habibi

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according to google, habibi variously means either ‘mah boy’ or ‘my love/dear’ depending if it comes from a man or a woman.  We ate at a little local place for lunch today called Habibi.  I am guessing it is a labor of someone’s love.  Clean, tiny and a big menu of Lebanese fast casual eating, they had everything from the falafel I was craving to schwarma and kebabs.  I had falafel in Lebanese bread with Lebanese hot sauce, pickled red onions and tahini.  They didn’t have their fryer up which seems funny for a Saturday afternoon so there were no fries or anything available but the sandwich was just great. Z had a kebab probably so he could say kebab.

bananas

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lemon cotton candy

we spent yesterday sleeping, picking up the house and recovering from the workweek.  About 4:45 Z asks if we should cook or go out.  We opened up the list of Orlando to-do’s and landed on Banana‘s, a diner in the Mills 50 district downtown.  Opentable confirmed a table although for the hour of 6, it wasn’t a problem.  It isn’t a diner in the strictest sense of a counter and a few tables but has the red and black checker vibe going for it.  The drinks menu was backlit and it had the effect of drawing me to the technology and away from the content and I ended up with a glass of water.  Z ordered a handspun dreamsicle milkshake – it was only mildly orangey but had some nice orange zest on top.  He had a buffalo burger and I had the patty melt.  They were really both only just average and we were mildly disappointed.  We expected more boldness.   I think they forgot the cheese on my melt and the burger was way too thick for the bread.  A lemony cone of cotton candy came with our bill and this was the highlight of our meal.  I think this is really a latenight (post drinks) place or a brunch spot and would hit that note better than it hit us.

candy

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this week was a wild ride at work.  There was a conference for the strategic players in the Americas area and a scripture celebration where we celebrated 28 recently completed scriptures.  The conference was primarily in Spanish with English and Portugese simultaneous translation.   Something of a language gap for us in the Discovery Center but a fun week all in all.  The strangest moment came Thursday afternoon when the conference attendees all came out of the woodwork to converge on a huge round table dumping bags of candy from their respective home countries.  Ranging from balls of coconut wrapped in lime leaves to salty sour tamarindo to goats milk caramel wafers.  If this wasn’t enough-the Brasilians brought us boxes of thank you candy that turned out to be my favorite of the lot-chocolate stuffed with cashew nut cream.  A sweet end to a busy week.