RR's and M&M's

The river has been reaching flood levels lately, which doesn't mean that we're getting washed away. Some streets like Dock Street have been closed, and the James has overrun its banks in a few low-lying areas. Mostly, though, it's business as usual.

I went to breakfast with Jean & Bruce the other day before work, and I stopped and snapped the top photo on my way to their place. I was on Riverside Drive at the river bank, and you can see that the slender island in the middle of the James is nearly submerged. Farther downriver, on the other side of the falls, logs and debris have damaged the boat docks at Sadie's place. Fortunately, her boat is being safely stored out of the water for the winter. One man saw a cow floating by.

A couple of days prior to the top snapshot, I photographed this lovely board & batten house on Main Street, built in 1859. Several of us went to the deLux Diner to celebrate Sherry's sobriety anniversary over brunch. We all enjoyed the food, and I will tell you that if you decide to try the deLux Diner, you would do well to park in front of that pretty white house in the picture. It's right across from the restaurant, so it is very convenient, and as you can see there are no large trees at the curb.

I parked on Strawberry Street beneath a tree, and when we returned to my car after dining, we were awestruck by the amount of bird poop on my car. It defies description, really. The entire car was plastered. It looked like a vendetta, and I tried to recall whether I had been mean to any birds in my past. We were mostly silent as we sat in the car and looked at the windshield.

"I wonder what kind of berries they'd been eating?" murmered Shirley, "Bird poop is usually mostly white."
"It looks like they ate meatloaf," I replied.

In mid-January, Morris & I decided we needed a day trip, so we hopped on the road and took a little tour of central Virginia. We visited Amelia Courthouse, Crewe, Victoria, Kenbridge, and Blackstone. Just before we reached Amelia, right around Chula, we spotted the little vacant church pictured below.

We think this was probably the original Mt. Olive Church, before a newer, larger version was built a few hundred yards down the road. It was possibly turned over to another congregation, perhaps African-American, before they too moved on.

I don't know why I am so fascinated by abandoned buildings. They have intrigued me since childhood.


While we were riding around Crewe, a railroad boomtown at one point in history, we called our friend Molly, who lives in nearby Victoria. Molly served as an excellent editor for our local monthly newsletter, and I have enjoyed getting to know her. She was thrilled that we were in the area, and offered to ride with us to show us the sights.

Victoria truly was a railroad town, having been established in 1906 as a planned community during the construction of the Tidewater Railway. The town was a maintenance center for the railroad, and had a lovely station and a large roundhouse.

Now these buildings are gone, but the town remains. It features a tiny downtown section, where Morris & I stopped at an old storefront that has recently been converted to a non-Starbucks coffee house. Then we picked Molly up at her charming two-bedroom house, which was built in 1919.

Molly showed us around Victoria, and took us to the adjacent town of Kenbridge, where we had lunch at Mildred's Meals.

Mildred serves good home cooking in a friendly restaurant that has probably changed very little in the past fifty years. I had a roast beef with gravy dinner (with homemade rolls!!!) that was smack-your-grandma good.

Mildred still greets her guests when they come in. She wanted to know where Morris & I were from, and said she hoped we enjoyed our visit. She's about a thousand years old, and just as sweet as she can be, but the town was afraid that they were going to lose her a few years back. A crazy lady came into the restaurant and shot Mildred. It was touch & go for awhile, but Mildred pulled through and is still treating her guests to gentle Southern hospitality. Bless her heart! We love you, Mildred, and your delicious dinner rolls.

From Kenbridge it was just a short drive to Blackstone, which seemed like Metropolis with its population of nearly four thousand. Blackstone was originally named Blacks and Whites back in the late 1790's, because of two rival taverns on the stagecoach route between Petersburg and North Carolina. John Schwartz's tavern is pictured below, and I have no idea what happened to Francis White's tavern.

Molly took us to the chicken hatchery where she works, but before we could go in she asked us if we had been around any chickens lately. I pointed out that Morris had just eaten chicken at Mildred's Meals.
"Live chickens," Molly amended.
Once we gave our assurances that we had not held, fondled, licked or brushed up against any live chickens recently we were allowed to enter the office. We didn't get to see any live chicks. Molly works in the office, which is all we toured, but if we had gone into the hatchery it would have required suiting up like the scientists in The Andromeda Strain. They are extremely particular about safety and hygienic conditions at the facility, which should make us all feel a bit better the next time we bite into a chicken sandwich.

Schwartz Tavern is pictured below, and it serves now as a museum of local history.

We had a marvelous day exploring this quiet, rural area of the state, and having a local guide in the car was invaluable. Molly was able to educate us on local history as well as current events & gossip. Since she's a very active member of our recovery fellowship, she pointed out where many of the area's AA meetings are located. This will help me a great deal since I get calls from people seeking meetings throughout that section of the state. Molly also knew all the backroad shortcuts, and you always see the most interesting things when you get off the beaten track.

One of the first things I learned about being powerless over alcohol was the imperitiveness of staying away from the first drink. The normal drinker does not have to worry about this, which is why they frequently think that the problem drinker would be okay if they just learned to "cut back" on their consumption. It just doesn't work for the alcoholic, at least not yours truly. I tried so many times to control my consumption, and it appeared to work for a few days or a week, but then I would be pounding them down worse than ever.

Here's an example: at my office, I've continued the tradition of my predecessor by having a bowl or basket of candy available for visitors. I get the good stuff, too - Snickers, Reeses, Mars bars, Kit Kats, and other premium candy that I buy in a giant bag at CostCo. I've learned that I have to treat the candy dish like the first drink of alcohol.

Yesterday I was sitting at my desk, working at the computer, and I decided that one "fun size" bag of M&M's would hit the spot. Just one, no big deal. I tore open the little bag, and inside I found 2 green M&M's, 6 blue, 2 yellow, 7 orange, and 2 brown, for a total of 19 candy pieces. I noted that the green color was a nice light shade, and reflected that they used to be a darker green (if my memory is accurate). I also noted that there were no red candies.
It seemed logical and acceptable, strictly for candy research purposes, to open another bag after I ate the first bag's candies one by one. How else would I know whether they still made red M&M's?

Well, what do you think I found in the second bag? The contents were 4 green, 7 blue, 3 yellow, 3 orange, 2 brown, again totaling 19 pieces. Still no red.
Had they eliminated red M&M's??? Only more research would determine for sure. In the third bag I found 4 green, 3 blue, 2 yellow, 2 orange, 2 brown, and 4 red. Case closed. But wait! There were only 17 M&M's in this packet. I recounted. Seventeen. That didn't seem right.

The next bag held no green candies, 4 blue, 5 yellow, 4 orange, 3 brown, and one lonely red button. Seventeen again. By now I was eating them three at a time. The next packet contained 4 green, 3 blue, 2 yellow, 4 orange, 3 brown, and 2 reds. Eighteen.

Clearly, this could go on until I ran out of M&M bags. Besides, I was starting to feel bleary & icky from all the sugar. The fun size bags had stopped being fun. I decided to leave the shadowy boundaries of portion control to the good people at Mars, Incorporated.

So, for this alcoholic, there is no such thing as one drink. Having one drink would be like having an itch on my back and finding someone with nice, long fingernails who only gave me one swipe across the itch. One day recently, during a particularly rough day at work, I thought "This is exactly the kind of day when a nice dry martini after work would be in order." Then I laughed at myself, and was suddenly happy that today I have the choice not to take that drink. At the end of the day, I went to a meeting instead, and there I found exactly what I needed.