Paul Ryburn's Journal

The Overton Square Crawfish Fest has been announced for Saturday, April 9. People always get these two festivals confused, so here it is:

– The Midtown crawfish fest will be on the 9th, next to the Bayou in Overton Square

– The Downtown crawfish fest will be on the 17th, on Wagner between Union and Beale

Both festivals run from noon to 6 PM. The Overton Square fest benefits the Alzheimer’s Association and there will be music by Black Rock Revival, Tullie Brae and the Medicine Man Review, Lightning Malcolmm and Amy LaVere.

I didn’t attend the Overton Square fest last year, but I heard plenty about it, as I heard one person jump into the following conversation no fewer than 25 times:

“Well, you know, I went to, like, the crawfish fest in Overton Square or whatever last weekend… anyway, I tried the crawfish, and I guess they tasted pretty good, but you know, later on in the day… they kind of gave me INDIGESTION.”

Funny how some people lack the “does anybody give a shit” filter before they start talking. Seriously, though, both the Midtown and Downtown crawfish fests should be a lot of fun.

The Peabody is holding a “Stay the Night, Party All Season” contest for its opening Thursday night rooftop party on April 14 with Ingram Hill. If you win, you get deluxe accommodations for the night of the 14th at the hotel, and two season VIP passes, a $1,200 value.

To win, you need to go to the Peabody Ducks’ Facebook page. (Yes, even ducks are on Facebook now.) If you’ve already “Liked” the ducks, click on the “Win!” tab on the left side underneath the profile pic. If you haven’t “Liked” them yet, you’ll be taken directly to the contest entry form. Winner to be announced April 8.

Two pre-season Redbirds events are coming up at AutoZone Park next week. On Monday, April 4, there will be a Town Hall Meeting at 6 PM. You’ll be able to ask coaching staff, business management and players questions about the upcoming season, and you’ll get a look at the improvements to the park. Free hot dogs, nachos and soda will be available. Free food? Wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up.

The following day, the 5th, will be “Bird Watching” from 11 AM to 2 PM, as the public is invited to come to the park as they practice for the home opener on the 7th. Again, free hot dogs, nachos, and soda.

Time to go check out that happy hour… my friends who don’t have to work until 5 have already been there for close to an hour. Will let you know what I find out.

MyFoxMemphis is reporting that the building at 118 Madison, whose roof collapsed Saturday, will have to be completely torn down. Previously it was thought the building might be able to be stabilized with only the top floor removed. Other neglected Downtown buildings are being targeted with aggressive anti-blight measures to make sure this continues to happen.

Meanwhile, Madison between November 6th and Second is blocked off, with private security keeping watch. Wonder who’s paying for that? Hopefully the building owner, and not the taxpayers.

Google has announced the first city to get Google Fiber for Communities, and it isn’t us. Kansas City, Kansas is the winner. Details here. Note that the article says KC will be the first city, not the only city, so Memphis still may get the service at a later date. Hope so. I’m itching for a reason to give Xfinity/Comcast/whatever the boot.

There will be a dinner to celebrate Tennessee brewery beer at Local Gastropub Tuesday, April 12. Here’s the menu.

Appetizers
Ghost River Golden Ale Steamed Mussels & Yazoo Dos Perros Beer Bread
Paired with ~ Ghost River Golden Ale

Salad
Tennessee Lyonnaise ~ Baby field greens, local fresh poached egg, crisp pork belly with tarragon aioli
Paired with ~ Yazoo Hefeweizen

Entrée
Ghost River Glacial Pale Ale beer-brined bone-in pork chop with crawfish cream & spicy mashed sweet potatoes
Paired with ~ Yazoo Hop Project

Dessert
Candied Bacon Crème Brulee
Paired with ~ Yazoo Dos Perros

$37.95 + tax and gratuity, call 901-473-9573 to RSVP. Reception at 6:30, dinner at 7.

Warning: Crowd Downtown is going to suck next Tuesday, April 5. Ole Miss plays the Tigers at AutoZone Park at 6:30. I’d already been leaning toward staying home that night to get my taxes done, and this pretty much cements my decision. There are no fans as irritating as Ole Miss fans (Tennessee fans are a close second though).

Grizzlies play Golden State tonight at 7, and hopefully move one game closer to the playoffs. Go Grizz! Meanwhile, the ninth-place Houston Rockets play the Philadelphia 76ers tonight, and we all need to be cheering for Philly to put another game’s distance between the Grizzlies and the Rockets.

I still plan to follow up on a recent happy hour lead after work tonight, and plan to post a report.

All right, catching up on two days’ worth of news… first of all, congrats to the U of M and Coach Josh Pastner. They agreed to a new deal that will extend Coach P’s contract for 5 years and pay him $1.7 mil/year. Excellent move by the University. Details on the deal can be found in this MBJ article.

ServiceMaster by Stratos is holding a ribbon cutting ceremony at the Lowenstein Building at Main and Jefferson this Friday, April 1, at noon, and the public is invited. This is a rather significant event, as the Lowenstein Building was saved from demolition on several occasions in the past two decades. Photos of building construction progress can be seen here. The public is invited, and there will be an assortment of appetizers on hand from City Market. Free food? Wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up.

The busy season is approaching for Memphis in May, and they’re looking to hire seasonal help. View opportunities here. A friend of mine has worked some of these positions the past several years, and she’s found it to be a tremendously rewarding opportunity.

The Madison Hotel’s Sunset Atop the Madison Thursday rooftop parties will begin April 21. Band for the first week will be Elmo & the Shades.

AutoZone Park has announced a number of improvements, including right-field picnic dining and the ability to use credit and debit cards at concession stands. Full story in this CA article.

That’s all for now. Hopefully this blog will be back on its normal schedule tomorrow. Just took medication to ensure that my allergies won’t keep me awake all night tonight, so all will hopefully be good in the morning…

That’s been the reason for the lack of posts the past two days. Allergies really got to me this morning, almost as bad as they did Saturday afternoon when I had to forego the second session of the beer fest.

You know, it’s funny, every time I walk around Walgreens with Dristan, people commented, “You have to be careful not to get addicted to that stuff.” Meanwhile, nothing was said about the other item in my shopping basket, a liter bottle of Mountain Dew.

Behind on e-mail. Apologies to those who’ve sent me stuff to post. I’ll try to get to it tonight, or tomorrow at the latest. Also, I have a lead on an outstanding happy hour that I plan on trying tomorrow after work, allergies permitting.

Yesterday at noon, I walked over to Handy Park for River City Brewers Festival. It was the festival’s sophomore year, and it has improved to the point where I’d have to rank it as one of the city’s best beer fests. This is one reason why:

If you’ve attended beer fests before, you’ve probably experienced the “Really? That’s it???” feeling when given a 2 or 3 ounce sampler glass. With samplers those sizes, you know you’re going to be spending most of your time standing in line for beer. Not so at River City. The sampler was a TWELVE OUNCE MUG. The volunteers at the beer booths were not shy about filling it either. In most cases they didn’t fill to the rim (although a few did), but most of the time I came away with a generous serving of beer.

The Shiner booth was very impressive. I almost skipped it, because I find Shiner Bock to be a rather mediocre beer. Glad I tried their two other selections, not commonly available in the area, though. They had a spring seasonal on tap which was delicious, as was their “102” double wheat.

Also impressive was the fact that they served beverages that didn’t taste like beer, like Mike’s Hard Lemonade and spiked tea. Now, a lot of my friends avoided those booths, but I think it’s good to have them. It lets people who aren’t into the taste of beer still find something they enjoy at a beer fest.

Pabst was there, and I had to get my mug filled with the best beer on the planet, PBR. They were giving away keychains and stickers, and they had PBR T-shirts on sale for only $5. Great deal!

Their food court had better food than is usually seen at beer festivals, as well. Food was not included in the price of the ticket, which is normal at most beer fests. I saw one friend of mine eating a BBQ sandwich, which I would guess came from River City restaurant The Pig on Beale, and another was munching on a sausage and cheese plate. I, however, went for the crawfish.

Man, were they spicy, just the way I like them (more on that in a minute). The plate was a Frisbee.

The only thing that really needed improvement was the weather. For the second year in a row, Mother Nature didn’t cooperate at all, with mist and temps around 50. I was glad I wore the PBR hoodie so I had some protection from the elements.

Here are some more pics:

 

Unfortunately the day ended early for me… I had passes for both sessions but didn’t make it to the evening one. I had been forgetting to take my Walgreens knockoff of Claritin-D, and not long after I got to Handy Park I started suffering one of the worst allergy attacks I’ve ever had. The crawfish boil made it even worse (although, a good spicy crawfish boil SHOULD make you sneeze a little). By “halftime,” when the gang convened at the Saucer at 4 PM, I was sneezing almost nonstop. I went home to try and recover, but it wasn’t to happen. Gave up, bombed myself with NyQuil, went to bed. I hate it that I missed the evening session. I also hate that I missed my friend David the Worm spin at Rehab Disco. I feel somewhat better today, and I hope the Walitin-D has taken effect so my Sunday Fun Day doesn’t end as badly as my Saturday did.

Anyway, back to the festival… I had a very good time and heard nothing but positive comments from my friends. They’ve hit a winning formula, and if the weather ever cooperates, River City Brewers Fest is going to pack Handy Park one of these years.

The roof of this building at 118 Madison, at the corner of Madison and November 6th Alley, collapsed yesterday afternoon. It had been raining hard for most of the morning, and it’s possible that the weight of the water caused the roof to give way.

Sad to see it happen. I thought this was a beautiful building, with wraparound windows on the corner. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately, given the collapse) it had been empty since I moved Downtown, except for Easy PC on the ground floor. I always thought it was a shame no one ever gave it the attention it deserved and turned the upper floors into apartments or condos. It was appraised at only $81,000 according to this CA article. Amazing that this huge building was estimated to be worth about what a 600 SF condo in the area would be appraised for.

There are several other buildings like this one on Madison between Main and Fourth – buildings that admittedly need a lot of work, but could be true hidden gems with a little TLC. I hope developers will take a look at Madison’s potential.

This building was said to be leaning into the alley, so streets had to be blocked off and it may not be able to be saved. Here are more pics.

 

This weekend’s Groupon is $89 for a one-room paint job, up to a $300 value. Normally this would fall outside my blog’s radar, but I know the guy who owns the company… Jason is a former student of mine from the U of M. His company JRI Design/Build designs and remodels kitchens and bathrooms. Check out their website and Facebook page to see the work the company does.

Two more posts to come this morning, both with pics so it’s time for me to plug in the camera and see what’s on there.

This article preaches the Gospel.

It’s Saturday morning and I just made my Mountain Dew run to Walgreens. As I walked out, I noticed an issue of the Tri-State Defender, with the headline story about a new club to open in the old Red Rooster space at 340 Beale. It will be a blues and jazz club, more designed to appeal to grownups than other clubs on the street, and Vernon Johnson and Preston Shannon are among the names to be associated with it. More details here.

Walked home, watched Downtown homeless legend Scratchy have a discussion with the staircase next to Winfield’s. Attn Downtown smartphone developers: There needs to be a “Where’s Scratchy” app. Can someone get on that?

Memphis nightclub legend DJ David the Worm has announced that he will open at Rehab Disco tonight, playing from about 10 to midnight, filling in for resident DJ J2 who will be running late.

Yesterday I read the Wikipedia bio of Butler coach Brad Stevens. After doing so, I’ve decided I’m pulling for Butler to win the tournament. He even out-Pastners Pastner. He’s 34 and has been living and breathing basketball since he was a kid. He prefers to recruit players with a team ethic than players who are likely future NBA stars. I’d love to see a Memphis-Butler NCAA championship game in a future year. Could happen.

Max’s Sports Bar will open at 2:30 for basketball today.

Kooky Canuck has upped the ante on their Foursquare mayor special. Not only does the mayor get half off one meal a day, but now they get one free 34 oz. Labatt Blue a day as well. All you have to do is check in more times than anyone else in the past two months (only one checkin a day counts) and you become the mayor. Wish other businesses on Second would follow Kooky’s example with the mayor specials.

Looking at Twitter and Facebook to see what everyone did last night… yep, there’s the 2 AM Nuh-Uh Girl checkin at Club Shadows. I wonder if they have senior citizens’ discounts on drinks for customers over 30? After I’d walked back to the core from South Main Trolley Night, I saw a number of my friends check in at the Monkey. Almost went down there, but I wasn’t wearing a jacket and it was cold… wanted to go though, to show that I’m perfectly pleased to hang out at the Monkey as long as it isn’t crappyoke night.

Speaking of which… I’ll be on South Main next Friday for a birthday party. I really will have to make an effort to stop by the Monkey afterward.

At Trolley Night, I wrote a check and renewed my South Main Association membership. Toward the end, they were breaking down, and SMA vice-president Mikey had to run up the street and close a vendor booth. “Pauly, I need your help,” he said. “I need you to guard that keg,” pointing at the still half-full keg that had been at the SMA booth. Can you say, fox guarding the henhouse? I discharged my duties faithfully, testing the tap handle several times to make sure it was dispensing beer properly.

Getting ready for River City Brewers Festival today. Going to wear my PBR hoodie AND my PBR headband. Gotta be appropriately attired, you know. I have tickets for both sessions. Hope to see you there!

TV that makes you “Kooky”

Sorry, that may have been the stupidest introductory slogan ever, or close to it, but this is a drunk post. I went down to Kooky Canuck tonight after getting bored at the Saucer. A number of my friends had checked in at Kooky on Foursquare, so I decided to join the party. I got there and this is what I saw:

The TVs at the bar have been replaced. Previously there had been old-style CRT TVs, but they have been replaced with five flat-screen HDTVs, four of which are visible in the pic above.

Good to see Kooky doing the upgrade. It needed to happen. One fewer TV but much higher resolution. It’s a long time away (maybe even longer than usual), but next season’s NFL games are going to look sweet on those TVs.