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Back in Hoboken, home of baseball and Frank Sinatra. They played the first baseball game in the whole wide world here. That is what "they" say and it is true. Frank's granddaughter plays in the music venues here. I have not heard her myself. I would prefer to see Lisa Marie Presley. I can relate to her. For example, Lisa sings: High Enough

Can you bring me another
I'm not there yet
Do I seem to remember
How much 'til I forget 

I can't get high enough, light enough, nice enough
Can you hear me now
'Cuz I'm not doing fine
I'm drowning in my mind again
Oh why... ooh, does earth turn
Takes so much to disappear

Can I, ooh, can I stand up
Help me from this chair
I was the life of the party
Oh, so you tell me

Can you hear me now
'Cuz I'm not doing fine
I'm drowning in my mind again

I could have written that song.  Wait a minute, I did write a song like that one a few years ago. If Hoboken were the home of Elvis and Lisa, I would be much happier.  Sometimes the Sinatra stuff here is a bit much.

While I was away in the deep, deep South, for 21 days to be exact, a brand new food market opened right on Hoboken's main street.  My business partner, Christopher, told me about it. He is Italian, born in Hoboken, and loves food so much. It drives me crazy. I could be throwing up and he will put banana bread out for me to eat.

"Lori, this will make you feel better, just eat some and have a little sausage to go with it, you'll feel all better I promise you. Would you like some butter on your sausage?"

Sickening. And now he was insisting that we pay a visit to this supposed temple of culinary delights.  I figured it was just another cute food place for him to shop for wine, grapes, tomatoes, leeks, more cheese, matzos, more wine, olives, pickles and more hummus. More about his food fetish below.

This morning, Chris told me he would pick up my package from the post office up. One problem.  It was registered mail and he had to pretend to be me. This would be difficult.  He is 6'2 with dark hair and eyes and, oh right, is a guy.  Amazingly, he pulled it off. What a good bullshit artist, I have to hand it to him. perhaps he used his high pitch voice, hunching over: "Hi Mr. Postman, I'm Lori Victoria Braun and I need my vitamins today or I will die."

I did not ask him how he did it.   I gave him these explicit instructions late the night before:

"Please, please, pick up my vitamins from England that are sitting for three weeks at the post office. In the morning, the Post Office has threatened to send them  back to the UK if not picked up by 9:00 AM."

You might ask why I was not picking them up.  Me, get up early?  To do anything before 11:00 a.m. is a joke and anybody who knows me would fall off their chair laughing if I  told them I was going to attempt to pick the pills up myself this morning. I lose track of dates, time, even years. I stopping tracking dates and times in 1974.

With my U.K. vitamins in hand, I kept my end of the bargain and agreed to go to the new market.  Boring, boring, I was anticipating boring. As we were approaching the market, I passed Danny Aiello, who is always in Hoboken at this little Italian restaurant on the corner eating, talking and joking with all his pals. He said hello to me, we waved to each other as always. I love him.

Now we approached  this supposed crazy, interesting, zany food place. 

Chris got me good this time.  He was not exaggerating for a welcome change. This store

It.

Blew.

Me.

Away.

This food store is freaking out of this world. Had everything you could imagine from fresh fish and meat to organic fruit and vegetables. It was a very large store with great everything everywhere. [The Right Aid was knocked down and the crappy Quickcheck and this is what replaced those awesome stores.] Then I hit the bakery. OH, my lord. I just stood there staring at the desserts mesmerized. Chocolate everywhere, dark, white, milk......big blocks of it, the possibilities were endless. The Garden Of Eden is the name of the store in case you are in Hoboken for some reason and do not believe me like I did not believe Chris. A grocery store straight from the heavens.

[Hoboken, Washington Street] 

I have to think about my living arrangements even harder now then before. How can I move away from a market like this? It just got here. It also has a perfect seating area upstairs to chomp your food down just after you pay. It was all wooden oak laid out beautifully up stairs and so clean. I love clean. Clean, clean, clean. I did not check out the bathroom, but I can bet that the bathrooms are spotless too, smell good and are even pretty. Sinatra would approve of this new addition to Hoboken. I call my town Ho-Bacon. Some how it got stuck in my head sounding like that when I moved here. HO-BACON. I love bacon. Damn, bacon tastes good burned.