Happy birthday to Grizzlies All-Star Marc Gasol, who turns 30 today.
For Memphians who have moved away, you have a rare opportunity to see your Grizzlies on TV tonight. The Grizzlies’ home game vs. the Denver Nuggets will be broadcast on TNT tonight at 7. You’ll want to tune in for the pre-game, though, because the All-Star reserve players will be announced. Both Zach Randolph and Mike Conley have a chance at making the team, with Conley being more of a longshot not because of a lack of talent, but because there are a lot of good point guards in the Western Conference right now.
If you didn’t make it to Soup Sunday four days ago, you can still taste one of the winners. Chicken Velvet Soup is Bardog Tavern’s Soup of the Day today.
Central BBQ is selling 6- and 12-packs of ‘que for Super Bowl watch parties. $22.99 for the 6, or $38.99 for the 12.
John Mellencamp’s Plain Spoken tour will make a stop at the Orpheum Tuesday, June 23.
Voting was delayed on the issue of whether to take away the Pinch District’s National Historic Register status. Losing the status could make development easier in the neighborhood, which will boom once Bass Pro opens in May.
More bad publicity for everyone’s least favorite cable company: Comcast apologizes for changing customer’s first name to “Asshole”
I’m not a gamer, but nevertheless, I have a game recommendation: Resident Evil 3. In this game, a character named Jill who has a tube top on gets chased by zombies. If I ever become a zombie, I hope I get to chase some hot women in tube tops.
Note for my fellow pro wrestling fans: Starting Sunday, February 1, if you sign up for the WWE Network they’ll give you February for free, including the Fast Lane pay-per-view to be held here in Memphis and the next of the awesome NXT Takeover specials.
I hadn’t played the Wednesday night poker game at Bardog in two years, but for some reason yesterday seemed like the right day to check it out. It’s a good game and Joe has come up with two innovations that really help: First of all, the blind clock is on the big-screen TV, where everyone can see it, and it shows not only the current blind level but the next. That’s really helpful in figuring out how aggressive you need to be. Also, Joe has two decks at every table, so the person in the small blind can shuffle and have the cards ready to cut and deal by the time the button moves and they become the dealer. That allows more hands to be played per blind level, which makes the game more likely to be decided by skill rather than luck.
I won’t become an every-week regular at Bardog poker, because I have a bartender at Silly Goose who would not be happy if I left her bar early every week. However, I will go back from time to time. It was an enjoyable Wednesday night. As a bonus, last night they had their Rancher’s Pie on special – beef brisket covered in chipotle mashed potatoes, carrots, onion, and cheese.
The same bartender works at the Goose tonight, so I will lead off there after work. Plans for the rest of the evening TBD.