Year: 2011

My friend Mary Pat lost a shamrock pin at Bardog Tavern while celebrating St. Patrick’s Day Thursday night. She went back the next day to ask if it had been turned in, but it hadn’t. Someone probably found it and kept it, thinking it was just a random piece of St. Pat’s schwag, but it was given to Mary Pat by her grandmother when she was 12, and she’s quite upset over losing it.

She’s offering a cash reward for it. If you have it you can e-mail (OMG, I’m not in compliance with the AP Stylebook!) me at paul@paulryburn.com. Mary Pat won’t ask any questions, and neither will I. I just want her to have her grandmother’s pin back.

Last night as I was walking down the Main Street Mall, I noticed that the new bar at Blue Fin is now open. It has its own separate entrance, through a wood door to the right of the patio, and is much larger than the old bar.

They were still putting the finishing touches on the place when I walked in about 6 PM. Also, they’re getting two 55-inch TVs hooked up today.

The folks at Blue Fin commented that the new bar is part of the restaurant, yet separate from it, and they expect it to develop a vibe of its own. It will be open until 3 AM Thursday-Saturday. Sunday-Wednesday, the hours are still being determined, but it will stay open later than the old bar did.

The bar has its own lounge area upstairs, complete with DJ booth. I came back later in the evening, and while it appears that the bar has yet to really be discovered, quite a few people were in there enjoying it. I never went to the old bar much, except when I was meeting someone for sushi or when it was a stop on a pub crawl, but this is a place I can definitely see myself hanging out from time to time.

In other news… we didn’t win, but what a great finish to the season for the Memphis Tigers. We were in the game until the very last seconds. My congratulations to Coach Pastner and the team. My goodness, what a force we will be next year! We totally proved that we belonged in the NCAA tournament. Meanwhile, the Tennessee Vols proved that they should have been in the NIT, losing to 8-see Michigan by 30 points. Any predictions for when Bruce Pearl will be fired? My guess is Tuesday. If the school’s top officials have any sense at all, they’ll send AD Mike Hamilton out the door right behind the Bruchebag.

I was amazed at all the celebrating I saw on Facebook and Twitter yesterday over the AP Stylebook changing “e-mail” to “email” as the official spelling. Really, who f-ing cares? Quite honestly, people who get all up in arms about things like spellings of “email” and one space vs. two after a period annoy the living piss out of me. This blog does not use the AP stylebook, so I’ll spell words however I feel like, although at some point laziness will finally win the day and I’ll realize it’s less work to type “email” instead of “e-mail.”

Plans for today include watching basketball and drinking beer. I have more posts to come, so check back.

A few weeks ago I linked to a Commercial Appeal article about River City Indoor Bike Park, the idea of a Memphis police officer. Aaron Feathers wants to turn an old warehouse, at 587 Hernando in the South of Forum area, into a family-friendly indoor park for BMX and mountain bike enthusiasts. So far, however, he has not been able to secure funding to make his dream happen.

If you like to dance and want to chip in, proceeds from the door at Rehab Disco tonight will be donated to the park. Mary Jane, MarkMad, Eno aka ?CONFUSION?, IKIS, and Extremely Terrific will be spinning. $5 cover.

If you can’t make it out but want help, there’s a Donate button on the bike park’s web site.

Getmyperks.com, a daily group deal site, has a deal for a Downtown restaurant: $7 for $15 worth of food at Kooky Canuck. Get the deal here.

MIFA needs help tearing the roof off a house tomorrow (Friday, March 18) so that a new roof can be installed on Saturday. If you can help, show up anytime between 10 AM and 5 PM at 3397 Dobbin Ferry. No skills required. Wear clothes and tennis shoes that you don’t mind getting dirty. If you have the time, I know they would really appreciate it.

If you’re headed west to watch the Memphis Tigers in the NCAA tournament, the Tulsa Food Guy has put together a 5-part series on where to eat. View it here.

I’ve spent the past 4 days compiling a list of St. Pat’s parties and specials Downtown. Let’s see what we’ve got:

Kooky Canuck will have its usual Green Carpet Party with Irish menu and drink specials all day. Here’s the list (sorry for the all caps, I copied and pasted from their Facebook event page):

$3.00 – 34oz Green Bud Light Draft
$5.00 Car Bombs
St. Patricks Day Menu
$100 for who wears the MOST GREEN!! Winner will be picked at 10pm.

APPETIZERS : POTATO SKINS , BEER CHEESE DIP , IRISH SODA BREAD

SANDWICH : REUBEN , OPEN FACE POT ROAST/ IN GUINNESS GRAVY

SOUP : COLCANNON POTATOES , IRISH STEW

ENTREE : SHEPHERD’S PIE , CORN BEEF / CABBAGE / WHISKEY GLAZED CARROTS , BEEF IN GUINNESS , IRISH ROASTED POT .

DESSERT : CHOCOLATE POUND CAKE / WITH IRISH WHISKEY CREAM SAUCE , IRISH BREAD PUDDING / WITH IRISH WHISKEY CREAM SAUCE

The Silly Goose will have $3 Irish Car Bombs all day long, as well as Guinness and other specials.

The Peabody will have $2 St. Pat’s chocolate cupcakes in their deli all day long.

TJ Mulligan’s Pinch will have green beer, corned beef & cabbage and jello shots all day. Adam Levin will play 4-8 and MudPuppies 9-1. At 8:45 there will be bagpipers.

I don’t know if Max’s Sports Bar will have any St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, but if you’re a basketball fan they’ll have all the NCAA tournament games on their many TVs. I texted Max’s Foursquare “mayor” Mikey and asked if they’d be doing Thursday poker at 7 as usual, and he replied “Next stupid question?”, so it looks like poker will happen.

The Flying Saucer will have Irish dancers at 6 to kick off the evening’s festivities. Irish bagpipers at 7, music by the Real McCoys at 8. They’ll have an Irish food menu for lunch and dinner, and they’ll have Irish beers like Guinness and Harp on tap, as well as the rest of the Saucer’s beer selections.

Silky’s will have the traditional Raising of the Goat and Blessing of the Kegs. Festivities are slated to begin at 5, but remember that Silky operates on “Silky Time,” so if you get there at 6:30, 7:00 or later, you probably won’t have missed much.

Flying Fish will have green margaritas and 2 for 1 Killian’s bottles all day.

Perhaps the celebration I look forward to the most will be the one at Bardog Tavern tonight. It’s their third annual Erin-Go-Braghless party. Toss your bra on the bar and get your first drink for a penny. Attire suggestion for Suzy, if she’s reading this: Green tube top. They’ll have beer cheese soup made with McSorley’s, Guinness and McSorley’s specials, drink specials.

Today is Escape Alley Sundry’s first birthday. Tonight they’ll celebrate with music by Landon Lane and the Ivories, Smoochie Smith and the Stunning Cunning.

Hope to see everyone out tonight! Weather is perfect and it should be a fabulous evening to get your drink on.

Thanks to LifeHacker, I found an awesome weather site this morning. WeatherSpark has a very cool interface where you can mouse over days in the future, hour by hour, to see what the temperature will be and whether it will be raining. But here’s the really cool part… it has historical data for the past 50 years. I was able to put in the zip code where I was born, back the date pointer up, and see what the weather was like the day I was born. Light rain and temps around 60 for most of the morning, then light rain again late afternoon, then the temp tapered off to the upper 30s. Typical November day, in other words.

In her latest Whining & Dining post, CA columnist Jennifer Biggs says that the Bon Ton Cafe is scheduled to re-open in May. It has been closed since 2008 when the owner unexpectedly passed away. It will re-open as a “retro diner.”

The Big Wig Ball has been announced for Saturday, April 16 at Minglewood Hall. I have never made it to this event, due to conflicts with Hot Wing Fest and Memphis Brewfest, but friends tell me it’s one of the biggest parties of the year. As the name implies, everyone wears wigs to the party. There will be live music by Seeing Red, complimentary wine & beer, heavy hors d’oeuvres, and free parking. Cost is $55 in advance and you can get tickets here.

Having fun with WordPress today at work. The Widget Logic plugin is awesome if you’re building a CMS and need different sidebars to appear on different pages. Time for an expensive trip to the gas station, then a quick lunch. Not sure what I’ll get into tonight, but it’s too nice outside to stay home.

A new concert has been announced at the FedExForum – Foo Fighters, Motorhead and Biffy Clyro will play May 20. Tickets go on sale to the public this Saturday at 10 PM.

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about a new fitness center coming to South Main – Klein Fitness, near Main and Vance. Today’s Groupon is for Klein – $45 for a month of unlimited group classes and one 30-minute personal training session. It’s up to a $125 value.

Couple of specialty gyros are on the menu at Elliott’s on Second this week. They have the “Red Sea G,” a gyro made with hot habanero curry sauce and hummus. “If you like mouth explosions, you’ll enjoy the Red Sea G,” owner Harry posted. For those who want to enjoy hummus on a gyro without feeling like a volcano is erupting in your mouth, try the “Lamb Hum.” Both will be available the rest of this week.

The food truck ordinance goes before the full city council today at 3:30. It’s not perfect – trucks can’t operate past 10 PM and can only stay in one place for two hours – but it’s a start. Hope it passes. The Memphis Daily News has more on the food truck ordinance.

The Majestic Grille has St. Pat’s specials all week: Fish & Chips, Corned Beef on Rye, and Shepherd’s Pie. Chef Patrick, being Irish, knows a few things about cooking for St. Patty’s Day.

I got a notification on Facebook that the annual push-cart parade on Beale, scheduled for tonight, has been canceled. Not sure why. It’s something the local bars and restauants do the Tuesday of St. Patrick’s Day week.

Congrats to my BBQ Fest team The Ques Brothers, who received official confirmation from Memphis in May today that we are IN for 2011. I’m ready for a week of BBQ and debauchery!

I’ll be at the Saucer for trivia night at 7. The team is 3 for 3 since new trivia guy David took over. We’re getting another sizable stack of gift certificates together for the next team party! Right now, it’s time for lunch then a few hours of work on WordPress… have a good afternoon everyone!

I came in second at poker at the Silly Goose tonight. Unfortunately that did me no good whatsoever, as only first place gets the weekly prize! So I drank a bunch of PBR and did a shot someone bought for no return on investment at all.

Actually, that’s not entirely true. I earned 5 points toward Poker Jon’s league standings. Problem is, I’ve played so much drunk poker at the Goose and the other locations that it really won’t help.

At least I eliminated Brick (pictured here) tonight.

Damn Brick is photogenic.