Title: Vegetarian Delight (1/1)
Authors:  Cousin Shelley and Arletta Asbury
Faction:  Cousins
Date: July 10th, 2001
Time: Noonish
Disclaimers:  All participants used with permission.



"How many restaurants have we tried to so far?"

"I dunno I lost count," Arletta sighed, "and not a trace of
vitamin U at any of them!"

"There MUST be some of it *somewhere*."

"I guess it's pretty obvious why there's this ... this epidemic
of ... what was it called again?"

"Personality Switching Disorder,"  Shelley answered. "Yes,
I agree.  I bet the whole town has the deficiency!"

The two women were sitting at a booth within the Happy Souvlaki
Deli, and they briefly scanned the menu.

"Let's see, they have lamb souvlaki, beef souvlaki ..."

"Tuna souvlaki, swordfish souvlaki," Arletta giggled. "Do we
sense a pattern here?  OH! They have VEGETARIAN souvlaki.  Two
kinds even!"  she said happily.  "Vegetable souvlaki and tofu
souvlaki."

Shelley rolled her eyes heavenward with an expression that clearly
said 'give me strength'.

"What can I get ya?" asked the waitress that had suddenly appeared.

Arletta grinned, "one of everything on the menu."

The waitress gave her a suspicious glare, "*everything*?"

"Everything," Shelley echoed.

---------------

A few minutes later there were plates of purple souvlaki, green
souvlaki, magenta souvlaki, chartreuse souvlaki, and pink souvlaki
covering their table.

The waitress glanced in their direction several times, but seemed
to think better of actually approaching the table.  Various stares,
pointing, and whispering could be heard from other Deli customers.
Apparently, most of them had never considered chartreuse a
good color for souvlaki.

Arletta was happily eating the two vegetarian souvlakis, when
Shelley politely *reminded* her that it was for *testing*.
Reluctantly, Arletta stopped eating the vegetable one and stared
wistfully at it.  Shelley brought up the familiar eye-dropper with
the clear liquid in it, and dropped it down on the dish.  Everything
on the plate turned shocking pink.  The women sighed.

"And the other," Shelley prompted.

"No. It's mine."

"Arletta!"

With an expression like Shelley had just taken the last bit of food
from a starving person, she dropped some of the testing solution
onto the tofu souvlaki and watched it slooowly turn a faint blue.
An Electric blue.  They gasped in surprise and delight.

"This is IT!" they both shouted.

Several of the Deli's other patrons turned to stare.

"We have it!" Shelley whispered, suddenly conscious of their
audience.

"No wait.  We can't give that to Lacroix.  It had *garlic* in
it," Arletta hissed.

Shelley waved the waitress over, "Can I have an order of ..."

"Tofu souvlaki," her friend supplied.

"Tofu souvlaki without any garlic in it.  I'm ... allergic to
garlic," Shelley lied.

"*Without garlic*," the waitress echoed disbelievingly. "It
wouldn't be true souvlaki.  It would taste, well maybe not
terrible, but pretty bland.  No!  Let me find you *something*
else.  Now let me see..."

"No!" Shelley insisted, "I *want* tofu souvlaki without garlic!"

The waitress sighed and headed for the kitchen, muttering something
about strange customers during wartime.

-------------

After the special order of garlic-free tofu souvlaki also turned
electric blue, they ordered several dozen more as carryout, and headed
happily back to CERK.
***************