This is more of a thank-you post than it is theoretical or even practical in any sense. I can be myself around PJ, my former roommate and my constant friend. He is, like me, goofy, Christian, and southern—but he especially keeps me rooted when I come visit him in Charlotte and I realize only by his invitations to southern restaurants and by his jabs at my non-regional intellectualism that I can by my hailing-from-SC self with him. Last week we went to John’s Country Kitchen in Charlotte, voted by all sorts of quasi-unofficial organizations the “Best Breakfast” and “Best Southern Food” in Charlotte, for lunch. It was the best meat loaf I’d ever had, let alone the gravy, lima beans, fried okra, and sweet tea and cornbread I’d had short of Grandmama Leila. Seriously, what more could you possibly ask for? (I have a menu here that I’ve been meaning to scan in, but as I write this, I don’t have access to that scanner. Will upload ASAP.)

This is more of a thank-you post than it is theoretical or even practical in any sense. I can be myself around PJ, my former roommate and my constant friend. He is, like me, goofy, Christian, and southern—but he especially keeps me rooted when I come visit him in Charlotte and I realize only by his invitations to southern restaurants and by his jabs at my non-regional intellectualism that I can by my hailing-from-SC self with him. Last week we went to John’s Country Kitchen in Charlotte, voted by all sorts of quasi-unofficial organizations the “Best Breakfast” and “Best Southern Food” in Charlotte, for lunch. It was the best meat loaf I’d ever had, let alone the gravy, lima beans, fried okra, and sweet tea and cornbread I’d had short of Grandmama Leila. Seriously, what more could you possibly ask for? (I have a menu here that I’ve been meaning to scan in, but as I write this, I don’t have access to that scanner. Will upload ASAP.)