John Vaughen

Austin and I once took a biking adventure to Cafecito, a Cuban Cafe in Chicago. After 20 minutes of biking, Austin, unused to biking and certainly not fond of biking in a boring straight line for more than necessary, suggested that we stop at a grassy enclosure near the firefighter memorial on Lake Shore path. Austin didn't bring any food, insisting he wouldn't need any. However, as I happily bit into my crunchy apple, he soon joined in, as I had brought extras. Funnily enough, once we got to the restaurant, a 7 mile ride, he insisted that he wasn't hungry and just wanted to try the Cuban espresso. This was perplexing to me, considering both the bike ride and the fact that Austin did not drink coffee. At any rate, we ordered two espressos and I also got some eggplant sandwhich called "El Jardin". Austin speedily rectified my butchering of the Spanish language ("It's Harrrrdin, not JARdin"). As I began to gratefully dig into the delicious sandwhich, Austin began to eye it. And of course, we ended up splitting it, half and half. Not hungry my @$$. The biking trip was more fun than normal thanks to Austin's meandering route choices and his invariably happy company, even if I was still hungry upon leaving Cafecito.