............................THE OSSIE-PLUMES

It is a balmy Sunday morning in San Francisco. The radio blares on as the Porsche Boxter S roars down Noe Valley. 106.7 ZRock FM serves and smashes Rihaana’s ‘Shut up and Drive’ raw and hot. However, Rihaana can’t shut David and Brenda up, as they sing and talk over the top, like two very raucous love-birds fawning over each other after a high- adrenaline, sizzling Saturday night.

“What a magnificent night babe,” David smiles from ear to ear, as he effortlessly screeches to a halt at the water fountain standing at the entrance of Brenda’s one-storey condominium.

There at the end of her street, David pushes that wayward strand of hair behind her ear and smiles. He wags her finger, winks and says “Baby, stay home, do you laundry and be a good girl. You need the rest after yesterday’s heavy-duty passion and action. (winks) I’ll be out of here and back in no time.” Brenda looks into his eyes, happy tears blurring her vision, “You’re my pillar of strength and support- my well of happiness, fortitude and dynamism. I hope I make the right decision. Making it overnight is shelving it as a worst case scenario, but I know I can make it anyways.”

David had never been the counter-emotional type. He altered his tone to a teasing one, “The prognosis for the day is that you’re going to have a lazy day ahead. Go warm your butt. (Smiles)”

Brenda hugs him tight and gets out of the car. She waves to him, as he zooms out of sight. She walks into her home, kicks her stilettos into the air, puts on some loud music and decides to get real lazy.

She changes into her favorite night pajamas that smelled of flowers, from the Tide Simple Pleasures Detergent. She walks to the liquor cabinet: pours herself a glass of Zinfandel and fills her plate with the Potato Stroganoff hot from the hamburger helper her maid Maria had made her.

After the relaxed self wining and dining, she moves to the attic. “Maybe, I should pull out some old stuff, and feel good about old times,” she twitters to herself.

A cardboard box hidden in a dusty corner catches her attention. She opens it, only to find a gob of golden cookbooks collected over the years. A big blue diary catches her attention.

Her breath gets stuck in her throat as she looks at the two ostrich feathers glued atop the diary. As a six year old, when she’d been to the 600 acre Rooster Cogburn’s Ostrich Ranch on the Picacho Peak, she’d taken these two feathers as a keepsake, and filled in the dairy with marginalia of specialized ostrich egg and meat recipes, and childish doodles of the huge ostrich egg and the gummy Ostrich Goulash she’d eaten.

She carries the blue diary with ostrich feathers to bed that night. She smiles and thinks of David. She had made her decision.

The door bell wakes her up in the morning. She gets the door in her night robe. David walks in, gives her a hug. “So what have you decided?”

“I’ve decided that the theme for the next month is going to be ‘ostriches’; we could call it ‘The Ossie Plumes’! We’ll have big ostrich feathers at the grand entrance and ostrich masks given to every guest who enters. Ostrich artifacts and sculptures shall be placed at every table. We’ll have a special ostrich-fan dance by the ‘Ostricia Girls’ at the special hour and an entire ‘Ostrich egg and meat’ special on the menu. To ring in some extra greens, we could also auction ostrich boas, handbags, head-gear, leather belts, bags, wallets and other fashion accessories. Media and celebrities from every walk of life shall be there for a sneak peak on the opening Saturday of the month………” “Fantabulous,” he says. “I knew you are the best Restaurant Concept-Moghul I could ever ask for. You and I, our partnership is going to ‘cook’ up more than all our head-chef could. ”

The previous night had been a just-opened- pressure-cooker: starry-eyed, hot and steamy, yet eased out and very much in-its-element.
Saturday night had been the opening night of ‘Cornucopia’, the most awaited restaurant of the year. David, the Restaurateur of the year 2007 had begun ‘Cornucopia’ with great aplomb- the theme of the restaurant was to have a new theme every month. David had hired Brenda as his Conceptualiser. The first month’s theme had been ‘Starry eyed’ with Hollywood stars and their favorite foods doing the rounds.

Welcome to Cornucopia. Fall in love with David, Brenda and their ostriches.
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Last week's Wordzzle Challenge by Raven:
Cardboard box, liquor cabinet, ostrich feathers, longitudinal, hamburger helper, partnership, laundry detergent, magnificent, San Francisco, prognosis
And for the Mini Challenge: worst case scenario, marginalia, water fountain, specialized, fortitude.