Every time I see the word “organic” I hear it in Alice Krige’s voice from her role as the Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact.

Every time I see the name “Ramirez” I hear it in the voice of the Kurgan from Highlander.

The actor who played the Kurgan was in Cowboys and Aliens, an exceedingly silly movie that was just right for a sleepy Saturday night accompanied by pizza.

“Hey, it’s that guy!” I said when he came on screen. “From Highlander. He played the kudu. The Cromm. The kookaburra. You know.”

When I say I can’t remember anyone’s name, I mean it.

PS: I couldn’t find a clip of the Krige, but you can see the kookaburra/Ramirez thing here, at 1:08ish.

PPS: I keep thinking of more of these.

When I see the name “Agrippa” I think of “He has a-studied hees Agreepa” from Princess Bride.

It is possible that the following sentence has been uttered in my house: “I’m easily startled; but soon I’ll be back, and in larger numbers.”

A Classic Virginia Phrase: “Eat, Papa, eat! The children want a fat Santa!” Sadly, this is not *actually* from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. It is a paraphrase. But if I say it often enough it will come true.

In October of 1991, as a Wee Baby Thing Fresh from College, I moved to Chicago. This caused my parents a great deal of distress, but it turned out pretty well: I ended up loving Chicago (still do); I moved into a gorgeous, affordable apartment with roommates from college; and I lucked into a fortuitous arrangement to get my stuff up there from North Carolina. Once in Chicago, I started temping pretty much right away and soon got my first-ever grown-up job.

I lived just north of Clark & Halsted, and if there is a good place for a freaked-out young lady to live, it is the heart of the gay district. That soothed many of my worries. It was close to Action, close to cute shops and restaurants, and our landlords were friendly and protective. My roommate M was one of my best friends in the world, and my roommate K was organized and calm. My job wasn’t so awesome, but what did I know about the subject? I was a not-savvy 21. It was okay. I had big dreams of Making It in the Theatah (that’s a story for another day).

So my boyfriend of the time, who became The Unlamented Starter Husband, is not someone I want to blog about because why speak ill of the Long Ago and Far Away, but one small point he had in his favor was a sense of food adventurousness, and at the corner of Clark and Halsted was an Afghani restaurant. At that point in my young life, it was a little amazing to me that an Afghani restaurant even existed, much less in a place where I could get there. What I remember about the meal: it was super good, especially the appetizer, which was some kind of pumpkin thingo with meat sauce that blew my tiny mind.

That was when the internet was still a tiny baby, and if I took notes on what I ate, it’s in a journal packed way in the back of the attic, so for the next 20 years I thought periodically of the Afghani pumpkin thingo but never successfully searched for it. I will admit that when we went to war in Afghanistan, my first thought was “oh no” and my second was “pumpkin thingo.”

Cue about 3 weeks ago, when my friend Rosa asked on her blog what dishes people considered their specialty. One person posted about kaddo bowrani, and I used the mighty power of Google to find out what that was.

Pumpkin thingo!

Tonight I made it. I had roasted butternut squash, not pumpkin (reheated in the microwave with a bit of sugar and cinnamon). I had pasta sauce, not tomato sauce, and leftover Roast Beast, not ground beef.

Even bastardized, it was worth waiting 20 years for. AND I have enough left for lunch tomorrow!