2.1.2009




Ah, you've come early today!

What's that?  Two weeks, you say?  Well, it seems like you were just here.  But of course... I've just set up the last of the tables and the coffee is brewing.  Please, come inside.

Good, right over to the corner table.  Marcus will be coming in later to play the piano.  The last time I saw Marcus was ten years ago - 1999 - I was still a ballistic youth in those days, full of 'the juice and the wonder', as they say...  wild, smiling eyes and all my belongings slung in a satchel over my shoulder, carousing through various train stations and port towns...  Many of you may remember those free, traveling times and marvel at the transformation... your faithful proprietaire is 31 years old now... un vrai homme, entering the most productive years of a man's life, with the taste of invincibility still on his tongue, but intermingled now with the bitter spices of death and of fear, and a coconut sauce to cut the fear of death... a sweet concoction indeed, and one which brings me to the menu of the day.

(A tapping on your knee...  a tiny girl, no more than two years old, hands you 'la carte du jour')

La Carte:

Almond-encrusted red snapper with coconut and macadamia, served atop mint cous-cous
Summers Vineyard Chardonnay, 2005
Bananas foster
Cafe creme


Here, let me pour some of this fine buttery chardonnay for you...  it's aged it in French oak... speaking of which,  I saw an amazing old movie last night - All About Eve (you want to talk about acting?) - which led me to contemplate the notion that all the Great Ones started acting the part of Great One long before they earned the title.  As I watched into the lean hours of the night, with Peanut by my side, Brittany and Aubrey slept soundly in their beds, and the unborn baby slept soundly inside Brittany, most likely contemplating the cosmos.  Doesn't it almost seems silly now to be bringing more people into this world, an act of foolishness, perhaps (or faith, what's the difference) especially when you look back on those 'running around' days of youth...

The difference in a family man and a single man might best be illustrated in the setting of an airport...  traveling used to be so easy... as a twenty-year-old kid, I would breeze through airports, hardly breaking stride from the parking garage to the window seat.  A white T-shirt, jeans, and juice balls (which you didn't even have to take off at security) were all you needed to jet from city to city.   Imagine what I would have thought if I saw my future self, en famille...  traveling home from Las Vegas last Wednesday, trapped beneath a pile of fourteen carry-on items, a baby backpack, two diaper bags, a purse, four plastic sacks with various crayons, notebooks, stickers, three water bottles, two milk bottles, a slice of airport pizza in one hand, a sandwich in the other, hair shooting out the front, back and sides of a torn baseball cap, shoes untied, carrying a two-year old child, sweating, shuffling, and wishing I were home!  The young me probably would have checked out Brittany's ass, maybe even tried to lustily lock eyes with her while the poor, ragged husband struggled with the kid and the bags... but then again, I would have been cruising too fast to make any connection, moving right along...

The occasion for the Vegas jaunt was my sister, Jodi's, 30th birthday.  She is an acrobat in a spectacle called "Le Reve," a show at the Wynn Hotel.  (I might add that the Wynn is the best place to stay if you find it necessary to trek to that desert mound of kitsch-trashiness.)  Franco Dragone, the creator of the show, is also the man behind Cirque du Soleil's "O", which, along with this one, are the most breathtaking, beautiful stage productions in the United States, and some might say, even in Las Vegas.

The birthday party was a refreshing departure from the whorish Strip... a melange of Polish tumblers, Midwestern gymnasts-turned showgirls, French trapeze artists, writers, art dealers, and two of the most truthful men I have ever laid eyes upon... Senegalese musicians, one playing the kora, the other playing the djembe... gave it the feeling of a backstage, post-performance gathering...




The fellow playing the gourd-like instrument is Toumany Kouyate, a soloist in "O." The kora has a transcendental sound, something otherworldly.  Listen to Toumany here, and relax into the wine.

Aha, look who's come in!  Hello, hello, come sit over by us.  We have plenty of food for everybody.  You were watching the Superbowl?  I see.  I skipped it myself.  Instead, I took the opportunity to have a solo surf session... with only the clouds to keep me company, tumbling and folding in the sunset like something from a Dutch landscape painting.  Anyway, I don't properly care about the Steelers and Cardinals.

But excuse me for a moment while I make the rounds with the wine...  what else are people talking about today?  What's that you say?  Jessica Simpson is fat now?   No, I hadn't heard that.   It's just a publicity stunt, is it?  You're not drinking anymore?  Shame.  Can I get you a cranberry juice?  Good, good.  The stimulus package?   Yes, I suppose we're all tired of hearing about politics in the media.  Yesterday, Jim Woodhull, a prominent Cocoa Beach attorney and ex-city-councilman, and a great supporter of the cafe, asked if I were a Democrat or a Republican.  I told him that I was Canadian, which is worse, I suppose, to the conservative faction.  But I do carry a handgun with me wherever I go, so that's got to be worth something for the Neo-cons, right?  Even if the gun isn't loaded, or even functional for that matter (it's a replica of the 'Peacekeeper' .45, purchased at Wall Drug store in South Dakota.)




Did I mention that I bought another Rick Piper painting to go with the new bookshelves in the office?  I love what this guy does with water...



If everyone is finished the snapper, we can move onto dessert.  I thought the Bananas Foster might go well with the last of the chardonnay.

I suppose some of you are wondering why I keep showing you pictures of my office, when I should be showing pictures of the cafe?  Well, I believe a good proprieteur should do his best to adhere to the cafe's rules, and as there is no photography inside (many of these pieces are too delicate for flash bulbs), you'll just have to keep it in your head, won't you?

Remember, it's not the End, but the Way that's important...

d

12 comments:

  1. Check out the Oakland A's hat on the truth drummer!

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  2. I have to agree about O. I saw it a couple of years ago and I've never seen anything like it before. Definitely Cirque's best. I haven't seen Le Reve yet, but maybe I'll check it out next time I'm out there. Thanks, D. And NY is really nice sometimes in the springtime - you're missing out!

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  3. Oh la la (accent on second la)!
    Rick Piper! Amazing stuff!
    The Water - the colors - how it flows in and out of the painting.

    There is a really good article on him:
    Here


    Say,

    This wouldn't be the preacher talked about, would it?


    Nawww.

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  4. Good afternoon, Propieteur D. Rieter...merci for the invitation to your cafe. Long time no speak!
    Congratulations on getting married and on your beautiful daughter!

    I have taken the road less travelled to arrive at your cafe. Included in my travels are 7 spanish-speaking years in Puerto Rico, Mexico, Bolivia, and Spain. In November I will be married, and in two years a plastic surgeon.

    Though, I am a bit thirsty after these journies...does your cafe happen to have any Bush Beer on tap? How do you spell it again? I remember drinking it back in 8th grade honors English class. I think its spelled...B.O.S.P.U.D.? If possible, could it please be served in a schtein-like mug with froth on top? It is good for one, good for two, good for me, and good for you! Bospud round house! Bospud for all! It is good, if you are great or small!


    Cheers,
    Greg Lakin

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  5. I find myself reflecting on the very same things at the aeropuerto these days...but would not trade my current haggard existance traveling for the relaxed, "sedated" youth I was...although maybe it would be nice when traveling to California, if just once... Has anyone seen all of the oscar films? I have not but did thoroughly enjoy slumdog millionaire...it did reinforce my ongoing thought that I have no desire to visit India anytime soon...reminds me of morocco which was interesting but my cup of tea so to speak... love what you've done w/ the cafe D, look forward to the next seasonal menu...Miguel Sarnoff

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  6. This is the best little cafe on the internet.

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  7. I thought Benjamin Button was really well done visually, but I heard Slumdog was a masterpiece. I want to see it before it's out of the theaters. And obviously Heath Ledger is going to win for Batman. Tropic Thunder sucked, no idea why they nominated that guy.

    Pete

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  8. Mon Dieu! D,
    Quite foolish indeed, bringing new people in at this time.

    Just take a look at where the masses have their attention!

    Now I'm not very savy on current events, so I checked out

    Google HotTrends
    to get informed.

    What I learned from Hot Trend numero 1: markopolos
    Madoff whistleblower

    Markopolos, eh! Is this some kind of inverted imagery referral
    to that exalted Venetian trader and explorer, Marco Polo?

    Is that what your child is to learn in the coming months and years?

    I'll spare you, and your kids, some of the other divergences from reality and go
    directly to Hot Trend numero 80: cleavage covers
    jessica Simpson and Marilyn Monroe:

    both fat


    Two lives summarily dismissed with a single phrase.

    Well, fear not; As I mentioned before (and Bob Dylan too), the times are changing,
    so I congratulate you on your far-sighted move.

    But for now, I leave you with this:

    ...
    "The only guys in the audience were clutching their girlfriends
    while trying to sneak a peek at
    Perry's cleavage,
    which showed
    through her peculiar gold dress that appeared as if a snake was
    wrapping itself around her."
    ...


    Good luck dude, yeah, good luck.

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  9. Interesting thoughts, Monsieur Knickerbocker... I suspect this is one of the Good Doctor's aliases, but I cannot be sure. To answer your question, we have diverted some of the riffraff next door, to El Guapo in DC's, so that our regular clientele can enjoy themselves at the proper speed.

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  10. ahh vegas, the whorish strip is now simply normal. and i drive home into the redred mountains everyday. next time you must see the edge of town, it ends so abruptly here making you so aware of how we just plopped it right down in the middle of the desert. like any city really, but here it's not hidden.(raphi plays the tambourine in the room next to me, i have a fairly constant percussive life soundtrack, lovely). you see the last house and then, nothing, the desert, mountains, low lying brush, that's all. next visit.
    the lion king was loosely based on hamlet by the way--what do you think of that? the circle of life and all.
    and slumdog millionare--it's funny how for many people it makes them not want to go to india. and it's not getting a good reception in india because of how the country is portrayed. asfor me, i love it. i want to go back. so much devotion, intricacy, contentment. you can see it in the kids playing at the airport in the beginning especially.
    besos

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  11. I also skipped the super bowl, though there is a cardinal fluttering just outside my window. He seems to be approximating a kind of halfback sweep, or the pick-and-roll. But that's a basketball move, foolish, foolish cardinal. Disgusted by his ignorance, I leap from the open window, clutching at him, grabbing him in my fist, and slamming his head against the windowsill repeatedly until it falls off. I flick the disembodied head from my windowsill, throw the carcass at his flock, waiting for their leader in the branches of the mango tree in my yard, screaming, Marino to Duper...touchdown! as the carcass scatters the remaining birds and knocks down a few mangoes, which I mash into a kind of makeshift salsa. I look around the yard, but there are no "steelers" about, wisely avoiding my yard and the wrath of my right arm. I listen to the news, and hear that John Updike, in what is being reported as "unrelated to the case of the brutally murdered cardinal," has finally died. Good, he sucked.

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