Would you like a warm up? It’s one of the greatest questions posed by the dining service industry in this fine land of ours. If you look broadly across the blessing of the English language landscape, you may find it to be that, and so much more.

One of my fondest early memories in life is going to breakfast with my dad on Saturday mornings to a small diner in an even smaller town. Quinlan, Texas, won’t make the list of Every Point on the Map given it’s proximity south of the Red River, and its a shame in some ways, for Quinlan in the early 70’s was vintage “good people” country.

I have an old friend who likes to say “denial is more than a river in Egypt”. Amen to that, but I would add that the Red River, likewise, is more than just a boundary between Oklahoma and that neighbor to its south.

Which brings us to today’s topic. Where does any of this fit within the genre of “27 hats”, you might ask? Well, topper 12 of 27, save one, is from Red River, the resort town in New Mexico, not the tributary to our south. It has been the selected hat for this post for almost a month now, but as I told our friend RDK in an email after writing the similarly themed post on 11 of 27, I’ve been finding myself at a loss for words. And, likewise, this morning, I concur that it’s OK.

Red River, New Mexico, at least for me, for many years was a place of mythical legend. I had never been there. Continue reading Would you like a warm up? →