Besides these similarities in the two men, major differences between Bloom and Stephen also emerge in "Calypso," and they foreshadow the ultimate inability of the two men to be reconciled with one another. Stephen has no home, much less a place to write, but Bloom has, at least, a writing table, albeit it is one that his cat stalks over. Other differences, more profound, concern the inability of the man of science, Bloom, to truly communicate with the philosopher-artist, Stephen. Bloom wonders, prosaically, if the cat's tongue is rough so that she can eat more easily; but Stephen wonders if Tatters (in "Proteus") is actually digging up his own grandmother, and he questions whether any so-called reality can be said to truly exist.
Bloom, then, is — in contrast to Stephen, a man of the mind — a man for whom the physical world does emphatically exist, and in "Calypso," Joyce stresses Bloom's acute awareness of the sensations of taste and touch. To say that Bloom eats with relish is no exaggeration, even though the food may be prohibited by Jewish dietary laws. Again, Bloom's solution for a dry mouth is simple: a cup of tea; and while the water for the tea is rising to a boil, there is time to stop by Dlugacz's for a pork kidney.
The shop of Dlugacz, the pork butcher (a Hungarian Jew, like Bloom, and therefore forbidden to eat the food he sells), is a garden of meaty delight for the "peckish" — that is, the hungry, protagonist. Having been partially calmed by the aroma of pig's blood, Bloom suddenly becomes apprehensive: the serving girl of the Blooms' next-door neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Woods, might decide to purchase the last kidney. Bloom finally escapes with his prize, however, and eats it as he reads Milly's letter. He enjoys the repast, and Joyce twice describes him as sopping his bread through the kidney gravy, an ironic contrast to Bloom's behavior in "Lestrygonians" just after 1:00 p.m., when he is forced to leave the Burton restaurant because he cannot stand the spectacle of food being swilled.
