Foggy glasses and chocolate men

Ordering noodle soup can sometimes be a tricky thing. The steam rising from the hot bowl of soup fogs up my glasses and turns everything to a gray misty haze. So, when ordering soup, I have to be prepared with my contacts or willing to suffer through a blurry dinner. Tonight, I was willing to suffer.

I met Jon at his house (secretly hoping that I would meet his roommate to see if she really is as repulsive as he describes her) and we walked to Thai Place II on Divisadero at Page. I ordered the Noodle Tom Yum Soup, which was rice noodles in a soup of ground chicken, fish balls, sliced fish paste, prawns, mung bean sprouts, peanuts, and lime. It smelled heavenly when it arrived, the steam wafting up to my nose and tempting me to plunge my face into it. The noodle soup was just what I wanted, warm and full of flavorful random bits floating around. The noodles required the perfect amount of chewing effort, the prawns were tender, and soup tasted of lime, chili, and peanuts but was just a little too salty. The best part of it, however, was that the dish didn’t fog up my glasses one bit, which allowed me to watch everything going on in the restaurant and outside once I switched spots so that Jon and I were sitting next to each other and both with a full view of the restaurant action.

I returned to my place after dinner and ate the last body parts of the chocolate and butterscotch Christmas figures with a foreign “Demeestere” label that Ward brought with him from New York. St. Nicholas’ chocolate head provided the right amount of sweetness to the night’s meal.