A Rasher off the Old Side

Tea: Ginger Peach with Honey

Music: ABBA, "Dancing Queen"

Time: Night.

Church picnic this afternoon. (I made potato salad with not one, but two secret ingredients. Because I stink at keeping ingredients secret, I will tell you that one of them was Honey Bar-Bee-Q Sauce from Anthony' Beehive.

Going through the line (for the second time -- I'm Baptist, you see, so seconds are mandatory and thirds are allowable, as written either in First Impressions or Second Opinions), I found a pan of baked beans, near empty, with a strip of bacon lying atop.

My first thought: "Mmmmmm. Bacon." My second: "I shouldn't take all of it. I should cut the strip in half."

The bacon had other ideas. The whole strip wanted to be on my plate. So, of course, I obliged. Good thing, too. It was maple-smoked bacon -- rich, sweet and covered with the sauce from the baked beans. My arteries forgave, nay, blessed me for the indulgence.

On the way back to the car, I thought I'd score some gloat points with my 15-year-old son.

"I got a whole piece of maple bacon off the top of that pan of baked beans," I said.

"So did I," he said. "I tried to cut it, but it didn't want to cut."

I looked at him, did a doubletake and gave the only fitting response.

"Dude," I said, and we bumped knuckles.