a-good-a story about a-young-a couple

We arrived back in Detroit and had rented a 2nd story flat right in the city.  I recall it was $200 per month which was the going rate for pretty good accommodations.  Living in Detroit, actually a few blocks out side of Grosse Pointe there were some decent places. A little older but pretty nice brick homes.  In a big city you soon become acclimated to being around people from all different cultures and the area that we lived in had many people of Greek descent.  Anybody who has ever seen "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" knows that the Greek culture  has within it people who operate with larger emotional expressions than just the average dude on the street.  It seemed that many years ago when the people immigrated to the area it was popular to build a home that had one family upstairs and one down. In doing so they would share the expenses of home ownership.  As time had gone by,  one of the owners would move as circumstances changed.  But still these were known as 2 family flats and they were the same up and downstairs but with no entrance to the other from the dwelling itself.

The owner of the place was a guy by the name of Nick.  He had a few friends that I encountered over the time and it did seem interesting that their first names were all Nick as well. So Nick and Helen, his wife, welcomed us the first day with a nice breakfast.  In Detroit, we encountered people of both Italian and Greek background.  You could tell the difference because the Italian accent included an   -a- after most words and the Greek included the -a-  both before and after most words.  So I remember Nick inviting us to breakfast some like this.  "You  a-look-a  alike-a  a-nice-a  couple and I  wan-a   a-have-a  a-you-a  and  you-a  a-nice-a  a-bride-a  see-a  a-how-a  good-a  a-cook-a   is-a  my-a  a-wife-a."  We sat down at their table in the lower flat and found out that the Greek eating traditions vary somewhat from what we were used to.  Each person at the table was served two eggs in a little stand up cup.  I thought it was good.  Hard boiled eggs,  but these were different.  They were in the shell but they were far from hard boiled.  In fact the yokes were barely white.  Nick proceded to knock a hole in the top of one of his eggs and poor the contents out on a piece of toast.  Deb and I kind of looked at each other and soon did the same.  We had never had raw eggs before and have never had them since.  Nick asked if we  a-need-a   a-more.  We politely declined and went on to moving in upstairs-a.  I said to Deb as we were working our way upstairs that my eggs had a noticeable a-peep-a.  As we were exposed to the of people that resided in that area we gained lots of experiences on how people from different cultures live.

The other interesting experience from that first day in the new place was that Deb wanted to cook for me a meal.  Those of you that know Deb, know that of all her attributes the love for cooking has never been one. I must say when she wishes she is one of the best. On this day she had decided to make a meatloaf dinner.  With the unfamiliar stove, the product of this endeavor had some unique features.  The inside tasted OK but the outside was stuck to the pan and the whole thing had the appearance which indicated that she might wish to pursue a career in nursing rather than culinary.  I was so hungry from moving all day that I asked her if we had been given, in addition to the many fine dining gifts from the wedding, a chisel and hammer.  I would eat the rest of it as long as the chisel was sharp.  I am not sure if this was the right thing to say as evidenced by a short exchange that took place regarding who was going to do the cooking in the future.

One other thing I remember is that hanging above our bed was a poster that someone had  hung on the wall.  It had a boy and girl in a bed about 3 years old, in their P.J.s, with a real  frustrated look.  The caption underneath indicated they were talking with each other and asking  "So what is so much fun about Sleeping Together?"  As we were moving that day we were not only exhausted but we had heard through the floor in the Greek vernacular.  Those  a-young-a  people up-a  there-a  make-a  a lot-a  a-noise-a.  So we retired at around midnight.  We slept real good that night and the only noise might have been snoring.

We lived there about 1and 1/2 years.  Learned a lot there but not as much as at the next place.  Will you allow me to tell you about that next time? Or maybe I will skip forward to some really interesting stuff..........

Thanks very much all you readers.  I am learning bunches about how kind people are.  I know these things are a little corny, but sometimes there is good nutrition in corn!!!!!!!!!.........................