Go Jo Jo

There used to be a coffee shop on the other side of Main Street, the side of the street less walked upon, and I used to stop there every morning for a cup because it was right around the corner from the bus stop. It's always been my practice to eat breakfast, when I was eating breakfast out, or stop for coffee as close as possible to where I needed to be. Eliminate all the vagaries of travel time first, the theory goes, and you can enjoy your eggs more. But they didn't have enough other customers over there, other besides myself, and they went out of business after a while. There is not a whole lot of crossing that goes on on Main Street, this being New England after all, where people would just as soon stay on the side they're already on and most of the people, for some reason, are not on the side Jo Jo's is on. Jo Jo's is where the old coffee shop used to be, although it was some other kind of store for a long time in between. Jo Jo's is pretty new.

I took my car in to get its heater re-heated this morning and I walk home from there. It was a chilly morning and it's a fairly long trudge so it seemed like a fine idea to stop about half way for a cup of coffee and to warm up a little. But the coffee shop on the busy side of the street has gone all upscale on us - white tablecloths and some guy in the back trying to look like a chef and all that, so I was looking around for some other option when I noticed Jo Jo's sign. And I figured what the hell, and crossed the street.

And Jo Jo's I like. It's a order-at-the-counter kind of place, and Jo Jo makes your scrambled eggs right there and carries them over to a table for you (and she makes sausage just the way I like it too, and knows how to make toast so it's all buttery and soggy like it's supposed to be), and the tablecloths are that stuff we used to call oilskin, and they don't match. And not only that, the coffee is in paper cups (and self-serve) but the plates are real. It's perfect, in a word.

Unfortunately there were no more customers than the old coffee shop used to have - just me, and a woman who came in while I was there. Things have been a little slow lately, Jo Jo says, but maybe just because it's January. I hope that's true - January is almost done. In the meantime, remind me to eat breakfast out once in a while. As long as Jo Jo's is still there, it'll be worth it. Street crossing or no.

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