Mon update: Luau at Rooster, Bangkok Alley, Kookamonga Challenge

Blogging on my iPhone from the window at the Flying Saucer.

I forgot to mention in this morning’s post that there’s a luau at the Red Rooster tonight. Drink specials. Wear your beach or summer attire.

Bangkok Alley, the Thai restaurant going into the old Sawaddii location, has a website at www.thebangkokalley.com.

As of last night, Kooky Canuck had 1,999 people attempt the Kookamonga Challenge, where you get their 7 pound burger for free if you finish it within an hour. You could be number 2,000… few have succeeded though.

All right… one more Pint Nite beer, then it’ll be time for dollar cocktails at the Goose.

The weekend in pictures

Here’s a look back at a long Memorial Day weekend in photos:

dempseys-slims

The Dempseys at Automatic Slim’s Friday night, with guest singer.

polizei

1970s “Polizei” BMW that was driving around Downtown on Saturday.

ice-ice-baby

Not the first time I’ve seen someone walking the streets of Downtown with a trash bag slung over his shoulder, but it was the first time I’ve seen Bicycle Bobby do it.  The Ques Brothers had an extra keg, and we borrowed a trash bag of ice from the Saucer to ice it down.

coldbeer

Sunday at the Saucer, my friend Chris requested a “really, really cold beer.”  This is what they brought him.

coldbeer-chris

Chris enjoying his extra cold beer.

whatyearisit

You may need to click the image above to zoom in and see what I’m talking about here.  These are the plates of the five newest members of the Flying Saucer’s UFO Club, including the very newest who had his plate party last night.  From right to left the dates read

  • February 21, 2009
  • April 20, 2009
  • May 10, 2008
  • May 22, 2009
  • May 24, 2008

Looks like the Saucer doesn’t know what year it is.  I love it when they do stuff like this.

Yesterday I got up too late for brunch, so I headed directly to the Saucer and met up with the gang for Sunday Fun Day, and enjoyed some Leinenkugel Sunset Wheats on Fire Sale.  After that a few of us wandered next door to the Silly Goose for their Bloody Mary bar.  Then the gang decided to cook out on a rooftop in South Main.  I decided I wanted to remain in the core for Memorial Day Sunday, so I parted ways from them and wandered over to Kooky Canuck for their $2 beer day.  Then back to the Saucer, then the Goose, then joined a friend for a burger at Huey’s which we managed to order 5 minutes before their kitchen closed.  So I had a 15 hour day out at the bars Saturday, and a 14 1/2 hour day Sunday.  Gotta love holiday weekends.

I won’t hit the double digits today, but it is Monday Fun Day.  Soon as the laundry gets out of the dryer it’ll be time to get started.  Mmmm… $2.75 Dos Equis Lager at Pint Nite prices.  Of course, it’s also dollar Depression-era cocktail night at the Silly Goose from 5 to 7.  If you work out east and get home too late most Mondays to enjoy dollar cocktails, today is your chance!  Hope to see you there.

Drunkass post

This is a drunkass post that won’t go up ’til morning because I have to wait for YouTube to process a video.  I’m going to have to leave it overnight before I publish.  But once it loads… here’s a video of Paula & Raiford’s Disco about 2 AM Saturday night.

She’s not seen in the video, but to the girl in the fuchsia tube top who was at Raiford’s: Thank you for all you do.

By the way: The only reason I can claim to be a heterosexual male and know what color “fuchsia” is, is because I run a store that sells tube tops in that color.

I heard that Calhoun’s has raised its PBR price to $2.

The Silly Goose has several new menu items, including lobster dip which I tried tonight… very good.

Dr. Herman Green celebrates his birthday tomorrow… well actually tonight by the time this gets posted… Sunday … his 79th birthday, performing with FreeWorld at Blues City Cafe at 10:30.

Off to bed, although I’ll be awake again by the time you read this.  $2 34 oz. beers at Kooky Canuck all day Sunday.

Follow me

Blogging from my new iPhone. Got the activation problems straightened out. One of the things I did today was create a personal Twitter account. Feel free to follow me at @paulryburn. I will still maintain @firesale for Fire Sale updates. Speaking of which, I have advance knowledge that tomorrow’s is Leinie Sunset Wheat.

Not off to a good start

Today is not off to a good start.  I thought it would be.  I ordered a new iPhone through AT&T.  I charged it last night and connected it to iTunes this morning.  So it was ready to activate.

I went to AT&T’s activation site.  I got all the way through the activation process, and then on the last screen it said, “Sorry, due to an issue with our servers we weren’t able to activate you right now.  Please call (some phone number) if you continue to have problems.”

So I tried to call the number with my old Verizon phone.  That didn’t work.  AT&T wasn’t able to activate my new phone, but they did deactivate my old one.

So I tried to register again.  It said “This phone has already been registered.  If you think this message is in error please call (phone number).”  Which I can’t do because I don’t have service from either phone.

I tried to access their online chat support feature, but they wanted me to register first.  After I did, they sent me a password – they texted it to my new phone, which doesn’t work.  The only other option for getting me the password is U.S. Mail, which is not much help.

It gets better.  Last night I tried to pay at the Saucer and my debit card was declined.  I called the bank (my old phone still worked then) and they told me they had a threat of identity theft and had to issue a number of new cards.  They told me to check my mailbox, that my new card should be there.  It was.

But before I can use the card, I have to activate it with my home phone.  Which doesn’t work right now.

The only reason this stopped short of being a total emergency is that I had a couple hundred dollars cash stashed away for a rainy day.  So I can still live my life this weekend.

Gonna wander down to the Saucer or somewhere and see if I can borrow someone’s phone and get this mess straightened out.  I may be unavailable by phone this weekend though.

Friday afternoon thoughts

After Memorial Day weekend, I’m going to get back to building new websites, specifically, Amazon.com storefronts. Related to that, I have a question for my female readers. I want to design some sister sites to Tube Top Boutique, where I focus on a very narrow niche of women’s fashion. What niche do you think my next storefront should focus on? If you have ideas, shoot ’em to paul@paulryburn.com.

It’s been a fulfilling week at work… I’ve spent most of this week setting up a WordPress blog that we’re going to roll out next month. As a result, I’ve gained a much better understanding of WordPress than I had before. I’ve added a lot of bells and whistles that are going to WOW the blog’s readers and keep them coming back. I’ve also learned a lot of tricks that I will eventually use on my own blog.

I feel like I’ve finally found my niche. I’m a marketing person with a very strong knowledge of IT, rather than an IT person. I enjoy creating things that will excite and motivate people. I don’t enjoy optimizing SQL Server stored procedures to reduce import and transformation time of large data files by 10%.

Got another question… those of you who work near the airport, where is there a place to pick up a Memphis Flyer in that part of town? It’s Friday and I haven’t read the Flyer yet. That’s completely unacceptable, especially since it’s one of my main sources for blog info. You just don’t see green boxes out by the airport like you do in Downtown and Midtown.

All right… had a friend call and say he was at the Saucer before I even left work… time to head up there and get the weekend started.

Couple of quick Friday morning news items

Beginning July 1, out-of-state wineries will be able to ship wine directly to Tennessee residents.  They will still have to register with the Tennessee ABC and get a permit.

In honor of the long weekend, Kooky Canuck will sell 34 oz. Super Cold Coors Light for $2 all day Sunday.  Most everyone has Monday off to recover, so stop on by and have one, or a few… don’t forget to bring your pennies to tip Meghan, if she’s working.

There’s a Facebook group for Tube Top Month… feel free to join if you’re a fan.  Only 10 more days!

The block party last night was outstanding.  Bluefin had Delirium Nocturnum in bottles for $2 each.  Nice!  They also had delicious beef and shrimp skewers for a buck each.  Great music by the Bluff City Backsliders and Blind Mississippi Morris too.  Those bottles of Delirium took me out of commission early and I just didn’t feel up to the Peabody rooftop.  Hung out at the Saucer for a while then went home and got a good night’s sleep… plenty of weekend coming up to catch up on partying though.

But first, I face an exciting day of diagnosing configuration issues in php.ini files.  Joy joy.

They brought the monster back

meghan200I thought part of the settlement when Kooky Canuck agreed to totally dissociate itself from its former name was, no more scary almost-human creatures.  No Big Foot, no Sasquatch, no Yeti.

And then tonight they brought back the scariest creature of them all.  “Meghan.”  What were they thinking?

Please, Shawn and Lana, let the nightmares end.

Wed update: Vote for St. Jude, Red Rooster, C# programming position

There’s a Facebook promotion going on right now called Bullseye Gives. Through this promotion Target will give $3 million to St. Jude and other charity partners. Your votes will determine how much of the $3 million St. Jude gets. Go to Target’s Facebook page to vote, and you can vote once per day through May 25.

On May 26, Target will announce the amount each charity gets, based on vote percentage. So if St. Jude got 50% of the vote, they’d receive 50% of the money, or 1.5 million dollars.

Something else I saw on Facebook – this coming Monday, the Red Rooster will throw a Monday Fun Day party entitled “Luau – everyone gets Laid.” It’s a chance to show off your summer beach bodies and tans. Attire is beach or summer clothes. Domestics and vodka drinks will be on special for $2.50.

Also, the Rooster’s prize for this week’s “You Got the Look/Chicklette of the Week” contest is a Big Buddha handbag.  It’s Thursday night after the Peabody rooftop.

If anyone is looking for a C# programming position, I know of a recruiter who has one open. It requires 3-5 years programming experience and some project management experience. It would be ideal for someone out east in the Germantown/Collierville area, and it’s for a large manufacturing company. If interested e-mail me at paul@paulryburn.com and I’ll put you in touch with the recruiter. No need to send resumes, just send a paragraph summarizing your past experience, and if you seem qualified, I’ll put you in touch.

Hmmm… the recruiters never give out the names of the companies, but I think I know which one they’re talking about… if I’m right, I interviewed with them 2 years ago and got asked one of the dumbest IT interview questions ever. “How many languages support the .NET framework?” The real answer is, it doesn’t matter, because as long as you know one of them, you’re good to go. The answer he was looking for was 23 (this was 2 years ago – may be more or less now). I have no idea why he asked that. It was completely useless trivia.

Outta here… I was asked to do a photo shoot for some social media presentation and they want to do it at the Saucer.  Now that I can handle.