Grandma Annable was from South Dakota and was the original CATEYE i spose. I tried to call her "Granny" once cuz i wanted to love her like a granny, but she wouldn't let me call her that probably cuz she was strict like her oh so German blood demanded her to be. But it dint really matter cuz i loved her anyhow. She wore the CATEYE glasses now perched on my face, and I like to say granny is still seeing out my eyes, especially since i wouldnt know exactly where granny is right now though i spose she is in heaven like all true grannies would be. She had a crazy long name....Alvena Lena Rosina Olarkeen Annable, which actually sounds more Italian than German when you listen to it.

Granny married a Canadian, my grandpa, who i never really knew though he fathered a perfect 7 kids, one of which became my mother, Ora...... Ora Louise. Grandpa owned a service station there in Custer, the kind of service stations that arent any more. Before that, during the Depression, he worked on the road to Mount Rushmore. It's funny, but i spose all those big heads dint mean to Grandpa what they mean to me the American. I love those heads and what i think they stand for. ....freedom and justice for all like the pledge-allegiance says. I have always been proud that grandpa worked on the Rushmore road...not just any ole road--and that is my favorite part of grandpa's not so long life but...

Eventually, The family left South Dakota cuzza Grandma's cripplin' arthritis. They loaded up the 7 kids into a rumble seater, the brand spankin' new refrigerator into the pickup and headed West to warmer promised lands....and that is the Cateye part of the story...the part about grandma, her 7 kids, her glasses and me wearing them.

But there is more to the Cateye than the glasses. There is a part about Cats and a part about Eyes........ Abe Lincoln saved three cats from the South and took them to Washington during Civil War, and Roosevelt had cats with him at the dinner table just like i do at home but cant at this cafe. I bet Winston Churchhill had several cats too considering he was up there with Abe and F.D.R. I really like guys like Abe and Roosevelt and Churchill. I like that great leaders have knotches in their belts, follies in their histories, and cats at their tables. The cats at my table are norm, bug, pickle and turbo, and they do have a way about them...a knowingness and secure confidence, a lack of self conscousness, a freedom in being that humans tend to lack. ...admirable.

Then there is the part about Eyes....Vision, insight, the Third Eye, or the Eye on the dollar bill, or the window to the soul...we all know the power of looking into another's eyes to see what they are made of, we all know how hard it can be to look another in the eye, we all know that eyes tell secrets and hold the majik. SO.... you see it all come together....THE CATEYE....GLASSES, CATS, EYES, COMING TOGETHER LIKE A SNEEZE, AHHCHOO....to see Blake's eternity in a grain of sand is the point if there were one and whatever doesnt kill you makes you stronger and the bending tree doesnt break. you gotta go thru. figure it out. FIND IT.

Thanks for stopping by the Cateye...where we do our darndest to charm your stomach and your heart with warmth and 100% homemade good food you can promounce. It aint easy, and we wont always succeed so let us know if we can fix something. We hope you will be fed on the inside as well as the out----i spose that would be our mission statement so remember, man shall not live by bread alone.