ABOUT ONCE A week I go to this coffeehouse and every time I think, from the distance of the doorway, Finally, they've changed the art. Then I realize, once I get my cup of black and sit where I always sit, in the back, in the corner, under the awesomeness of Antelope Canyon, Ariz., Nope, it's the same old same old. This has been going on for ... years, I want to say, but that would be lying. One year, tops. Long enough, at any rate, to warrant the raising of a not particularly important question. Namely: Is this – this repeated apparent newness – a sure indication of great art, or of a really dumb art critic?

I wonder if the people who read Cheap Eats (Hi Dad!) wonder, when it appears to be the same review, week after week after week ... something similar. Namely: Is this a really bad review, or a really dumb restaurant reviewer?

Both!

Nah, let's say this, and leave it at that – that it is great art, that it is not a bad review, but that the critiquing or reviewing of anything really is really dumb. I mean, I go into restaurants, and I always notice and always mention the art, but I never know what to say about it other than, there it was. Yup. It was art. It was food. You just have to go there, I guess ... is the message.

I, personally, love everything (art, food, butterflies – I could go on and on). But I have also started to question everything (authority, the absence of authority, food, butterflies).

Not sure what the point is.... The point, according to Rilke, is to learn to love the questions. But what did he know? His name (part of it, anyway) was Maria. No wonder he wanted to love questions!

I can't do it, Mr. Maria. I tried, but there are just too many of them. The question mark key on my keyboard has taken such a profound beating that it calls out to me at night, in my dreams: Enough! Enough already! Exclaim something, for a change!

It has a point.

Remember when I was in my 30s, how this column used to be loaded with exclamation marks???????????? I'm sorry. I'm in my 40s now (still), and this is what we do. We ask questions.

Battambang?

It's a restaurant. Yeah, downtown Oakland, Broadway between Eighth and Ninth Streets. Cambodian food and, yes, I love it. I can't say for sure, because everything's sort of wavy and ethereal (or else I'm too old to check), but I think it might be a little bit cheaper than Angkor Borei, my place in the city.

I was killing some time across the pond with Deevee, who lives in West Oakland now with my brother, and she was killing a whole different sort of time, and there's no better way to accomplish any and/or all of the above than with way too much food for two little people.

Green papaya salad, a huge sampler plate of appetizers, grilled pork, and prawns and asparagus. I've got my appetite back, in other words, because every one of these plates was cleaned clean by us, by the time time was pronounced dead, 8:14 p.m., and lord knows the waif Deevee had barely lifted a finger to help.

My personal favorite was the grilled pork ($6.95), which was marinated with lemongrass and other things and came with a great lime sauce and a pile of pickly stuff. The prawns and asparagus ($7.95) were sautéed in coconut milk and red chili sauce, which was mysteriously not spicy. Deevee loved that one.

She also loved, and always loves, the green papaya salad ($5.95), which is shredded green papaya with carrots, mint, ground peanuts, and – God bless everyone – more pork and more prawns. And, of course, lime sauce.

Neither one of us was particularly wowed by anything off of the sampler combo appetizer platter ($9.95). What they call "emperial" rolls, which are more like the Vietnamese cold rolls than imperial rolls (or vice versa), were the best of the bunch. Prawns, mint, lettuce, sprouts, and rice noodles in a wrapper that felt, tasted, and acted more like lasagna noodles than rice paper. What they call "lawt" (which I prefer to see spelled "lott," so as to remind me of Ronnie) are of course those cute little tiny pork spring rolls – not bad, not great, but oh so fun to eat. Then there was a stuffed chicken wing stuffed with pork, peanuts, etc., and a Cambodian crepe, which was an eggy-looking rice-flour pancake full of ground chicken, sprouts, etc.

Nice atmosphere: lamp-shaded Xmas-tree light candles along the walls, and a same-style chandelier. Oh, and art.

Battambang. 850 Broadway (at Ninth St.), Oakl. (510) 839-8815. Mon.-Fri., 11 a.m.-9:30 p.m.; Sat., 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Beer and wine. Takeout available. American Express, MasterCard, Visa. Wheelchair accessible.