Wed update #2: Saucer re-opens, a note on my focus at BBQ Fest this year and more

The Flying Saucer is back open, a day earlier than previously announced. They have a new beer selection and a new menu that includes gourmet burgers.

Looking to get away from the Music Fest madness that will happen Downtown Friday night? I have a suggestion. Wiseacre Brewing Co. out on Broad Avenue will host a brewery tour at 6 PM. They’ll explore beers that are “sour” versus those that are fermented with the wild yeast called brettanomyces. Sampling will include Golgi Apparatus, a Belgian Trippel brewed with brettanomyces and a Berliner weisse, Beach within Reach with watermelon. $10 per person and you can sign up here.

Bedrock Eats and Sweets at Main and Vance is looking for Saturday line cooks for an 8 AM to 3 PM shift. Additional shifts will be available but are not required. Email brandi@bedrockeatsandsweets.com to apply.

Michael McDonald has been announced for an Orpheum date. His first new album in 10 years, Wide Open, will be released September 15, and he will go on tour to support it, with a Memphis visit scheduled for November 4 with special guest Marc Cohn. Tickets go on sale at the Orpheum box office Friday, May 12 at 10 AM.

When the levee breaks, have no place to stay… if you have friends or family in Pocahontas, Arkansas, keep a close eye on the news. A Black River levee broke and the town is under a flood emergency.

I hear there’s bad flooding in southeast Missouri as well. I hope everything is OK with my BBQ teammates Jeremy and Jeana’s farm up there.

Beale Street Caravan has announced two big shows not this weekend, but next weekend (the weekend between Music Fest and BBQ Fest). On Friday, May 12, Al Gamble, George Sluppick, and Joe Restivo will put the band back together. The City Champs were a popular band in Memphis several years ago, releasing albums in 2009 and 2010. However, offers of better-paying, wider-touring projects broke the band up. They have stayed in touch, though, and on May 12, they will be back on stage together at Loflin Yard (9 PM showtime) and they have even written some new material. Tickets are $10 in advance at brownpapertickets.com. Cover charge at the door will be $12.

On Saturday, May 13 at Loflin Yard, ten-piece Lovelight Orchestra will perform the sounds you might have heard on Beale Street in the 1940s and 1950s. Think of the sounds you might have heard at The Palace on Beale, the big-band sound on Duke and Peacock Records. The sounds of hometown kids of that era who came up through the music programs of Booker T. Washington and Manassas High School. This show will be taped for broadcast on radio program Beale Street Caravan. Tickets are $10 in advance at brownpapertickets.com. Cover charge at the door will be $12.

Want to check out the new Memphis Grizzlies Memphis Escape Room at Main and G.E. Patterson? Retweet what you see below and you might get to go for free.

Been thinking about photos at BBQ Fest. In past years, I have taken 200-300 photos a day and have posted them to my blog the next morning. The trouble is, I have relied on Google Picasa as a fast way to edit the photos and get them online. Picasa has been discontinued, so I will be using Google Photos, which is not quite as fast or user-friendly. So, if I can only post, say, 50 photos a day, I asked myself, what kind of photos should be my priority?

The answer is obvious… the food. The Moody Ques are a competition shoulder team, but we do more than cook to impress the judges. We feed our members and their guests very well, with 2 meals planned for Wednesday night, 4 meals for Thursday, 4 for Friday, and pulled pork all day Saturday. There will be sausage and cheese plates, burgers, wings, ribs, brisket, pizza and “a surprise” by the cook team in addition to pulled pork. Of course there will be sides and desserts too. My plan is to take photos of every type of food that is served in our booth BBQ Fest weekend. There is an inaccurate, outdated perception out there that if you come to our booth, you won’t get anything to eat. That has not been true for the past two years and has not been true since our current cook team took over the kitchen. For 2017 I plan to completely squash that perception once and for all. Request for my teammates – if food is being served and you notice I am not in the booth, text me and tell me “Paul, get down here” or take photos of the food yourself and text them to me.

Don’t worry, I will get photos of the team and the booth as well – but the food will be my main focus. I feel that is the best way to fulfill my Director of Public Relations role with the camera.

All righty then, that’ll wrap this one up. I’ll be out at the Silly Goose after work getting silly.