Author: paulryburn

One of the most frequently-mentioned people in the ten-year history of this blog is leaving Memphis. Today the Nuh-Uh Girl announced that she is moving to the Bay Area. I already knew – she told me Sunday night at poker – but today she emailed and told me she has made it public on Facebook, so I am free to post.

There have been many photos on this blog of the Nuh-Girl eating food, usually other people’s food. Despite the good-natured kidding we all give her, though, she has earned a reputation as a well-respected foodie. Chefs around Downtown seek her out to sample their new dishes and provide valuable feedback. For a while she co-authored a blog for the CCC (now DMC) about the things hip young professionals like to do Downtown. When she asked to write a guest post on my blog about Downtown Dining Week, I immediately said yes, knowing there would be no one better to write such a post.

She will not be alone in the Bay Area. Her brother Joel, one of Facebook’s first employees, lives out there, and her sister the Nuh-Uh Sister moved there in 2010. She has the chance to pursue education and opportunities in a field she is passionate about (you guessed it, food). She is very sad to leave Memphis but is excited about what the future has in store.

So you have only a few more weeks to read “Free food? Wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up” in this blog. She has been a great friend and neighbor. Many of us Downtown will miss her, but we can’t blame her for choosing to pursue her passion.

Good luck to you, Rebecca, and please stay in touch and let us know how your new adventures are going.

There’s a really good Groupon for a Commercial Appeal digital subscription happening right now. For $26 you get one year of digital content, a $239.88 value, and you have the option of adding the Sunday print edition. 50 cents a week is not bad at all.

Looking for a job? Aldo’s Pizza Pies is doing open interviews from 3 to 5 this afternoon. They are looking for happy, smiley hard workers.

Tamp & Tap will have a Kill the Keg party Friday starting at 4 PM, featuring local Ghost River, Wiseacre, High Cotton, and Memphis Made beers. There will be live entertainment from Christian Seay and Jamison Puckett from 6 to 9.

The Flying Fish has announced that crawfish have arrived for the 2014 spring season.

Congratulations to Start Co.’s Eric Mathews on the publication of his first book, From Garage to Greatness: Succinct First Steps for Early Stage Entrepreneurs. Appropriately, he published the book on a Memphis startup, Screwpulp. You can send any ScrewPulp book to Kindle if that’s your preferred method of reading, including Kindle apps for iOS and Android.

You can support another startup business, Memphis Made Brewing Co., by purchasing a Memphis Made glass tonight at the Flying Saucer. Glasses go on sale at 7 PM.

Also at 7 PM tonight, the Grizzlies host the L.A. Lakers at FedExForum. I bet the “MARC > PAU” T-shirts will be out in force tonight.

Three people have been indicted for the shooting death of Methodist Le Bonheur nurse David Santucci. The murder happened last year on South Main. The two men who were participants in the actual shooting face a maximum of life in prison, and I hope that’s what they get.

I ordered the WWE Network last night. It was easy to pay using PayPal (you can use a card if you prefer that) and within minutes I was browsing the entire library of WWE, WCW, and ECW pay-per-views. I watched a few minutes of ECW’s 1997 Barely Legal show on my iPad. I see there are some videos of a couple of 1970s Madison Square Garden events going up today. Those would be interesting to watch. Most of all, I want to see NXT Arrival tomorrow night.

That’ll do it for the news for now. See you tomorrow, or sooner maybe.

Lots of sports-related news to report today. First up is a Grizzlies Groupon that is currently ongoing. It’s a $92.29 value that you can purchase for $30.

Still on the subject of the Grizzlies, Zach Randolph is once again helping people keep their lights on. For the fourth time, he has donated $20,000 to MIFA to help people who are in danger of having their power cut off. He has also set up a community assistance fund.

The Memphis Redbirds have introduced a 4-game Grand Slam pack. Buy it and you’ll get to see the Redbirds play March 28 against the St. Louis Cardinals (exhibition), April 12 against the Iowa Cubs, May 25 against the Oklahoma City RedHawks, and August 22 against the Sacramento River Cats. There are three seating options, including $110 for a Club Level seat, $95 for Dugout, and $75 for a Field Box ticket. For more information or to order, call (901) 722-0299 or visit www.memphisredbirds.com.

UT sports writer Gregg Doyel writes that UT should hire Bruce Pearl back. Fine with me. That school deserves an utter douchebag as head coach and that way I won’t have to look at him every time I turn on basketball on ESPN. Cuonzo is too nice. The Bruchebag perfectly fits the culture of the university, which is a compliment neither to UT nor to Pearl.

Home from work. Heading to the Goose to console a friend who had a bad day, then on to poker at the Blind Bear at 8.

So tonight I stopped by the Blind Bear and a discussion broke out about the chili cheeseburger I had at Green Beetle yesterday. I compared it to the one at Westy’s, with favorable comments about both.

“Have you had the chili at Dyer’s?” I was asked. Indeed I have. It’s damn good chili. In fact, one night I was there with a group and the Nuh-Uh Girl finagled a free bowl of chili and gave me a bite, which I guess makes me a mooch squared. Anyway, I got some awesome advice tonight about the burger at Dyer’s. “Order the double-double without the bun,” he said. The double-double is two meat patties, two slices of cheese. “Have them put it on top of the fries and then cover it with chili.”

This may be the best food recommendation for Downtown I have ever received. Thank you. Will try it soon.

David Scott Walker, the chef who is the pitmaster of our Moody Ques BBQ team, made a major announcement today. He and his family are opening a German restaurant in Overton Square, at 2110 Madison in the space formerly occupied by Paulette’s. The restaurant will be called Schweinehaus and will open in late summer. Read more about it here. Congrats Chef and I guess I will have to make some field trips to Midtown later this year.

Youth Villages has announced the Soup Sunday winners. Congratulations to Downtown restaurant eighty3 on taking the Best Bread award with its jalapeno cornbread.

WWE Monday night Raw will be at the FedExForum two weeks from today, Monday, March 10. The main event will be a six-man tag of John Cena, Daniel Bryan, and Batista vs. Kane, Alberto Del Rio, and Bray Wyatt. More info here.

That’ll do it for this Monday. Home from work, heading out to have a few PBRs at Bardog.

Happy to fulfill requests like this, especially when I wake up at 11:30 AM and am too hung over to find any other material to post. Taken at the Blind Bear about 1 this morning. In my hand is the reason why I slept until 11:30. Dammit Fireball.

Harbor Town is having a problem with ducks. Muscovy ducks have made themselves at home on Mud Island. Although ducks can be fun to watch, they are multiplying at a rapid rate. They are getting into people’s yards and eating their plants. If it continues, steps may have to be taken to remove the ducks.

I wasn’t familiar with Muscovy ducks so I looked up the species on Wikipedia. Man, those ducks are kind of ugly. Here’s a video of crocodile vs. Muscovy duck from the Florida Everglades. As you can guess, this didn’t go very well for the duck.

There’s a showing of At the River I Stand today Downtown. It will be at the Martin Luther King Labor Center at 485 Beale at 4 PM, and it is a benefit for the locked-out striking workers at Kellogg. The movie is a documentary of the 1968 sanitation strike that brought Dr. King to Memphis.

From ESPN’s YouTube channel: James Johnson dunks after an alley-oop to himself off the glass in last night’s victory over the L.A. Clippers.

Following the Johnson-inspired fake necktoo giveaway last night, the MBJ reports that the Grizzlies are getting back to more traditional giveaways for the rest of the season. Fans have basketballs, sunglasses, and Super Grizz capes and masks to look forward to between now and April. With the entire starting lineup back in place, I’m hoping to see a growl towel giveaway sometime around May 1.

The Flyer’s Hungry Memphis blog reports that Paulette’s has introduced a vegetarian menu.

There will be samplings of Reverb coffee and Memphis Made Reverberation beer at Cash Saver on Madison tomorrow from 10 AM to noon. Brewers from both businesses will be on hand to discuss their products. Reverberation beer is made with Reverb coffee. They’ll have snacks as well as beer samples. Free snacks? Wonder if the Nuh-Girl will show up.

Watching curling (not from the Olympics, on YouTube) this morning. It’s really an interesting game once you understand the rules, and is more of a mental game than it is physical. Also, I like it that ethics and sportsmanship are an integral part of the game, just as they are for the mind sport that has kept me employed for the past five years.

I’ll be at Bardog at 11 for some much-needed PBR and Fireball then will figure out the rest of the weekend from there.

I want to alert everyone to a fake parking attendant scammer who has been very active this week. His name is Joe and he is about 50, bald head, about 6’4″, thin. He’s been wearing a green jacket with a hood recently. Several locals caught him scamming a tourist yesterday and chased him down the Main Street Mall and got the tourist’s money back. Later in the evening a bartender told me he tried to scam her as well. If you park on a lot and an attendant asks you for money, ask the attendant for proof that he works on the lot. Any attendant who is legit will understand why you are asking.

Youth Villages’ Soup Sunday is this Sunday from 11 AM to 2 PM at the FedExForum. I’ll give my usual advice: If you’re going, get there at 11. Lines will get long by 11:20, so get a head start. Also, in the years I’ve been the most popular restaurants start to run out of soup around 12:30, so figure out what restaurants’ food you really want to try and go to their booths first.

If you’re thinking about going to the Lionel Richie concert at the FedExForum, today would be a good day to buy a ticket. There’s a Groupon for the concert going on right now, for a $61.69-value ticket for $30.

If you’re going to see the Grizzlies play the Clippers tonight, get to FedExForum early. First 5000 people get a free Grizzlies neck tattoo. As an added bonus, Tony Allen returns to the team tonight after a month being sidelined by injury.

Sunday night’s performance of The Tenors at the Orpheum has been cancelled. Refund information here.

That’ll wrap it up for now. The end of the work week is near and I am ready for some PBR.

If you’ve thought about volunteering in Memphis but are not sure where to get started, there’s an event for you next Tuesday. The annual Volunteer Expo will be held next Tuesday, February 25, at the Oak Court Mall. Many nonprofits will be on hand, all in one place, so can communiuty members can learn how to get involved. It’s organized and sponsored by Volunteer Mid-South. More info here. The event is free to the public.

Memphis International Airport is now on Twitter at @flymemphis. This is a very encouraging sign that airport management is more open to feedback from the public than they have been in the past.

The Blind Bear has tweaked its menu once again. The turkey burger, the BBQ baloney sandwich, and the fried egg bacon cheese sandwich from the original menu are back. The crawfish pepper jack mac & cheese and the poutine from the most recent menu were popular and are sticking around. “If there was anything from any of the old menus you’d like back on, let me know in the next couple of days,” Jeannette told me. “We’re finalizing the menu this week and not changing it again for 2 years.”

If you’re a fan of Bardog bartender Panda, she is back at work. Come see her during happy hour Tuesday through Friday.

Aldo’s Pizza Pies has announced that new small plates, brunch items, and cocktails will be coming to the menu soon.

I’ll close this post with a hearty CONGRATULATIONS to my friends Colin and Whitney who got married in Las Vegas this afternoon. They bought the webcast of the wedding, and I took a few minutes away from programming to watch. Beautiful service and I wish them a lifetime of happiness.

Outta here for now, home from work, time for beer.