other) after the hygiene routine. Think I'm starting to like these guys.

Big Love to All