But first…….I digress. Walt Kelly coined this, and I will always remember him for it. Such a useful phrase. But I have to admit something. True confession. When I was growing up, Pogo was one of the comics in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that appeared at the top of the page every day. And every day I’d read it, and I never understood one word of it. I had no idea what was going on. Not blaming Walt Kelly. Just a fact.

I digress again. While I am writing this, I am waiting for our new furnace to be delivered. The installers are already here. They are waiting, too. Our furnace went out Wednesday night. So we have had no heat since then. That’s Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday and today. Luckily, I don’t think we ever went below freezing, but unluckily, the highs the last several days have been in the low 40s. But I am in my home office, which has its own furnace, so there has been one room in the house where we could be comfortable. But after 6 days, this is getting old.

Would you mind a digression? Last night – although the down blanket does cut the atmospheric cold – I had a terrible time sleeping. It might have been the cumulative cold, or it might have been the four full garlic cloves I had at dinner, or maybe the double espresso that I had after dinner. Hard to say.

My fourth digression goes to the dinner itself. Of course, we have gone out to eat every night starting Friday night. Last night we went with very good friends to I’m Eddie Cano, our neighborhood Italian restaurant. (Sorry, I must digress: “I’m Eddie Cano”. What kind of a name is that. First I need to tell you that the “a” is pronounced as in “ah”. Then, if you say the name quickly, it’s supposed to (I think it does) sound like “Americano” with an Italian accent. Try it.)

I had a perfect dinner. I started by surprising myself and saying to the server: “I’ll take a Gray Goose martini, straight up, with a couple of olives”. When was the last time I asked for that? I think it was never. But I must say this: it was the best drink I ever had and I am going to order one every chance I get. Can’t wait for lunch in a few hours.

But I digress. For my main course, I ordered cacciucco. Google it. It was perfectly put together, but it included the four garlic cloves, cooked and softened. Garlic cloves often make it had for me to sleep and I usually avoid eating them, but they went so well with my martini.

Then, after dinner, I ordered “an espresso — no, on second thought, a double espresso”. Again the Gray Goose martini straight up speaking?

Mini-digression here: everyone liked their meal, but no one had a martini and a double espresso. Edie had eggplant parmigiana, and our friends had a vegetarian ravioli, and lobster meat with black ink squid spaghetti.

Well, I guess we haven’t got to the Civil War yet. It’s because of my digressions. I am going to take a couple of Alka-seltzer and see what happens. Supposed to be good for your digression.

Civil war tomorrow.