…I’d been having a serious craving for a dinner of knockwurst, sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.

In Charlotte, the closest I could come to real knockwurst (at least, after much searching) was a pre-packaged product from New Jersey sold at the deli counter in one of the city’s more gourmet oriented supermarkets, and that hardly passed muster — it was the wurst worst I’ve ever had and shaped more like slightly fattened, short hot dogs than any knockwurst I’d seen before.

Here in Chicago, however, I figured I had a much better chance of finding the real thing, given the historic German population and the variety of foods one is more likely to encounter in a big, diverse city like this one.

Even so, I began my search with a paucity of even near success until I found a place a block from Lincoln Square, at 4661 North Lincoln Avenue, called the Lincoln Quality Meat Market.

The establishment is really small, but has what can only be called an incredible selection of fresh meats, including a large selection of homemade sausage that is guaranteed to please everyone who crosses their threshhold (except perhaps a vegan or general purpose vegetarian — those folks are on their own). There’s a whole lot more, just read their list of fare at the above link. I will be visiting them shortly regarding their cut-to-order filet mignon.

Back on topic, feeling somewhat like a little boy in a candy store, I was thrilled to discover that they sell their own homemade knockwurst, and that it is the gen-u-ine article. I bought a bunch of it, and guess what I had for dinner! We’re talking YUM!

They also feature andouille sausage (although whoever makes up their signs insists upon spelling it “andulie”, but you can’t win ‘em all), for which I developed a major affinity when I lived in Nawlins years ago.

I used the andouille in some gumbo a couple of nights ago.

Now, I can cook many good things, but gumbo, which I love beyond description, is not one of them. For that, I relied upon my old standby (the same many New Orleaneans use when they aren’t up to a lengthy cooking project), Zatarain’s. Zatarain’s products, available in supermarkets all over the country, are the closest “instant” products I’ve yet to find to foods one encounters in Nawlins, wherein dwells some of my all-time favorite cuisine.

So with a large bowl of Zatarain’s Gumbo with Rice and andouille sausage, I sat in front of the TV and watched a DVD of a film I had wanted to see since its release (I haven’t been a major movie-goer in years), Tears of the Sun, with Bruce Willis and Monica Belucci.

The film is about brave men (in this case, U.S. Navy SEALS) who defy both orders and almost certain death in following the courage of their convictions, and concludes with the Edmond Burke quote, “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to stand by and do nothing”.

What grabbed me was the realism of the murderous and unspeakably evil acts of the Nigerian rebels and soldiers as they slaughtered innocent men, women and children for no sane reasons whatsoever, and did so with apparent joy, raping and killing without compunction.

We read about this penchant of Africans to conduct their “affairs of arms” thusly all the time (just look at Dharfur, for example), as a corrupt, do-nothing United Nations (spit!) and people everywhere scream their outrage — I heard some enraging stories decades ago from friends on the less conventional end of things who had hired out their military experience and skills fighting communist insurrection in places like Rhodesia (Zimbabwe since) and Angola — and little if anything gets done about it.

I, myself, have always been an optimist, and I try to understand everybody’s point of view before passing judgement, but I can also be extremely hardnosed and often ruthless when events warrant it, yet it is totally beyond me to accept the atrocities some so-called human beings perpetrate on their fellow man as anything short of grossly unforgiveable.

From the satanic deeds of the Third Reich (the very fact that the German people, all economic and other explanations notwithstanding, were capable of what they did to the Jews, including relatives I consequently never had the pleasure of meeting and those I did meet who had concentration camp numbers tattoed on their arms, and millions of others, bespeaks volumes about the contents of their souls), to the more modern acts perpetrated by Islam, the North Vietnamese, Pol Pot and these monsters in Africa who possess neither any value on human life nor any iota of the concept of mercy, I feel only intense despair and the total conviction that unmitigated, outrageous extremes are the only solution in all too many cases.

One of the things that really aggravates the living hell out of me is the aggression against Turkey by the PKK.

These assholes are so wrapped up in their own stupid millieu that they feel they have to pick a time when the U.S. and our allies are battling to stabilize Iraq to antagonize the Turks into an invasive and well justified military action. If I were the head honcho in Ankara, I’d already have a few thousand troops in northern Iraq, supported by jets bearing napalm.

Then there are Islamic terrorist activities everywhere on the planet from Indonesia to the former Soviet Socialist Republics, the MidEast and Southeast Asia, western Europe to the Balkans.

And now Iran is once again bee-essing the idiots at Turtle Bay by agreeing to talk turkey re their nuclear weapons program atomic energy ambitions.

But I’ll digress no further.

We continuously read and hear of mindless mass murder and downright genocide all over the world and then of diplomatic veneer or media apologism or blame cast on the victims, or of empty pledges by the U.N. or individual government spokespersons to proactively address the problems, but nothing ever happens other than additional or increased existing problems.

We have to face the facts: Whether they are based upon religion, political dogmas or both, the world’s problems of massive violence originate almost exclusively from sources on the African continent and southwest Asia, where murder, torture and mayhem are business as usual and human life counts for little, and spread from those locales to the rest of the planet, and no amount nor quality of diplomacy will ever serve as a permanent solution.

Civilized societies, decency and diplomacy will never break through the shell of barbarism that is shared by Islam and the inherently corrupt, violence as a lifestyle tribal mentalities of Africa.

It is my personal belief that no matter what we opine, legislate, say or do, the reality is that the final disposition of human co-existence on our planet, no matter what the individual dispositions of the myriad citizenries throughout the world may be, will be determined by a total encompassment of conventional and unconventional warfare and the deaths of billions of people.

Somehow, even utterance of the word “bummer” doesn’t cover it — so I’m going to sit back in my most excellent of swivel chairs (courtesy of Office Depot), sip some brandy and listen to the next two pieces of music in the playlist my computer is delivering, another study in complex diversity: Kiss Them For Me by the awesome Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees followed by one of my favorite classical music pieces, Smetana’s Vltava.

G’night…