Guess what I had?

....Chicken Coop!! uh huh, oh YEAH! he he!

For those of you who know what this is, you understand my excitement. For those of you who do not, let me explain a little:

In picture above you will see a tiny little building separated into three portions, the far left of which was the ONE and ONLY take-out chicken/french fries place in the community I grew up in (at the time when I was home...). Yep, that's right...the one and only place to enjoy anything but mom's cooking. To give you an even crazier idea of the extent of this...the closest McD's? Over an hours drive away!

As for the name..."Chicken Coop" is just a nickname. The actual name of this little place is "The Lighthouse Restaurant". And oh boy, did we enjoy eating there? It was so great on a Saturday night to drive down and wait for ages for a piece of chicken and home fries smothered in thick gravy. So Good! So addictive that when you leave home you simply crave it far above anything else. It's the first place my friends talk about visiting when they hit the rock.

And maybe it's not just the food that brings you back in memory to a place like the Chicken Coop. It might be the waiting and salivating over the aroma of the salt air mixed with greasy fried fish and chicken. It might be sitting in the front of the take-out chatting and watching people come and go...especially the people from the bar across the street who never failed to make fools of themselves in their drunken stupors demanding fast food. Or it might simply be the breathtaking view of the ocean from the front window of the restaurant, a view so taken for granted when you live there, but so sorely missed when you move to a city devoid of nature in such splendor.

So when my brother flew home for a visit last week I knew what I would do. We chatted on MSN on Saturday and I told him to please bring me back a "snack" (that's 2 pcs of chicken with french fries and gravy). He said, "Well, mom and dad have the truck at the business meeting at the church for the rest of the night and it's really stormy." to which I replied, "Well call them and tell them you have an urgent request that requires their immediate attention"....ha ha..."I'll see what I can do, " he said. He understands, you see.

And when I called my brother yesterday morning, he gave me the fantastic news, he had in his carry-on, some frozen chicken and french fries and gravy. Mom had lovingly dumped it all into plastic containers and taped it all shut and froze it for the flight. (Mom always tapes everything with that wide packing tape as though it is bound for an adventure around the world and she never quite expects it will ever reach its destination fully in tact). And even after being nuked, it was still great! I overstuffed myself and couldn't even quite finish it all. (Jamie then enjoyed finishing for me).

And then I couldn't help but call my sister and tell her the wonderful news of my meal. Her reply, "Hey, where's mine? I'm the pregnant one, remember?"

Sorry...better luck next time!