My mother became somewhat obsessed with a gift she got a few years ago. It was a chocolate-covered cherry from one of the other business owners here ate the shopping center where I have my store, BookNotes. In the years since that first gift, the number of cherries have increased to three or four. My mother became so infatuated with them that she started looking for the confectioner who made them so that she could get some on her own. She started her search last year, but it wasn't until this fall that she was able to find the store in Barboursville, West Virginia. She asked others for help, but not me for some reason. I mean, it only took me a few seconds to pinpoint the store's location on my Mac's Maps app. We could actually drive there if we ever go to the city again. Well, my mother made BookNotes the confectioner's only Kentucky outlet. Two weeks ago, the huge shipment arrived. My mother had most of the boxes sold within the week, save one box that was held back and has yet to be picked up. This has been followed by an even larger second shipment this Monday. A customer from Pikeville had visited the main location and brought down the cherries to save on shipping costs. This second shipment included boxes of cherries flavored with Crown Royal Canadian whisky. I had trouble finding available space for all of these boxes. I was sticking them in empty spots that didn't interfere with anything else. Mostly, I stuck them around the decorations, although I unfortunately had to stick a few by the 'Clearance' sign for heavily discounted books. As they sold, I have had to rearrange the boxes. They no longer overwhelm the available sale space, but the reserved boxes are hogging up room until they can be picked up. I can't even access the spot for book orders because of all of the boxes. Now, my mother claims that people who hate chocolate-covered cherries, as evidenced by someone who picked up a few boxes for relatives and wound up almost eating a box by themselves. On the other hand, someone else all but spit out the bite they took of a sample cherry my mother handed out to one of her friends. I too don't like them. I like chocolate. I like cherries, although the preserved maraschino ones are a little much for me. I like the two flavors when combined, as in Black Forest cake. However, when mixed with a syrupy filling, I hate them. I have tried various other chocolate-covered cherries over the decades, and I haven't really liked any of them, mostly due to the filling. Then again, I also don't like chocolate milk or chocolate ice cream either, so there is a precedent for hating them. The closest I have ever gotten to liking such things is when I tried chocolate-covered blueberries. Yes, they do exist, or they did at one time. I haven't really seen them in awhile. There were ten, maybe twelve, in a standard size box. They could have put all of them in a much smaller box, but I guess the company felt they could charge more with the bigger box. I ate the blueberries, but the filling still wasn't exactly to my liking. I think I got a second box, either later that same year or maybe the next Christmas, but I'm not sure. As I just mentioned, I haven't been looking for them, so they might not be a thing any more. About half of this second shipment has been sold, and I am surrounded by twenty red boxes all around my store in two sizes, two gold boxes of the alcohol filled ones, and seven more big red boxes waiting to be picked up as I finish writing this post. Two smaller boxes were sold just as I was beginning to write. As a sideline, I'm glad the store is selling so much. As a treat, I just can't wait until they are gone so I don't have to be reminded of how much I dislike eating them.
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