Author: paulryburn

A call to artists has been put out to design a temporary mural by the Downtown Memphis Commission and the owner of 107 S. Main. The goal is to improve the appearance of the building, an eyesore on an otherwise vibrant block of Main, for the next couple of years while the owner finalizes a plan to renovate. The artwork must be complete by May 1, 2016, must have a budget of no more than $10,000, and must be able to withstand the elements without maintenance for two years.

Taste of Memphis comes to Central Station Thursday, April 14 from 4:30 to 6:30 PM. There will be over 25 food vendors, a wine pull, and a silent auction. The goal is to support Young Life Urban Ministry, to help a group of inner-city teenagers experience a life-changing week at Young Life camp this summer.

Quench will have a free wine tasting this Friday from 5:30 to 7:30 PM. There will be tastings of new wines from California, Oregon, and beyond.

A MATA guard entered a guilty plea in the shoving death at North End Terminal of a 66-year-old man who was saying obscene things to a woman and who was slow getting off the bus. The man landed on his face and died of his injuries two months later.

The Grizzlies host the Sacramento Kings tonight at FedExForum at 7.

Hillary Clinton won Tennessee yesterday. Over the past week I have had a couple of people ask me, “You grew up in Little Rock, and you said you met Hillary one time. I have heard rumors about Hillary that her employees are scared to death of her. Her employees are said to move objects around the office to indicate the mood she’s in, with one of the object positions indicating, ‘Horrible mood, absolutely avoid Hillary at all costs.’ I’m just wondering if you knew people who have worked for her, and if they have told you stories like that?”

If the general election ends up being Hillary vs. Trump, I will vote for Hillary, based on the fact that I think she will appoint Supreme Court justices whose views are in line with my own, and that I don’t perceive her as a danger to the country as I do Trump. But to answer the question, yes. In 1993 I had a math tutoring client. We discovered we were both from Little Rock, and she mentioned she had worked for Hillary. I hate to say it, but she told me a story pretty similar to the one above.

Celtic Woman comes to the Orpheum this Sunday as part of the troupe’s Destiny Tour.

The Memphis Chamber opposes the hotel proposed for N. Front and Jackson in the Pinch. The opposition is not because of the hotel itself, but because the Chamber feels like an overall plan needs to be drawn up for that neighborhood.

From the Daily Beast: What are the most prejudiced places in America, based on tweets?

If you’re a member of the Moody Ques, keep scrolling because I put up a team info post this morning. One additional piece of news that has come in: We have received our acceptance letter from Memphis in May! Also, congratulations to our friends on Squeal Street who are moving up from Patio Porkers this year and joining us in Shoulder. Perhaps we will have booths near each other. That could be very interesting indeed!

Time to hit Publish and get back to work… I imagine I will see some of my fellow Moody Ques tonight at the Silly Goose tonight, and we can celebrate our acceptance with a beer.

Got a couple of pieces of news for my BBQ teammates in this morning’s post. First of all, the “MEAT & greet” team mixer is ON for Saturday, March 19. Our cook team has been to judging school, and has done a practice presentation for three certified BBQ Fest judges and got lots of quality feedback. The cooks are ready to show you what they have learned! They are planning to do a shoulder as well as several racks of ribs using our new process.

As for the location, we are still deciding. One option is to do the team mixer at pitmaster Frank’s house in the Poplar/Highland area (which is not Downtown). Frank has had the smoker this winter and has been doing as many practice cooks as time and weather permitted. (Follow us on Instagram at @moodyquesbbq for photos of the practices.) Another option is to have the meeting at the Holliday Flowers warehouse at 444 Monroe (which is Downtown). We had a cookout/team meeting there last August and it was the popular opinion of the team that it was an excellent space. It has a fenced-in outdoor parking lot so we can mingle outside if we get typical beautiful mid-March weather, and a large lobby to shelter us if we don’t. Now, as Director of Public Relations it is my official stance to be neutral as to which site we pick. I need to fill up some space in this post, however, so here is a portrait of our fifth president, James Monroe.

More filler: Here is a string of completely random numbers I generated: 44444444444444444444444444

IMPORTANT: We need to get an accurate head count so we will know how much meat to buy. If you think you will attend, please email us at moodyques@gmail.com.

Also, we still have a few spots for team membership open. If anyone has read about the team on here and has thought about joining, the meat & greet would be an excellent opportunity to meet the team members. Email the address above or paul@paulryburn.com if you would like to come. Have a look at our 2015 photo gallery for a look at what it is like to be on a team.

In addition, we have some good news to share with you. Royal Oak Charcoal is back on board with us as a partial sponsor. They will provide the charcoal and the wood for the Moody Ques. With the cook team having perfected its methods, quality charcoal and wood is a must, and we cannot thank Royal Oak enough for believing in us and being on board for 2016.

Although Royal Oak has been extremely generous to us, we are on the lookout for additional sponsors for 2016. We are one of the most visible teams in the park, with top three in Best Booth four years running. We’ve always been the best damn party in Tom Lee Park and we’re not changing that this year; however, we have stepped our cooking game way up in the past twelve months and will have some delicious meat to serve our sponsor’s guests. Take a look at our sponsor packet to get an idea of what we have to offer. If you want a printed copy of the sponsor packet, email moodyques@gmail.com and we will get one to you. Any level of sponsorship can be customized to suit your needs, so feel free to talk to us about what your ideal BBQ Fest experience would be.

Back at lunchtime or late afternoon with a news post. Got a few items in the queue already.

Gotta love Bruce V from the Memphis Flyer. Every Tuesday at 2:15, Cerrito Trivia tweets the trivia question of the week. Here was this week’s:

Q) Who was with Donald Trump when he visited the Memphis area last week?

— Cerrito Trivia (@cerritotrivia) March 1, 2016

Bruce V’s response:

@cerritotrivia 6,000 stupid racists?

— Bruce VanWyngarden (@sylamore1) March 1, 2016

The Downtown Neighborhood Association emailed their monthly newsletter today, and there is some good stuff in there. I want to share a few links for the benefit of those that don’t subscribe:

Hang a yellow ribbon to show that you miss the trolleys. There is now an app called Transloc you can use to find your trolley or MATA bus. Also, the trolley drivers are being trained to be ambassadors for Downtown. Drivers are being trained to share information about our neighborhood – for example, that the corner of South Main and G.E. Patterson is the most filmed location in the city. This adds value to the experience of riding the trolley.

Grizzlies president Jason Wexler spoke to the DNA recently. Wexler noted that the reason the Grizzlies are such a successful franchise is the organization’s tight bond with the community, and how the growth of the Grizzlies has correlated to the revitalization of Downtown.

The Downtown Memphis Commission gave the DNA an update on the fight against blight in the neighborhood.

DNA members helped clean up the riverbank recently.

Hopefully my readers are out voting today, and hopefully they are Feeling the Bern. Here’s an interesting article from the Daily Beast: Former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura will run for president if Bernie loses and Hillary becomes the nominee for the Democrats. Ventura hates both parties, seeing them as controlled by the oligarchy, and is an independent with a libertarian streak. I follow him on Facebook and I must admit I like a lot of what he has to say.

Energy-drink BBQ sauce will be on the menu when the Braves’ season opens in Atlanta. I hope this is something I never see in the Moody Ques tent at BBQ Fest.

That’s it for now. Home from work, off to happy hour with Mary at the Blind Bear. Time for some PBR.

The 43rd annual Silky O’ Sullivan St. Patrick’s Day Parade happens Saturday, March 12 at 3 PM on Beale Street. This is probably the best parade of the year, with local floats and marching bands. Expect to catch a lot of candy and beads being thrown from the floats (and expect to get hit in the head with a cabbage if you’re my friend Bones). The event is family-friendly. It’s a good idea to get there 30 minutes early and stake out your spot.

I learned something new about Bedrock Eats & Sweets at Main and Vance last night. I knew they had dine-in service, but did you know that they have pre-prepared food orders? There is a different menu (dinner and breakfast) each day, and you place your order by the previous Friday and arrange a pickup location. The menu looks really good with dishes like organic Italian meatball marinara with vegetables, chicken tikka masala, and banana nut bread with almond butter and breakfast sausage.

The owner of 100 N. Main could face a fine of up to $600 per day. In January, Judge Larry Potter ordered a fence to be put up around three sides of the building to protect pedestrians for falling debris. The problem is that it’s illegal to block a city sidewalk, punishable of a fine of $200 per day. 100 N. Main’s fence blocks three sidewalks.

Scoops. the gelato and crepe shop on G.E. Patterson, Instagrammed a photo of their brown sugar blueberry gelato. Looks good.

The search to find a company to manage Mud Island has been narrowed to two.

The Memphis Tigers have two regular-season road games left. They play at Temple Thursday night at 6 (ESPN), and at ECU on 3 PM Sunday. I’ll try to find out if my “home away from home on the south side,” Max’s Sports Bar, will be opening early for the Sunday game. Usually they do. Most likely these games will be two of our last chances to see Josh Pastner as head coach.

My favorite pair of librarian glasses was bartending Blind Bear last night, and I learned she also has tutored people in math and other subjects. I put myself through my first year of grad school by tutoring. My claim to fame is that I can explain derivatives, a core concept of calculus, in 10 minutes a way so simple that a 9-year-old could understand them. Maybe I will post that explanation on here sometime.

Off to work, perhaps another post later today.

Yesterday morning I led off at Bardog for Panda Time (Saturday brunch) as usual. Numerous groups had to be turned away because they had kids with them; for those not familiar with the law, bars and restaurants have to be 21+ if they allow smoking, which Bardog does. They always recommend sibling restaurant Aldo’s Pizza Pies around the corner to groups that have people too young to be at Bardog. That’s an excellent suggestion and I will add a few more: Irish pub the Brass Door, beer garden the Flying Saucer, Canadian-themed restaurant Kooky Canuck, perennial burger award winner Huey’s, South Main neighborhood bar the Green Beetle, and the downstairs of saloon and steakhouse Double J.

Recent performance on radio show Beale Street Caravan: The Memphis Ukulele Band at Sun Studio

When Kobe Bryant played his final game in Memphis this week, he gave Grizzlies guard/forward Tony Allen a pair of shoes signed “to the best defender I ever faced.”

Food recommendation: The Reuben wrap with spicy Thousand Island dressing on the top shelf of the grab & go at City Market. I had one for the first time Friday night and it was delicious.

Vote in this poll: If the Big 12 does expand, which two schools should it add?

I had several hard-core right-wing Republicans read my endorsement of Bernie Sanders yesterday and tell me, “Paul, it kills me to admit this, but your story of the smart kid who grew up in a bad part of town deserving the same opportunities as you… I find it awfully hard to disagree with that.” Cheers to my intelligent, well-spoken Republican friends. We may not pull the same lever in the voting booth but we both want what’s best for our country. I’m friends with many Republicans who post their political views on Facebook and I appreciate and respect your opinion, even if I don’t agree with it.

Unfortunately not all Republicans are intelligent and well-spoken. Pat Robertson, who by the way has endorsed Donald Trump, has proclaimed that people shouldn’t practice yoga because it will lead to them speaking Hindu. Never mind that Hindu is not a language. Stretchy exercises are cool, Robertson says, but chanting “Hindu” words is not cool because it can lead people away from the Christian faith. The sad thing is, there’s 12-13% of the population that will blindly believe everything Robertson says and fall off the cliff like lemmings. If you read the linked article and find any validity to Robertson’s claims, I have three words for you: YOU ARE STUPID. End of story.

From GQ: Just in time for President Trump, Canada introduces a bill that would make it easy to move there

Yesterday afternoon I was hanging out with my friends Tony and B-RAD at the Blind Bear. They wanted to go to South of Beale to visit former Bear brunch bartender Kaylea at her current job. I am always up for some Kaylea harassment so I came along. I was hungry so I got their hot dog special of the day with gator sausage.

I cannot describe how good this thing was, and the fried onions on the side added to the flavor perfectly. South of Beale is a place that needs to be on my radar more often for food. I have never had a bad meal there.

Later in the evening I was back at the Bear, hanging out with former Saucer girls Brittney and Whitney:

Also at the Bear, I revived a four-year-old “you need to wear more tube tops” conversation with one of the regulars.

I didn’t get to see the game, but congrats to my Hogs on their 75-65 win over the Knoxville Predators (UT) last night.

Time to get this day started. D-RANKS with “vocal” B-RAD at Blind Bear is first on the agenda today, followed by a trip to see Suzy bartending at Bardog. Back tomorrow (or maybe later today, who knows) with more news.

Somewhere in South Memphis, or Frayser, or Whitehaven there is a 17-year old kid who is every bit as smart as I am. However, life for him is different than life was for me at that age. He lives in a house with his brothers and sisters, supported by their mom who makes $13,500 a year at her two part-time jobs. The family constantly worries about getting so far behind on their utility bills that MLGW will cut power. He never met his dad, who left his mother 5 months before he was born.

A year from now he will graduate high school and it will be time to get a job and build a life of his own. Stocking the shelves at Save-a-Lot is an option, as is working the cash register at Taco Bell. If he works hard he might get promoted to assistant manager at either place, and eventually out-earn his mother by a few thousand a year.

Of course, there is a route to making the big money: Join a gang. Someone with his intelligence would be highly valued by a group like the Vice Lords. Of course, he would be expected to commit crimes, which could lead to him spending most of his life in prison. Worse, he could be shot and killed by a rival gang.

Getting a four-year liberal arts education after high school is not in the realm of possibility for this kid – not just because he can’t afford it, but because he has never been told that is an option for him; he can’t even conceive of such a thing. The owner of the rib shack around the corner from him dropped out of community college after a semester, but that is as much as he knows about college.

He can’t imagine getting a master’s degree. He can’t imagine being a graduate assistant teaching college classes, and then going on to teach college full-time for five years. He can’t imagine working for a company that builds rebate websites for companies like Coleman and Panasonic. He can’t imagine being a data engineer for a startup company that offers background checking services. He can’t imagine being a web developer supporting a card game played by millions.

I was able to achieve all those things because 1) I had the good fortune of being born into the middle class, and 2) from the time I was a little boy I was told I could – and should – be able to reach all of those goals.

Donald Trump may use “Make America great again” as his slogan, but you know what? Until that kid growing up in poverty has the same opportunities that I had, America is not as great as it should be. It is not living up to its potential.

When I was 15, I got kidney stones. Let me tell you, they hurt like hell. The pain has been compared to that of giving birth, and I believe it. Thank goodness I was covered by my mother’s insurance, and I was able to go to the emergency room and get drugs to dull the pain, and then the treatment I needed to pass the stones. I hope I never get kidney stones again, but if I do, my company has an excellent benefits package that will take care of me.

If the kid in the bad part of town gets kidney stones, what will happen? Maybe his mother will take him to The MED and face a mountain of medical bills she can’t pay. Maybe the kid won’t go to the hospital at all, and suffer in silence. Maybe his family can scrape together enough money to buy him a bag of weed to smoke to lessen the pain.

“But Paul,” you’re saying, “If America adopted your values, you would be taxed 50 percent.”

No. That is not true. My tax rate would actually drop. If one day my income soars to $10 million a year, yes, I would be taxed at 50 percent. But the thing is, if I made that much money, I would feel a responsibility to help those who weren’t given the breaks I have been given in life.

Perhaps the most important responsibility that a president of the United States has is to appoint Supreme Court justices. Justices do not have a term; they serve for life, or until they decide to step down. Therefore a president can have a huge effect on public policy for decades after he or she leaves office. For the past 40 years the court has leaned conservative. As many as four justices could retire during the next president’s first term, offering him or her to re-shape the court. I would like to see justices in the mold of John Paul Stevens, Thurgood Marshall, Earl Warren, and Harry Blackmun. Yes, I would like to see more women on the court. Yes, I would like to see more people of color on the court. But first and foremost I want people on the court who are staunch defenders of the individual’s rights.

For these reasons I support Bernie Sanders for president.

If you share the vision I do, I invite you to #FeelTheBern on Tuesday.

I woke up this morning to find a string of missed texts. Apparently someone had a hissy fit because I don’t respond immediately to texts at 1:40 in the morning. I don’t mention it on this blog much, but I have a hobby I to which I devote some time every day. It’s called “sleeping” and 1:40 AM is often a time spent in pursuit of my hobby.

Geez…

Yesterday I ranted about women who put their purse on the barstool next to them at crowded bars, selfishly denying those who come in after them a place to sit. Carbunkle Trumpet, a recent New York transplant from Memphis, had this to say: “Here in Gotham the bartenders either knock (the purses) off into the floor or tell the females they will charge them double for their drinks b/c they are taking up 2 spots. They don’t mess around up here. That’s why we love it up here.” Sounds like a great idea to me, one that I wish the bartenders at my favorite Downtown spots would start putting into action. Remember, more available barstools = more people to tip you.

Flight at the corner of Main and Monroe has announced that it will start serving Sunday brunch from 9:30 AM to 2:30 PM. Menu items, in addition to traditional favorites, will include a flight of milk chocolate chip pancakes, French toast, and Belgian waffles and strawberries as well as options including farm fresh eggs such as Filet Mignon Benedict, confit of duck, and the French Quarter Scramble. Among the beverage options will be the Flight Bloody Mary, iced tea with lemon sorbet and Tennessee Coffee. There will be brunch starters and a raw bar as well.

Evelyn and Olive has announced a change to its weekend hours. Starting next weekend the hours will be 11 AM-10 PM Fridays and 4 PM-10 PM Saturdays.

There will be a burlesque show at Earnestine & Hazel’s at 8:30 tonight. I have heard these are a lot of fun and my next-door neighbor is one of the performers. It’s 21 and up with a $10 admission, $20 VIP.

Attorneys and sports agents are said to be astonished at the golden handshake in Josh Pastner’s contract with the University of Memphis. If the university fires Coach P, they will almost certainly have to pay him the full amount remaining, over ten million dollars, whether or not he decides to seek other employment. Agents commented that they would love to get that deal for their client coaches, but most schools won’t even hear of it. The reason for the golden handshake is said to be because in 2013 when Memphis made the round of 32, AD Tom Bowen was told after the NCAA tournament that a Power Five school wanted to talk to Josh. President Shirley Raines told Bowen to do whatever was necessary to go ahead and lock Pastner down. New U of M president David Rudd is not a fan of golden handshakes and let Bowen know there will be no more of them in the future.

The director of development of Roots Memphis Farm Academy, an organization that trains and launches new farmers in the Mid-South, has been reading my blog and knows what a big fan of fresh produce I am. She emailed to tell me that Roots Memphis has a CSA of its own – Community Supported Agriculture, the subscription service where you sign up, pay a fee, and then get locally-grown vegetables delivered to a drop-off point near you once a week. 387 Pantry on South Main is a drop-off point for this CSA, very convenient for Downtowners. It is a 27-week CSA and pickup will be 4 to 7 PM on Wednesdays. Subscribers can pick from three different sizes depending on their vegetable consumption. Sign up here and if you use code 2016FRIEND, your first week of produce is on Roots. Here is the projected availability of crops for the CSA (click to view in larger size):

This week in Sports Illustrated, there will be an in-depth story on the alleged sexual assault/sexual discrimination culture in University of Tennessee athletics. The article quotes an attorney who was the UT’s general legal counsel from 1972 to 2008. “The university, in the last several years, has been more concerned with bad p.r. than about taking action to protect its students,” he said. Yes that’s how it sounds to me too. Athletic director Dave Hart needs to be careful not to let the door hit his ass on the way out, and head football coach Butch Jones should be right behind him.

Maybe we should start referring to the team as the Knoxville Predators. I see that a school where men treat women right, Arkansas, takes on the Predators in men’s basketball tonight at 6:30. It’s time to CALL THOSE HOGS!!!

Moody Ques members: Save the date. We’re looking at Saturday, March 19 as the make-up date for our team mixer, our “MEAT & greet” if you will. As you remember, we had one scheduled for February 13, but we decided that having a team event on Valentine’s Day weekend was a bad idea (also it was too damn cold). March 19 is not a holiday (except in San Juan Capistrano, California where it is the day the swallows return). It’s not the date of the Beale Street St. Patrick’s Day parade, which will be March 12 (reminds me, I need to blog about that). It’s still early in the year and won’t conflict with spring festival season. The date is not set in stone yet, but it’s looking like an option.

That’s it for now. I need to get a post typed up about Super Tuesday, so look for that in the next day or two, as well as more news.

I am going to start off this post with a rant about a pet peeve of mine: Women who sit at the bar and put their purse in the seat next to them, even though they know it is a popular time of day at a popular bar and every seat will soon be in demand. I can’t tell you how many times I have arrived at Silly Goose happy hour 5:35-5:40ish and there have been three unoccupied seats at the bar – and yet there was nowhere to sit because those three bar stools had purses in them.

It’s inconsiderate of customers who come in after you do.

It’s also rude to the bartender, who has 14 seats at her bar but will only be getting tipped on 11 tabs because of the purse-occupied seats.

There are hooks underneath the bar. Hang your purse there. Or put your purse on the bar. Or put it underneath your seat. Or just don’t bring a purse. Or sit at a table rather than the bar.

If you put your purse in the seat next to you to hold it for a friend who is meeting you in 5 or 10 minutes, no problem. If you put your purse in the seat next to you to hold it for a friend who will be arriving in 45 minutes to an hour? Not cool.

I’m glad my mother raised me to have consideration for others. Too bad not everyone’s mother did. This has always been a minor nuisance, but it seems like it’s really gotten out of hand at Downtown bars lately.

High Cotton Brewery posted photos to Facebook yesterday announcing that they are increasing their brewing capacity, allowing them to get their beer to even more locations. High Cotton’s beers, particularly its flagship ESB, can already be found in many of Downtown’s bars. PRO TIP: You can get High Cotton and other local drafts for $2 at the Silly Goose’s local beer night Tuesdays 7:30 to close. You might not get a seat due to purses, but you’ll get good beer for a good price.

High Cotton had their Drink & Draw event last night, where participants bring their favorite drawing utensil and medium on which to draw. It apparently was a success, because there was a sold-out announcement on Facebook and people begging for the brewery to bring Drink & Draw back for a second time.

There’s a Public Affairs Specialist position open at the VA. Short commute from Downtown and the pay is excellent.

The Republican party is sending in the clowns this weekend: John Kasich, Donald Trump, and Ben Carson will be in Memphis in the next two days. Carson’s appearance at Highpoint Church got canceled for security reasons, but he still has another stop. I feel bad grouping Kasich with the other two; he’s a decent fellow. I wouldn’t vote for him in a general election though.

Miss Cordelia’s, the full-service grocery store on Mud Island, is hiring a Produce Manager. The candidate must have one year’s produce experience and submit a resume to assistant manager Erica at Erica@MissCordelias.com. Given my love for fresh produce, this would be a dream job for me, but alas, I chose a career in information technology; I don’t have the experience to qualify for this job.

From 4-6 today, you can pick up a Grizzlies Growler from Madison Growler (inside the Midtown Cash Saver) and win prizes from the Grizz Girls.

Chris Johnson from America’s Idol will play Local Downtown tomorrow night.

That’ll wrap it up for now. I am more than ready for the weekend that lies ahead.

Here’s a sneak preview of the third piece of Mt. Grizzmore, Zach Randolph, to be given away at the Friday, March 4 Grizzlies game at FedExForum. The first two pieces, Tony Allen and Mike Conley, have already been given away, with the Marc Gasol piece yet to come.

If you missed the Olate Dogs performance at halftime at the game against the L.A. Lakers Wednesday, the NBA has a video.

The Memphis Symphony Orchestra performs Messiah tonight at the Cannon Center at 7:30.

This is really cool: An ioby fundraiser to help send high school students on college tours. To many high school students, college seems like something scary, something that is beyond their set of options in life. The college tours will make college seem more “real” to these students and hopefully make them realize that it indeed can be one of their options.

Blair Tower at 810 Washington is being redeveloped, but there’s South Main district news as well. The owner of Blair Tower wants to develop a new 160-apartment complex near Spaghetti Warehouse.

University of Memphis students: You can catch a ride Downtown to FedExForum Sunday for the Tigers men’s basketball team Senior Day. Here’s how:

Ride the Blue Line to Men’s Basketball game against Tulsa on Sunday! 2 pm departure from Central Lot. More details: https://t.co/VlPwuZ8e8V

— UofMemphis (@uofmemphis) February 25, 2016

From Bleacher Report: Should Butch Jones’s job be on the line if it is found that he helped enable a rapey culture at the University of Tennessee, and that he did indeed call one of his players “a traitor to the team” for helping a woman who said that two other UT football players raped her? Here’s an interesting quote from the article:

Jones has much more incentive to lie in order to protect his job, while Bowles lying in a sworn affidavit would almost certainly bring a perjury charge against him. Because of that, Jones looks horrible in this situation.

As the article points out, this is turning into a high stakes game of he said/she said. One party goes to jail if they are lying; if it’s the other party, they lose a career. I continue to think Tennessee should be kicked out of the SEC (at least for football) if the allegations are found to be true. Let the Vols join the Sun Belt Conference and look forward to a big rivalry game with Troy every Thanksgiving. Better yet, send the Vols to Conference USA…

Memphis Made Brewing Co. out in Cooper-Young has free brewery tours Saturday and Sunday at 4 PM where you can learn about the beer you drink. I have been given the tour and it’s pretty neat.

We have a bum Downtown called Mouthwash because he panhandles money to buy mouthwash at Family Dollar. Why mouthwash? It has a higher alcohol content than the rotgut liquor sold around the corner at CeCe’s. He’s a value drinker. Let’s hope no one tells him about the latest trend in Sweden: Getting drunk off hand sanitizer. Some teens are even mixing hand sanitizer cocktails.

Off to work. Back later today or tomorrow with more news.