April 2024 Central Virginia Guzzi Lunch REPORT

[Michael S. Jones]

The day dawned cloudy and cool, but the forecast for gradual clearing was accurate (for a change) and today turned out to be a great day for the Central Virginia Moto Guzzi Lunch. However, despite the great riding weather, only four Guzzis showed up at Bedford’s Bella Italia. Al Chappell rode his V7iii Stone, John Howard rode his V100 Mandello Aviazione Navale, Larry Echols rode his green and silver V100 Mandello S, and I rode my red Sport 1100. It’s interesting that, already, half of the Guzzis present were liquid-cooled. Several people wrote to me expressing regrets that they wouldn’t be able to join us. That’s OK; there will be another opportunity in May (at a different restaurant, naturally).

Everyone said that the food was good. The prices are definitely higher than at Napoli’s in Rustburg, but the subs came with potato chips that are made on site and are quite good, and the entrees came with side-salads, so the extra cost may be justified. The portions were very large, too. Larry’s spaghetti and meatballs was a work of art, and Al’s calzone was as big as two calzones at some restaurants. Plus, we were served house-made garlic rolls with our beverages, which is a gratuity that some restaurants have discontinued.

People often ask me to give my evaluation of the eggplant parmigiana sub, since that’s what I always order and I keep a mental score card of who has the best. Back during the pandemic Bella was only doing take-out. One day Laura and I decided to visit Bedford, get Italian take-out of lunch, and walk around the town looking in the shop windows and such. It was a nice, socially-distanced way to get some fresh air. That day the eggplant parmigiana sub was excellent. Today it was ordinary. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great, either. It was middle-of-the-pack, with a bit too much breading, a bit too little actual eggplant, and a little short on sauce.

What was excellent, in my opinion, was the friendship. We had a great time talking, even though it was just four of us. We stayed longer than usual talking about all kinds of things. We got some good pictures of the bikes all lined up in a row, too. And then we enjoyed a beautiful afternoon ride home, John and Larry heading up to the parkway first, Al taking the back roads back to Lynchburg, and me stopping at Tractor Supply en route to Evington. This lunch was a success. :-)

Hoping to see more of you next month,

Mike


M. Jones, executive editor, Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies (www.jsri.ro)
"The heart has its reasons which reason does not know." -Blaise Pascal
"With man, instinct and reason avoid each other with adversity, yet, by repudiating each other they lure each other to reach mutual correction." -Lucian Blaga
"Human reason has this peculiar fate that in one species of its knowledge it is burdened by questions which, as prescribed by the very nature of reason itself, it is not able to ignore, but which, as transcending all its powers, it is also not able to answer." -Immanuel Kant