So I Google "missing money minnesota", get taken to the Minnesota Department of Commerce site, get a little iffy about the url, call the department of commerce using a phone number I looked up on the state's website - not the number on the missing money site - verify with a state employee that the url is correct, thank them very much, go back to the site, enter in a wee bit of information, and see I'm owed sixty dollars and ninety four cents from guess who: Google, probably from back when I was an AdSense vendor. (Which means I've now made one hundred sixty dollars and ninety four cents from that old jam.)
So then I follow the instructions, meaning I open up a .pdf, fill out the .pdf, take the .pdf upstairs to our one notary on-site, get it notarized, go downstairs, scan the front and back of my license, scan the form, then go back to my computer and email the documents to the Minnesota Department of Commerce, and then I wait.
A couple of weeks later, I get a paper cheque in the mail for sixty dollars and ninety four cents, exactly the right amount of money to take my partner out for nice lunch or a decent dinner.
Come on, what else do you do with sixty dollars and ninety four cents of newly discovered money? That amount would have been walking around money back when I was in college, back when only half that amount was a lunch for two with drinks with my college girlfriend, back when that was the kind of money you had in your pocket for when you were out and you saw something nice and the price tag felt just right.
Today, though? Sixty dollars (and don't forget the ninety four cents) is a nice lunch or a decent dinner.
So I set to figuring where I would take Kath and I thought about Kramarczuk's. I thought about a couple other places I've already forgotten about. Probably some old Bully stand-bys. But then I remembered a place I read about recently on MPLS Twitter, a place called Guava's, which is only the second Cuban restaurant that I've become aware of in the Twin Cities. In fact, I had looked up the menu about a week or so prior, how could I have forgotten about Guava's?
Saturday morning comes around and I'm watching video essays on Little League World Series cheating scandals on YouTube while I'm doing laundry and waiting for Kath to get up. She gets up and I tell her all about how fucked up some people are in the name of winning a children's sports tournament while she drinks her coffee. And about ten-ish or so, I ask her if she wants to go to Guava's. She asks if it's open, I tell her it is and I tell her they have...
OK, you and me, we can talk, right? We can spill the tea. We can talk about our partners' dirty secrets, you and me, right? OK, good.
Well, you know how Kath's Achilles' heel is boneless buffalo wings? Yeah, well, her specific Achilles' tendon is tres leches.
I tell her they have tres leches and she says...
"Yeah. OK."
"Yeah. OK."? Just "Yeah. OK."? Woman, I am bringing you tres leches. That's Spanish for three milks. They could have given you dos leches but they said no, they went one milk further! I thought you would...
OK, well, at least we're going. I mean what the fuck could I hope for? I just asked her if she wanted to go to a Cuban restaurant half an hour after she's been awake and that half an hour has been listening to me prattle on about youth sports cheating scandals. OK. Yeah. OK.
Fast forward to us finding ourselves at a little plaza at fifty sixth and Chicago in the Diamond Lake neighborhood (marking our first Diamond Lake entry) and we walk into this little store front and the sandwich board in there says to order and pay at the counter and seat ourselves - the fast food model. I already know what I want, Kath looks over the menu for a mo and tells me she's ready. I tell her there's a two-seater just over there, she goes to grab it, and I get up to the register and place our order: One Cubano, one tres leches, one pan con churrasco, one Sprite, and one lime Jarritos.
Total comes out to forty five (!) something and the guy at the register tells me I'm in luck because they don't have any coins so he gives me a ten and five ones back and I drop the singles in the tip jar.
So, in case you were doubting what I told you earlier about what sixty dollars and ninety four cents could do, if you were keeping tally up above, that was two sandwiches, two sody pops, and one dessert for forty five dollars before tip, fifty afterward.
Wait.
Oh, shit.
Oh, my god.
Shit.
That means I stiffed the tip.
Five on forty five?
That's only an eleven percent tip.
Oh, shit.
I swear to god I wasn't thinking, it was just - You know, they handed me back five singles. That's code for "this is to tip because the tips have to be split between the front and back of house".
Oh, fuck, man, I stiffed the tip. Jesus.
I swear, my rule is twenty percent minimum, how did I not - Man.
No, you don't understand, I -
Fuck.
Well, I guess... I mean the damage is done, now.
[phew]
Shit.
OK, so , uh...
SHUT THE FUCK UP AND TELL US HOW THE SANDWICH WAS, CHARLIE.
Well, Kath got the Cubano and I got the pan con churrasco which is, as copied and pasted directly from the menu:
hanger steak cooked with onions and swiss and topped with zesty mayo, lettuce, tomato & shoestring potatoes
And you know? It tasted like a BLT but with steak instead of bacon. It was good. I liked it alright. But it was just... I don't know. It tasted really good, yes, but for fifteen dollars, I'd expect something a little more substantial. I guess for a brunch sandwich...
Well, no, now that I think about it, it was a fifteen dollar sandwich. I've been elsewhere and had steak sandwiches for less than that that were more hardy, more loaded. Two weeks ago, I was at Mr. Santana and had a cheesesteak that rearranged my brain for nine bucks. How was this really fifteen?
And I'm not trying to be a smart ass, either. While, at the table, talking with Kath, I acknowledged that this was a really good sandwich, but I would come to a point on the sandwich where the everything but lettuce ended. Was that because I stiffed the tip?
I don't think so because Kath's Cubano was loaded. It was falling out on her plate.
And maybe that was why I was a little covetous of her Cubano, another fifteen dollar sandwich but, you see, it was presented as a fifteen dollar sandwich. And how was that?
Well, she got three quarters of the way through it, said she might need a box, and I told her I would eat whatever she didn't because, honestly, I wasn't satiated. She gave me the last quarter of her Cubano and it was good, the kind of good that happens often here in our hallowed halls: Kath ordered the thing I wish I'd ordered.
But I'd had churrasco before, as a plate, and now I wanted it in sandwich form. I wanted to know what this was about. Go on an adventure, try something new. What is life without tasting everything? Without trying things you don't know? Without expanding your knowledge even if it is in something little like seeing the sandwich you know and trust on a menu but seeing the one you're like "huh" about and trying that instead?
What is life without always being on the lookout for your new favorite thing? Not just your new favorite version of a thing but a whole new thing that could be your favorite?
And in all the times you try, you will certainly fail to find that new thing but it's more important that you tried and you searched.
And, sure, in your failure, you will come across moments like this, when you wish you had just gotten the thing you knew was a sure-fire winner but those moments aren't as significant as when you find that whole new thing, that whole new thing that makes you say the old stand by was trash that you never want to see again. Those moments, those successes, far outweigh the tiny failures so, yes, in an instance like this, the pan con churrasco was a failure and the Cubano would have been the way to go but can you imagine if I was successful? What if I was served a mind boggling pan con churrasco? Can you imagine the elation I would be typing to you right now?
I'm trying to tell you to never stop exploring the world around you and enriching your life, ho.
ANYhoo, we finished our sandwiches and Kath was wondering when her tres leches was coming out and maybe if she had to ask for it, if it was being held in a pastry case or something. I tell her to hang tight, I'll go ask about it.
And this is where I should have known I fucked up on the tip because when I asked about it at the counter, I got a dismissive, "It'll be out in a second." Then I was like, "Oh, thank you," while I turned around and thought, "Dude was a little dismissive, there."
And this is where I should have known I fucked up on the tip because when I asked about it at the counter, I got a dismissive, "It'll be out in a second." Then I was like, "Oh, thank you," while I turned around and thought, "Dude was a little dismissive, there."
He was also in the middle of a conversation so that could have been it, too. I need to stop obsessing over this stiffed tip.
So the tres leches comes out and I mean, my god, look at this thing:
So the tres leches comes out and I mean, my god, look at this thing:
Like, look, I know I'm a salty bastard here but I do love my partner and I do love seeing her happy. To see this sudden reaction, this expression of joy just take her over, that was well worth the price tag. She let me try a bite and it was honestly way too sweet for my tastes but to see her brain explode in her skull like the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey was uplifting and I let her soak it in, wallow in it. Because I know her face very well at this point and I know when she's in ecstasy, which isn't often but this did it.
We left and we talked about how good it was all the way home, even after we got home. So maybe, yeah, you find some missing money in your name, you collect it and you go and hand it over to Guava's. Where else are you going to put it?
But belts are cinched tight for everybody right now, I get it. You take care of your needs first. But you get a little extra creep up from somewhere, this place will do you alright.
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