The Simple Life at Home

Well, upon insistence from my dear friend, Leeann, we made a stop by The Lady and Sons, Paula Deen's restaurant in Savannah. People, it's like the Holy Grail to people who love to cook, like myself, and who are similarly Food Network obsessed. I LOVE this woman - she's not afraid to use a little butter and cream and she sticks her finger in the food to taste it. She's a real "cook" - not a "chef."

Anyhoo, since we were just driving through Savannah and wanted to get to a hotel (it was already after 7:30) we knew we wouldn't get in to eat (you have to line up at 3 pm for dinner seating!!). Still, I was determined to at least visit the place so we set the GPS and headed into town. As we drove through this fairly dive-y area, I see this huge crowd gathered on the sidewalk and thought to myself, "What are all those people doing there!?" and suddenly the GPS says, "Arriving at destination." All those people were waiting to be called for their dinner seating. It was tiny one way street, so I grabbed my camera and hopped out, told Hubby to drive around for 10 minutes and came back. I went in, saw a woman I thought was Paula Deen and about had a heart attack, realized it wasn't her and recovered enough to go over to the store area. After browsing through the offerings, I selected some "Silly Salt" and a copy of the original "Lady and Sons Cookbook." It's got tons of recipes served at the restaurant. Before I paid, the clerk opened it up to show me it was autographed by the Lady herself - even with a smiley face on the end!!

I asked the clerk to take a picture of me in the store with my newly purchased cookbook and then realized that Hubby had taken the memory stick from the camera. So I called him and told him to take a picture of me under the sign as he drove up to pick me up. Instead he had Em jump out and come up the sidewalk (traffic was very slow). She took my picture and we ran back to the car to leave. I jump in the car, Hubby asked me "Did you buy anything?" and I answered in the affirmative. Then he started to pull away. Before Emily got in the car. She got knocked to the ground and, luckily, we didn't run her over as some man was screaming from the street. She twisted her ankle and got scraped up a bit, but she seems none the worse for wear.

So, my daughter almost got killed. But I got my autographed cookbook and a picture of me in front of the restaurant. All's well that ends well! Right?