Month: September 2011

Silly Goose costume party. I spent $1.39 on this costume. I had everything I needed except Elmer’s glue.

And the news just keeps rolling in… for the second day in a row, an after-work news update is necessary.

I have more information about The Brass Door’s alley party, to be held Saturday, September 24. The event will last from 3 PM until midnight, and will feature entertainment by Myla Smith, Jeremy Stovall, Candy Company, Walrus and Big Betsy. There will be a $5 cover.

The Downtown Memphis Commission (formerly CCC) is looking for a new Public Safety Director. This person will continue the work Larry Bloom has done for the past 4 years, supervising the Downtown Safety Patrol and working with various organizations, businesses and the police. The most notable qualification for this position is 5 years experience working for a full-service law enforcement agency.

With Larry departing in a few weeks, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank him for all the hard work he has done. Downtown is much safer than it was in 2007, and furthermore the perception of Downtown as safe (which hasn’t always matched reality) has much improved too. We will be very lucky if we can find a replacement as skilled as he is.

AutoZone Park has announced a free watch party for the second game of the World Series on October 20. The game will be shown indoors on the big screen at the Club Level. Activities available will be batting practice in the indoor cages, self-guided tours of the clubhouse and dugout, and (weather permitting) inflatables for the kids. There will be a buffet available: $7 advance purchase, $10 day of. Budweiser beer and Barefoot wine will be on sale at a cash bar. Call 901-722-0299 to reserve your place and get the advance price on the buffet.

In addition, if you renew your season tickets before the start of the party, you’ll receive a free buffet and one drink ticket for each season ticket renewed. You can call the same number as above to get this deal. Is there any minor league team that treats its ticket holders better than the Redbirds? Not to my knowledge.

New website Join the Revulsion invites you to join the protest against the University of Memphis’ incompetent athletic director R.C. Johnson. Keep up with all the latest “Fire R.C.” news there. They’re also on Twitter at @TheRevulsion.

Even The King has joined the protest against Johnson. CBSCollegeSports.com reports that WWE superstar and commentator Jerry Lawler emailed CA writer Geoff Calkins, commending him on his call for the A.D.’s resignation, and for head coach Porter’s as well. You know, since wrestling has come into this discussion, I’ll make this analogy: R.C. Johnson runs the UM athletic department about as well as WCW was run in 1999-2000.

I’m almost tempted to root for Austin Peay this Saturday. If they beat the Tigers this weekend, this thing will surely reach a tipping point and R.C. will be gone. I suppose it’s not really fair to the Memphis football players, though, to cheer for them to lose. Go Tigers and Fire R.C.

On my way to the superhero party at Silly Goose. Homemade costume on. Hopefully there will be pics.

(I have updated this morning’s post with updated info about the bottomless mimosa. Scroll down to view.)

Want to check out some art while helping fellow Memphians get a hand up in life? Check out the Art for Advance party at 769 Vance this Thursday from 5 to 8 PM. More than a dozen artists will have their work on display, and food will be provided by The Brass Door. All proceeds from the event go to Advance Memphis, a nonprofit which trains adults with soft job skills and education to be economically self-sufficient. They’re asking people who plan to attend to RSVP, either on their Facebook event page or by emailing kate@advancememphis.org.

Downtown Groupon Alert! Today’s Groupon deal is $7 for $15 worth of food at Cockadoos. Remember, they open at midnight Friday and Saturday and stay open until 3 PM the next day. Great place to go after a night at the bars and clubs. Weekdays they’re open for breakfast and lunch.

Attention Arkansas Razorbacks fans: I got a text last night informing me that Max was on the phone with Comcast, making sure Max’s Sports Bar would have the Arkansas-Troy game Saturday. Kickoff is 6:30 PM. It’s time to CALL THOSE HOGS!!! Troy is one of those Sun Belt teams that get a lot of TV dollars every year losing to the SEC in the preseason. They’d probably beat Memphis 77-3. Then R.C. Johnson would hold a press conference, saying he still holds out hope that one day Memphis will make it to 6-6 and get invited to a shitty December 18 bowl that no one watches. Because, you know, he doesn’t expect blind faith, but he still hopes for your continued support.

Amy LaVere and John Paul Keith and the 145s will play Earnestine & Hazel’s on Friday, September 30. It will be a musical celebration of Mayor A.C. Wharton. $10 donation at the door is suggested. Music starts at 6 PM sharp and the party will last until 9.

One of the widgets on my Google home page is a How-To of the Day. Today there was a good article on How to Be Less Clingy. Some of the WikiHow articles kind of suck, but this is one of the most well-written and relevant ones I’ve seen.

Stuff going on tonight: Journey, Foreigner and Night Ranger play the FedExForum. $1.50 house wine in the Peabody Corner Bar from 5 to 7. Superhero Costume Party at the Silly Goose at 9. Poker in Bardog’s Underdog Room at 7:30. Bikes on Beale. Lots to do, so take your pick.

Time for a quick Target run to get supplies for my superhero costume.

(Edit: I have updated info about this from a server who works there. $15, noon-3 PM Sunday.)

Last night I played trivia at the Silly Goose. Between rounds, Charles announces all the Goose’s daily promotions, and they’ve added a new one. $15 bottomless mimosas on Sunday. Wow. I hope they realize how popular that will be, and how much Downtowners like mimosas.

I wasn’t going to play trivia, but I got a couple of last-minute texts that people were going and headed over there. Although we had a small team, we managed to score first place.

Back at lunch with more news.

I want to apologize my readers for something I’ve said incorrectly on this blog and on Facebook and Twitter. In the past, I’ve said that University of Memphis athletic director R.C. Johnson has tolerated mediocrity from the school’s football program for far too long.

That statement is inaccurate. Mediocrity would be a huge improvement over what we’re seeing from the U of M. The truth is, R.C. Johnson has tolerated incompetence from the football program for far too long.

This weekend we play Austin Peay, who lost to Cincinnati 72-10 in their season opener. People are calling it the Super Bowl to see who is the worst team in Division 1.

I have a suggestion for Tigers fans who attend Saturday’s game, and every game for the rest of the season. Every time an opposing team scores vs. Memphis, start chanting the following:

FIRE R.C.!
FIRE R.C.!
FIRE R.C.!
FIRE R.C.!

If the entire stadium starts chanting it repeatedly, maybe the boosters will finally get the hint and tell Shirley Raines to get rid of Johnson. Chris Vernon made this point on his radio show Monday and he’s exactly right – The public can hate R.C. all they want, but as long as the people with the money are content, he’ll continue to have a job.

There’s a Fire R.C. petition you can sign online too, but I think the chants at the games will do more good.

Saying we can turn the corner and get to a bowl game is not my idea of vision. You only have to go 6-6 to be invited to a bowl. I want nothing less than the success the basketball team has enjoyed the last 5 years.

Fire R.C.!

Cool… I have my Comcast Internet fully restored, and a new, faster wireless router. Let’s get to the second news post of the day.

There’s a new festival coming to Downtown, according to the @DowntownMemphis Twitter account. The “Pinch and Punch” festival will be in the Pinch District, and will be an Irish festival featuring music, fun, food and plenty of punch. I’ll post more details as I get them. Given that it’s an Irish festival, T.J. Mulligan’s is likely involved.

The Peabody’s new promotions in the Corner Bar continue tomorrow from 5 to 7 PM. “Wine About Wednesdays” will feature $1.50 house wines and a selection of cheeses. Buck fifty glasses of house wines??? Are you kidding me? That’s the best wine deal I’ve seen since I bought a bottle of Two-Buck Chuck at Trader Joe’s in San Diego 11 years ago. Also, free cheese? Wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up.

The Third Thursday party happens on the block of South Main between Gayoso and Peabody Place this Thursday, September 15. Live music by Deborah Swiney, Blind Mississippi Morris and Shufflegrit. Shops and restaurants in the area will have retail and food specials. Now that the weather has cooled off a bit, I bet attendance picks up at this month’s block party.

There will be entertainment on the grounds of the Metal Museum Sunday, September 18. The Delta Collective will perform from 2-5 PM. There will be family activities, blacksmith demos, and a new exhibition, Master Metalsmith: Fred Fenster. Admission is $6 adults, $5 seniors and $4 students, and includes admission to the museum. No pets or coolers, but blankets and chairs are welcome. SallyAnn’s Ice Cream Diner and Eenie Weenie’s Hot Dogs will be on hand to sell food and drink.

That’s the news for now, but I’ve got one more post to put up. Stay tuned.

And I’m back with the lunchtime update posts… so much news today that there will be a second one, either after work or after I get home from the bars…

There’s a new promotion in the Peabody’s Corner Bar tonight. It’s Tweet-Up Tuesday from 5-7 PM with $1.50 domestic longnecks, an appetizer buffet, and a chance to enter to win Sunday brunch for two. Free food? Wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up. They have new promotions running the other weekdays too, and I’ll share more about those in future posts.

Tomorrow the Silly Goose is hosting a Superhero Party. Dress up as your favorite superhero, and enjoy drink specials. Action kicks off around 9 PM. I was in there a couple of days ago, and Daniel had a costume suggestion for me: He thinks I should make a costume out of old PBR boxes, and go as PBR Man. I’m considering it.

Two big festivals coming up this weekend. The first is the Cooper-Young Festival, one of the biggest neighborhood street parties in Memphis. Stretching nearly half a mile, there will be over 400 vendors, live music on several stages, and plenty to eat and drink. If you’ve never been to this, I highly recommend you check it out. I’ll probably cab it down there about 11 AM, hang out until the festival ends at 7, then walk up Cooper and check out the Slider Inn.

The other big event is the Smokin’ Aces BBQ Championship down in Tunica at Harrah’s Friday and Saturday. My team does not enter this regional BBQ event, but my friends on the Squeal Street team do, and they told me it was a LOT of fun last year. One of the festival events will be the Double Down Beer-Rita Fest, a huge beer and margarita tasting on Friday, September 16. Part of the proceeds from the festival benefit Porter-Leath.

Just over a month until the Cooper-Young Regional Beerfest (not to be confused with the Cooper-Young Festival; they’re separate events). However, if you want a sneak preview, head to the Cooper-Young Farmers Market the morning of Saturday, September 24 at 10:30 AM. They’ll have a “Everything You Wanted to Know about Homebrewing (But Were Afraid to Ask)” presentation. Mid-South Malts will be on hand selling supplies. You’ll also be able to buy tickets to the October 15 beerfest if you don’t have them already.

The Madison Hotel will host a fundraiser rooftop party this Thursday night. Format will be similar to its Sunset Atop the Madison Series, with music from 6 to 10, cash bar and tapas menu. The Living Daylights will entertain. 100% of the admission funds will be donated to the American Diabetes Association. Come support a good cause! I can certainly think of worse places to pay a cover charge (don’t get me started on that, though).

Time to hit OfficeMax and buy a new wireless router. I’ll be out somewhere tonight, just not sure where yet. Might be up for hitting the Corner Bar thing around 6 if anyone else I know is going.

So, I woke up Saturday morning and hopped on the Internet. It had been slow Friday; Saturday morning it had slowed to a snail’s pace. It wasn’t gone completely – I could still get my Gmail – but sites like Facebook and my blog’s admin panel timed out. I called Comcast and pushed the right buttons to get help for my high-speed Internet.

As the automated system suggested, I unplugged my cable modem and plugged it back in to reboot, as well as pushing the reset button on the front. I had Comcast send the modem a reset signal. Still slow. So I called back and navigated the system until I got a human being.

She examined my account. “My first thought is that you have an older modem. If you switch it out with a current one, that may fix it. There are several ways you can get the new modem. Probably the most convenient would be for you to come to our office and exchange it.”

NO, I told her. That might be convenient for Comcast, but wasting my lunch hour standing in line is not convenient for me, especially since there was no guarantee a new modem would fix the problem. I told her to send a tech out.

“Okay, sir, we have appoinments Monday, 8-11, 11-2, 2-5 and 5-7.” I told her I’d take a 5-7, thanked her and hung up.

I left the office at 4 today, knowing that sometimes they’ll show up early. Right as I was about to pull out of the lot, their automated system called, asking me to push 2 to confirm I would be home between 5 and 7 and still wanted them to come out. I pushed 2.

Got home at 4:25, and just for kicks I hit the reload button on the tab where I’d been trying to access Facebook for two days. Facebook loaded, blazing fast. As did my blog. As did every other site I tried to hit. Cool, I thought, I’ll call and cancel and be at the Saucer by 5.

I called Comcast and spent 8 minutes navigating menus and waiting on hold to talk to a human. Finally I got one. He told me to leave the appointment. “That way, if the problem is intermittent, we can rule out your equipment.” So I begrudgingly agreed to leave the appointment and wait on their tech to come out.

It’s now 7:05, they have not arrived, my Internet is running just fine, and I have received no call confirming that they are running late and will be here. They have 5 minutes before I leave.

What probably happened was there was a system-wide outage Friday night/Saturday morning, and they either didn’t notice it, or noticed it and didn’t care, until everyone came to work on Monday. I mentioned the slow Internet service on Twitter and others (although, in other parts of town) said they were experience slowness too.

F Comcast. They have until I get my shoes on and everything loaded into my pockets. After that I am outta here, and when they call trying to get in the building I’ll tell them not to bother.

Back with your regularly scheduled lunchtime post tomorrow.

Apologies for not having posted anything Saturday or yesterday. My Comcast high-speed Internet is down at home. Well, not really down, but running at about the speed of a 300 baud modem. It’s got enough juice to get my Gmail and see a little bit of Twitter, but bandwidth-hungry platforms like Facebook and my blog’s dashboard won’t even load. Not much news to report, since I haven’t been able to check my usual sources all weekend. Comcast tech is coming over after work to install a new modem, so hopefully I’ll be back online after that.

South of Beale is open for lunch now.

R.C. Johnson should be fired.

That’s all I got for now.

Got some exciting news for charities and nonprofits to start off this Friday blog post. The first ever GiveCamp Memphis will happen October 21-23. If your organization needs technical help, a wide range of techies including designers, developers, database admins, marketers and web strategists will be donating their time to provide solutions for nonprofits. If your organization is interested, the application can be found here. Of course, if you’re a techie they’d be very happy for you to register to attend.

Maggie Moo’s, the ice cream parlor next to the Center for Southern Folklore, is the Groupon deal of the day. You have two options: $10 worth of ice cream and treats for $5, or a 14-inch ice cream pizza ($21.99 value) for $10.

The Court Square Concert Series will return later this month. This year they’re doing it on Sundays from 3:30 to 5:30 PM, starting September 29 and ending October 16. Sounds like a nice little addition to Sunday Fun Day! View the schedule of bands here.

That’s all for now… just a few hours until the weekend. Tomorrow it will be time to CALL THOSE HOGS!!!