Travel Blog

Breakfast yesterday with the boys. We used to go to lunch together, back when we had jobs. This earlier meal suggests a greater seniority than we possess. Except for Mark, we are part of the prematurely idle, laid off or bought out journalists. Though Terry and I still freelance, and Greg is raising a four-year-old son (who gets out of pre-school just around lunchtime).

Self-mockingly, we sat in the rocking chairs outside Cracker Barrel waiting for Greg. Our last breakfast, back in April, was at The Floridian, a Ft. Lauderdale institution where tasteless food (how do you ruin a biscuit?) was delivered by an unfriendly waitress. Colorfully surly we could have all appreciated (we're writers) but this woman was dull and brusque. Before that, also ironically, we had met at Grampa's in Dania Beach.

We used to change lunch spots, but not as regularly. We started at Sal's on Second Street - the man sometimes credited with initiating sidewalk dining in Ft. Lauderdale - then when he closed moved to Tina's Spaghetti House on Federal Highway. Our last place, Giorgio's - just so you don't think we were a jinx - is still in business.

I had never eaten at a Cracker Barrel when I wasn't traveling somewhere, and this put a little pressure on the breakfast. It wasn't part of something bigger, it was all I had. Not to worry. The conversation sparkled, helped by the arrival of Joe, the son of one of our old lunch regulars. I feared that we had become one of those tables I glare at in restaurants for disturbing the peace.

At a lull Terry, looking out the window, said: "I love a rocking chair just after somebody's left it."