After dropping off Ken the other night (chatting with Sheila, admiring their new home), I had a craving for samosas, and specifically the ones they sell in the Reynolds Club on campus. It was obviously too late to get them there, but I wasn't too far from the place where they actually make them, a store called Rajin' Cajun. Or maybe Rajun Cajun. I'm not sure. It's a little diner-type place on 53rd, which sells a mix of soul food and Indian food. You can get samosas, parotha, various vegetable curries, chicken curry or lamb curry, mango lassis. Or you can get Southern fried chicken, fried okra, a mess of greens, black-eyed peas. If you want, you can get lamb curry with a side of black-eyed peas. The food's all good, and it's reasonably cheap.
In itself, that diner would be sufficient reason to bop down to Hyde Park. But what made my trip there even better was walking back to my car, loaded down with curries, and being passed by three people arguing pleasantly about Kant. Not in a 'we need to study' way -- just in a 'isn't this interesting' way. Samosas in my bag, a surprisingly mild night, friends around the corner and Kant in the air -- those are some reasons to love Hyde Park.