proofreading: it is accomplished

I finished the rest of my proofreading today. The job took only about two hours. Sometime just after the first hour, my boss showed up to do his own Sunday work. I mentioned that I hoped to finish early so I could go up the street to John Cook Deli Meats to see whether they had any mortadella (which I'm no longer going to capitalize because I have a French bias against unnecessary capitalization, and Wikipedia doesn't capitalize the sausage's name, either). The boss lit up and said he wanted to visit John Cook, too. I warned him that the place had been shrinking, so he shouldn't expect much. 

I finished my work; we headed up the street in the boss's car (John Cook is only a few intersections down from where I work) and found a parking garage in the same building as John Cook. A quick elevator ride up from the garage, and we were once again on the ground floor. We entered John Cook via its back door ("We're back-door people," I cracked lasciviously), and sure enough, the place seemed to have shrunk even more since the last time I'd visited—fewer shelves, less variety. I think the place is withering and dying. Sometimes, I think this sort of thing happens not because of competition, but because the place isn't marketing itself hard and creatively enough. It's always a shame to see a place go bust when it's selling decent-quality products. By rights, John Cook should have been bustling.

We walked around the meager interior, and I did manage to find mortadella. I also found a package of something labeled "smoked pepperoni," which snagged my curiosity, so I bought myself some. They also had some other stuff lying about that caught my eye; in the end, I came away with a plastic bag filled with several items. My boss, meanwhile, gave a grunt of disappointment and bought nothing. Once we finished, my boss went back to his car, and I ended up taking the subway back to my place.

Expect a blog post on the mortadella. I bought an extra package just for me to sample. John Cook's version of the sausage looks pretty legit. At least, it's got pistachios, and the meat looks fine-ground and emulsified, the way mortadella should look. Chewing on it shouldn't be like chewing on ear cartilage. Coming soon: the mort report.