Fifth dimension

So, after making a delightful pilgrimage downtown to visit the House of Peanut Butter, I ventured out to consume my requisite Cinco de Mayo margarita.

This may puzzle my Dallas readers, but finding a good margarita in this city isn't easy. I consulted my sources, and someone (and someone, you know who you are) suggested a place not far from where he works. So I checked the place out, but it was entirely too crowded for my purposes -- mainly to consume one margarita in relative peace and quiet.

So I headed back toward my apartment and stopped into another Mexican food place, which was similarly packed. I kept walking, and finally I chose a place, not because it looked festive (which it didn't) but because I spotted a margarita machine in the corner. I sidled up to the bar and ordered my drink (with a floater and without salt, fyi).

WELL, the drink wasn't much like the margaritas one gets in Texas, but it sufficed. As I sat quietly sipping, three well-groomed men approached the bar to my left. One of them, a 40-something salt-and-pepper looker whose name is Tom, asked me what I was having, and soon we were involved in a lively discussion. Tom, who'd decided to "go way-out homo" with a drink called Who's Da Man-Go, was visiting from California, and he insisted I was "way too young and way too cute" to birth Sean Connery's children. Hmmph, say I. We talked a bit longer, and then the handsome trio's table became available. We said our goodbyes.

Not too long after that I decided I couldn't finish my margarita and made a move to tab out. The dear waiter, whose name was Glen, refused to let me pay for my drink! I protested, but he'd have nothing of it. As I was leaving the tip and preparing to go, Tom reappeared from the shadows.

"Sam," he said. "We're hijacking you. You're having dinner with us. Now pay your tab and come with me."

I truly wish I'd been remotely hungry, but I wasn't. I apologetically declined Tom's offer, and he insisted upon a big hug, which suited me just fine (for Tom is tall, strong and good-smelling). "Bye-bye, sweetheart," he said. "Do you know I haven't tried to pick up a woman since I was 25?" I found this quite flattering.

A total aside: The other day I was out walking and saw, much to my continued amusement, a man with a cart labeled "NUTS" painted in giant letters, wheeling his apparatus squarely down the middle of the street.