What is Darryl's, you ask?  WHAT IS DARRYL'S?  You don't know? Seriously? ..

An incredibly beautiful day, I need to exercise and there's an empty beach.   ..

What a perfect weekend for TV watching since the weather outside is frightful - ice and snow on the ground, 12 degrees below I've-never-been-this-cold-before with a wind chill that could make a big pair of Dumbo ears like mine freeze and break off. To add insult to injury, the miserably cold weather has been the same for 4 days in a row - unheard of in these parts.  ..

And what more needs to be said? ..

Who knew Googling "tipsy cake" would yield hundreds of pictures and thousands of recipes? Certainly not me until I recently did it. If you add "trifle" to the search - and after all, a tipsy cake is the Southern cousin of an English trifle - you'll have even more hits, but none remotely similar to my grandmother's Tipsy Cake (capital letters de rigueure for this perennial family favorite). Her recipe was an original - and perhaps a regional favorite although I wouldn't know for certain because I've never had Tipsy Cake any other way and I've never lived anywhere else.  ..

Both kids are with their in-laws and Susan is traveling with her sister, Anne, so today it was just Mother and me having a delicious Thanksgiving lunch at The Albemarle. Even with all her physical issues, she's still going strong, is remarkably resilient and can still cuss with the best of 'em. I hope her resilience, determination, spunkiness and zest for life have all passed down to my children and grandchildren (and perhaps the cussing gene stops with me). ..

....but in regular clothes, I'm a nobody." Dean Martin ..

A dinner cruise - with delightful company and spectacular views of the water around us and above, an enormous, full rising moon - should have been enough. The night was still young when we arrived back at the dock, and Susan and I hadn't eaten much dinner and were still a little hungry. So instead of calling it a night and walking back to the hotel, we walked in the opposite direction to explore and find a good restaurant to have a glass of wine and an appetizer or two to finish off a perfect evening. Little did we know we'd find a rose among a lot of thorns.  ..

Some weekends just work and even though the family was scattered east and west in North Carolina, from Linville to Atlantic Beach (and Wilson, of course) and north and south from New York to New Orleans, it's been a picture perfect weekend. I'm at the beach doing my normal beach stuff - running errands, putzing around the cottage, taking long walks and having a good meal or two (...or three). Susan, Elizabeth and Page are on a girl's trip to New York while Joe and Alex are in Raleigh for a birthday and an action-packed, fun-filled Alex-centric weekend. Anderson and Campbell are on the wedding circuit and Cotton and Sawyer are left behind at home in Raleigh. In the meantime, my cousin entertained her father and friends with a special dinner in Wilson while Johnny and Susan visited Claire in New Orleans. Enough of the words....I'll let the pictures tell the story of one family's fan-damn-tastic weekend.  ..

Driving to Raleigh on Tuesday, Rocky Mount yesterday, and to Elm City today, I couldn't help but notice all the cotton that is in full bloom and making a handsome, feather-like halo of the fields surrounding Wilson. So what's a guy supposed to do but take a quick picture and do what all the young people do? Yep- make it a selfie.  ..