To celebrate my brother Chris’ homecoming, I treated him out to dinner on Thursday. Our place of choice was The Counter in Cupertino. This burger joint got chosen because of the birthday freebie coupon they sent me in the mail (“one free burger after 5pm or 50% off during other times”). For the record, my parents were invited, but they abstained to allow for more brother bonding time.
To include a Hope Services donation (aka the big bag of unwanted clothing that has been sitting in our frontyard for ages) in our trip, we had dinner super early. The Hope Services outside Safeway closes at 5:00pm so we left the house at 4:40pm. The donation process was speedy (“Yeah, just leave it there. Thank you!”) so we arrived at The Counter just before five.
Dining in so early allowed us to take advantage of their $12 Monday to Friday Counter Combo, which ends at 5:30pm. Chris went for the Sprouted Veggie burger while I ordered a Old School Cheeseburger. Both of us got Shoestring Fries. As for drinks, Chris got a Stella Artois while I went for an Orange Fanta.
The meal itself was good, but very oily. Throughout the meal, we bros chatted mostly about the October train trip. Chris mentioned things he ate (i.e. Daikokuya in LA, gumbo in New Orleans), things he saw (i.e. El Paso Texas / Mexico, Niagara Falls in Canada, 33-hour train ride from Denver to California) and random facts he learned (i.e. friendly New Orleans vampires, slaves working to buy themselves).
We finished our meal and headed home around six. As we were driving back, we considered grabbing boba, but I deemed it too late. (My cutoff time for caffeine is 3pm.) All in all, I had a great time. Hopefully future food outings with Chris could become a real thing. Compared to my other friends, Chris seems more down to try new things; who knows…Milohas empanadas might finally get a chance.
