Listen, there's no whey I'm done talking about cheese curds. That's because I haven't even told you the best thing I learned about them in Quebec and it's called POUTINE.

If you've ever been drinking after hours in Baltimore (Cut to Baltimore accent, GO!) an’ yew're tee tarred to drov haome, and yew'd eat anyfink on erf -- yew probly of wount up eedin gravy fries at the doiner, hon (Good job!). Well, poutine is gravy fries with cheese curds mixed right in there with it. It's salty and gooey and hot and it comes to you in a mound, like a flavor cairn memorializing French Canadian resourcefulness: 

Don't forget that the word "cairn" is the worst sounding word in the English language.

Many Canadians are embarrassed by poutine because of its low brow ingredients. There's no need for that because now you can order upscale versions of it in fancy restaurants and spend more money that way. Of course, I gravy-tated toward this and ordered:

Pulled Pork Poutine, Fresh Cheese, Chipotle Sauce, 

Deep Fried Sage and Bearnaise Sauce

(notice above, no mention of french fries, curds or gravy 

and p.s. fried sage: thank you!)

However, if you want to tease a French Canadian, you can put poutine on his birthday cakes, as shown here:

I made a personal discovery when we were in Quebec City and it's called cheese curds. Cheese curds are the potato chips, make that the pork rinds, of a French Canadian dairy aisle, because they're salty and addictive. They are usually sold allsqueezedtogether in bags, and are irregularly shaped -- each one about the size of an in-the-shell peanut.  Also this: they have a slightly rubbery texture and they squeak when you eat them, which is a completely unboring gift that snack foods generally don't offer (mostly, as we all know, they tend to rely on the crunch, which, okay, let's hand it to them, never gets old). Here is an image (which is a fancy, cool way of saying "picture") of a guy making them:

First of all, why does this guy look so French?

Second of all, is anyone else as turned on as I am?

Greta just graduated from high school and Bo and I were having a hard time deciding what kind of present to give her.  Margot told us about a bracelet that some of her friends received from their parents when they graduated. It looks like an ID bracelet, but on the front, you engrave the latitude and longitude of your house. Then on the back, you can write something like, "So you'll always find your way home." Bo squirmed and said, "I'm more of a cash and bread crumbs guy."

We decided on a trip to Quebec City because, from what we could tell, Greta was good at French in high school and we thought it would be fun for her to communicate with French Canadians, who are known to be super accommodating. Just kidding on that last part, but you can't blame the Québécois for being cranky and defensive after all they've been through, historically speaking. Here's what happened in a nutshell. After they settled there in the early 1600's, the French had massive problems holding onto a place that was blessed with so many beaver pelts. After lots of back and forth, in 1763, England took over for good. Just after that, the people of Quebec put into effect L'Acte Passif Agressif, an unofficial but palpable movement in which they started speaking a clubbier version of French even faster.    

If you live in New England and you have an urge to visit continental Europe and you can't afford a trip to Busch Gardens, just drive up to Quebec City. Margot, Greta and I decided to take a road trip here to celebrate Greta's graduation, and this place super French.

After we drove for five hours or so, we got a little road weary. Then Margot said, "Hey, we're in a new country. So why don't we look out the window and say what we see? Traffic cone. Traffic cone. Traffic cone. Traffic cone. Traffic cone."

My mother-in-law lives nearby and her house was burgled the other night by area rug thieves. This rocked her world because, as everybody knows, area rugs "ground" a room. And now she's left stuck to the wall of that carnival ride where the floor drops out from under you, which is a lot safer for her than taking a spin on a floor with area rugs.

The rug burglars probably left through my mother-in-law's garage, and on their way out, they may have snapped this photo of the step ladder that she's obviously favoring over the walker she's supposed to be using. It's likely that they considered stealing the step ladder, to curtail risky "climbing up and reaching out for stuff" activities. Then, picturing her doing those same activities on a swivel chair, they must have decided to leave it behind and get the hell out of there. We were in enough trouble already.