Must Learn Turkish!

Yesterday, I hiked along Franklin Street in Chapel Hill and am guessing that downtown is about one third the same as back there when I was in library school, two thirds different. Of course, that was nearly twenty years ago, just when The Simpsons was beginning. The Intimate Book Store is long shut, but Internationalist Books survives in a third location since its opening by Bob Sheldon in the 1980s, and across the street still survives The Bookshop, though a large number of books were being conspicuously boxed up at the back of the sprawling space at 400 West Franklin. I didn't have the heart to ask whether they were about to close, move, or downsize. Maybe they were just rearranging for the fall. . .

The best new find -- by far -- was coming across Talullas (or Talulla's) Messe-Pide-Bar-Lounge at 456 W. Franklin. Yum-yum-yum-yum! It was like walking right onto the set of From Russia With Love, complete with excellent (and comely) Turkish servers and a wide assortment of exotic, well-prepared food. Must learn Turkish!

Another place that looks good is just down the street -- Vespa Ristorante, a Tuscan place at 306-D W. Franklin. A further indication of the Vespa craze: black and silver Vespas parked out front and also zipping up and down Franklin in near-100 degree heat.

Tar Heel novelist Thomas Wolfe famously observed You Can't Go Home Again. Luckily, you can still go home to visit and, furthermore -- not all change is bad.


Today's Rune: Fertility.

Birthdays: Diamond Jim Brady, Katharine Lee Bates, Jacinto Benavente y Martínez, Edith Hamilton, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Cecil B. DeMille, Pauline Frederick (Libby), Marion Lorne, Zerna Sharp, Fortino Mario Alfonso Moreno Reyes, Samuel Fuller, Porter Wagoner, Buck Owens, William Goldman, Miss Cleo (Youree Dell Harris), Peter Krause, Anthony Swofford, Rebecca Gayheart, Muqtada al-Sadr, Dominique Swain.

Güle güle gidin!