Paul Ryburn’s Journal

The Grizzlies have a blog now.  Check them out to get all the latest news and updates about the team.

Restaurant.com has a new sale from now through Sunday that is even better than the one I previously blogged about.  Enter coupon code SAVE at checkout to get 70% off your total.  A lot of restaurants Downtown (Big Foot Lodge, Stella, McEwen’s, Majestic Grille, and many more) and all over town participate in this program.  The $25 face-value certificates normally sell for $10, but with the 70% off coupon code you can buy them for $3.

Please note that some restrictions apply - in many cases they can’t be used to purchase alcohol, and many restaurants require to spend at least $35 to redeem the $25 face-value gift certificates.  Still though, they’re a great deal - you can get $22 worth of food for free if you get in on the sale.  You can buy more than one certificate for the same restaurant, but can only cash in one per table per visit.

I’ve blogged about these for over a year now, and many of my readers have bought the certificates and successfully used them.  The program is totally legit.  So, if it sounds like something you’d be interested in, now is the time to take advantage of the sale.  Happy eating!

I’ve referred y’all to the site Hot Chicks with Douchebags numerous times now.  After 2 hours at the Saucer from 9:30 to 11:30, I’ve decided to ask the question:  What makes a Memphis douchebag?  It’s slightly different than the national average.   I have thoughts on the subject (one brand of shirt in particular) but want to hear from my readers.

E-mail your thoughts to paul@paulryburn.com.  I’ll post on this approximately next Wednesday, give or take a day.  The gloves will be totally off profanity-wise for this post.  It’s time to put some people in their place.

A couple of days ago I posted about a deal where you can buy Restaurant.com gift certificates for local restaurants for 50% off (meaning, you’ll get $25 face value certificates for $5 rather than the usual price of $10).  I see that a few people have bought them, and there’s nothing wrong with that, they’re a good deal… but if you haven’t bought them yet and are considering it, HOLD UP UNTIL TOMORROW.  There’s an even better promo code coming out tomorrow, that’s worth 70% off.  I’ll blog the new promo code and set it to auto-post early tomorrow morning.  The new sale will run through Sunday, October 12.

Mendi is sooo excited about her friends’ status updates!  You’re eating?  Cool!  Bout to go to bed?  Awesome!  Tell me more…!!!!!

Finally got my allergy medicine, which involved a drive to Midtown.  Wow, driving twice in one week, that’s not something I do very often.

Sauces is under new ownership.  I’ve been told that Jeff Johnson, a long-time bartender at Newby’s, now owns the place.  They’re open and will have some new specials this weekend including Asian wings with wasabi blue cheese, thai steak salad, and grilled halibut over low country grits with a side of wild spinach.  Because the place has a new owner, it had to re-apply for a liquor license and won’t have it for about another week, but in the meantime you’re welcome to carry your own in.  If you provide the rum, they’ll make your Mojito setup.

I hope they do well… Sauces always had great food, but I often got the impression the business side of things wasn’t quite right under the old ownership.  Sounds like this new guy has been around the bar and restaurant business for a while and knows what he’s doing.  “I just hope he doesn’t hang up too much UT orange,” one reader commented has he sang Jeff’s praises.  Uh oh.  Ask Calhoun’s bartender and almost-BFF Lauren what UT orange will get you.

Businesses on the block of the Main Street Mall between Gayoso and Peabody Place will throw a block party next Thursday, October 16.  Five businesses on that block won awards in the Flyer’s Best Of issue.  There will be live music and the following specials:

Majestic Grille - Best Restaurant (tie) and Best Martini (3rd)
2 for 1 flatbreads
$4 strawberry basil martinis
$4 mojitos on the patio

Circa - Best Restaurant (tie) and Best Chef
$5 appetizers and $19 ’steak frites’
feature wines $5/glass or $20/bottle

Blue Fin - Best Sushi/Japanese (2nd)
$10 dumpling/sushi combos and $5 hurricane and tornado rolls
$2 Miller or Coors bottles
$5 select martinis

Center for Southern Folklore - Best Free Festival
$4 peach cobbler and ice cream
$1.25 cappucinos
$3 domestics & imports
10% off merchandise and Art by Gray

Shelton Clothiers - Best Men’s Clothing (3rd)
buy one get one neck ties (I think, there was a typo here)
25% off all pink pig apparel
sale items excluded

A reader e-mailed about my post about RealClearPolitics, and told me that Electoral-Vote.com is more accurate because they don’t use partisan polls.  So you may want to check them out in addition to RCP.  He says RCP includes some GOP-leaning polls, so the actual numbers may be tilted even more toward Obama than the RCP map shows.  In any event, the RCP map shows another move - West Virginia goes from “leaning McCain” to “toss-up.”  This is turning into a complete disaster for the Republicans… if the economy continues to spiral downward, I predict that by election day Montana, North Dakota, Georgia, Louisiana, and Arkansas will have moved to the toss-up column.

Downtown business owners:  Check out the CCC’s website for info on a $2500 storefront decorating contest.

The concert at Jefferson Davis Park last night was excellent.  Perfect weather and Delta Highway tore the place up with their blues.  Great food from Crepe Maker, and from a vendor selling funnel cakes and corn dogs.  The final concert in the series is next Wednesday, October 15 in Barbaro Alley next to Sauces, where there will be a miniature GonerFest with Jack Oblivian, The Limes, and other musical acts.

The Rapscallions dominated yet another trivia night last night.  Mikey and Pete the Trivia Guy did the first week of trivia at Jillian’s.  Format was a little different from the Saucer… there are 6 questions per round, 3 rounds total.  Each round has one question from each category of Trivial Pursuit (although Pete makes up the questions himself).  If you get an entire round right, you get bonus points.  At the end of the 3rd round, there’s a final question.  Teams get to vote which category they want, majority rules.  You can wager as many of your points as you want on the final question.

Due to the wagering, the Rapscallions took first place with 118 points.  Joe and Jake, who normally play on my BFFs’ team at the Saucer, came in second with 2 points.  That’s not a typo - TWO points.  The final question, after the teams voted for “science”:  The wolverine is the largest member of what family?  The correct answer was the weasel family - it’s not a wolf or dog.

They’ll have trivia again next Wednesday at 7.  The event is still relatively unknown, so if your team shows up you have a better-than-average chance of winning a prize.

My BFFs Jenny and Michelle didn’t show up after saying they would.  Earlier, they had proposed a trivia team consisting of all my former BFFs and me.  “That’s not a bad idea, Darbi and Kristin and really smart, and so is Suzy.”  After thinking about it for a minute, though, I added, “Maybe we better not invite Meghan.”

Five sneezes since I started typing this post.  My throat is sore from all the sneezing and coughing.  Allergy meds have not kicked in yet.  If I get to feeling better, I’ll get out for a little while this evening.  I have a coupon for $5 worth of beer from the Saucer, redeemable today only, and in these tough economic times one shouldn’t let free beer go to waste.

RealClearPolitics updated its electoral map this morning. Virginia has now moved from the “toss up” column to “leaning Obama,” with poll averages now showing Obama up by 5.1% in that state.  That gives Obama 277 electoral votes that are “solid” or “leaning” his direction, with 270 needed to become President.  So, even if McCain wins all the remaining toss-up states - Nevada, Colorado, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, North Carolina, and Florida - he’ll still lose the election.

The worse news for McCain is that he’s behind Obama in all those states except Indiana, although the races are all still close enough to be called “toss-ups.”

Unless McCain makes a major move real soon (like replacing Sarah Palin with someone competent and qualified), his goose is cooked.

1) Mountain Dew.

2) My allergy medicine.  They’ve been out for the past week.  Up until this morning I successfully lived without it, but I’ve been up since a little after 1 AM trying to breathe.

I called in (actually e-mailed in, this is the 21st century) to work and told them I’m taking a day off, not wanting to treat my co-workers to 8 hours of listening to me sniffle and sneeze.

At some point I’ll drive to Midtown and find a place that sells Claritin-D (or the drugstore brand knock-off).  Back later today with a review of “Bands, Beer, and Bums” at Jefferson Davis Park, and trivia night at Jillian’s.

Two pieces of advice:

1) Get there by 6:45 (they go on sale at 7) and tell your waitress or bartender that you want to get a Lennon glass as soon as they are allowed to sell them.  This is one of two glasses per year (Elvis being the other one) that sell out extremely quickly.  If you’re even 10 minutes late, you may miss out.

2) Bring cash to pay, and if possible, bring exact change.  The bartenders and waitresses are going to be SLAMMED.  If you plan on leaving right after you get the glass, and you pay with a credit card, expect delays getting out of there.  If you pay them cash, exact change, all you have to do is hand them the money and go.  The cost of the glass (I believe, don’t hold me to this) is $5 plus the cost of the draft beer you put in it (and don’t forget to tip).  This is one of the few nights of the year I pay with cash rather than my debit card.

See you tonight, and don’t forget about trivia with Mikey and Pete the Trivia Guy across the street at Jillian’s.

Joe’s Wines and Liquors will host a beer tasting Downtown at the Cotton Museum on Thursday, October 23.  They’ll pour 25 beers for sampling, along with some hearty autumn fare.  The e-mail I was forwarded says that all the craft breweries will be represented, along with a few new ones that are just establishing a foothold in Memphis.  More info to come soon.  I actually don’t have info on how to get tickets yet, because the e-mail I got forwarded was for their wine club members only, who had first chance at the tickets.

The beer tasting was discussed among the team last night at trivia.  The Nuh-Uh Girl:  “Will they have FOOD there?  What kind of food are they going to serve?  I’ll go if there’s food.”  Geez.

The Rapscallions took second at trivia last night, adding a $25 gift certificate, bringing our total to $220.  However, it’s interesting to note that the team that beat us was named “Paul Ryburn’s BFFs.”  Yes, Michelle and Jenny finally found a way to win at trivia, by inviting about 20 of their friends and co-workers to join them.  This week they won fair and square, with no arguments about point totals or unclear questions, beating us 136 to 127.

Tasteless comment of the week:  Air Traffic Mike:  “It’s John Lennon beer glass night?  Shouldn’t that be a shot glass?”  After thinking a little more, he followed up with, “Or a John Lennon beer glass and a Mark David Chapman shot glass.”

If the Flying Saucer ever opens a restaurant in Moscow, I wonder if they’ll do Lenin glass night, instead of Lennon glass night?

Congratulations to my trivia teammate Eric on his appearance in the Commercial Appeal this morning, in a great article about the Memphis Grizzlies’ mentoring efforts in the community.

Turbo Dog is the Fire Sale today… yuck.  Don’t forget, folks, Bardog Tavern has $2.50 PBR, all the time.  If it weren’t for the Lennon glass I’d bypass the Saucer altogether today.

I’ll be at “Bands, Beer and Bums” at Jefferson Davis Park for about an hour before I go get the Lennon glass.  The rain will have moved out of here by the time the music starts at 5:30 and it should be a fun time.   After I pick up the Lennon glass I’ll head over to trivia at Jillian’s with Mikey and Pete the Trivia Guy. $2 drafts, $3 Jager bombs, cherry bombs, and grape bombs.