Paul Ryburn's Journal

The FIFA World Cup matches kick off today.  If you’re up early and don’t have to go to work, you might want to check out Bardog Tavern.  They’ll have the matches on their TVs, and they open at 8 AM on the weekdays.  You can get a Bardog breakfast or a Bloody Mary while you watch.

Time to give away a prize.  First person to get this exactly right wins a Pint Nite beer at the Saucer on my tab.

Here’s the question:  If Yoda owned a restaurant, what would he tell the Nuh-Uh Girl?  Winner must come up with the exact wording I’m thinking of.

Everyone, including the Nuh-Uh Girl herself, is eligible to enter.  E-mail entries to paul@paulryburn.com.

One of my favorite food blogs is Dining with Monkeys, where writer Stacey Greenberg takes the monkeys (her kids) out to restaurants all over the city, and blogs about her experiences. She recently blogged about a gem I discovered when I worked near #memphisairport – Maharaja Cafe, in a strip mall on American Way. Delicious Indian food, and be sure to buy some snacks at the grocery next door on your way out.

However, the next post down saddened me – she wrote that South Philly had closed. I guess the competition from the new Lenny’s two blocks down the street was too much for them. I only ate there a handful of times, but South Philly had delicious cheese steaks. Kelly at the Saucer is not going to be happy when she hears about this closing.

In other food news: John Bragg from Circa posted two his Foursquare account that an expanded Cravings menu is coming soon, and that house-ground sliders are another coming attraction. Those sliders made an appearance at the May Main Street block party, and received rave reviews. I can already hear the Nuh-Uh Girl saying, “If you need to try out any new items on the Cravings menu, I’m a great taste tester! And I’d love to try one of your new sliders!” The Nuh-Uh Girl is a big fan of the word “try.”

Friday night the Redbirds will have a celebration honoring something commonly done at baseball games – clapping. Giveaways will include albums from Eric Clapton and Clap Your Hands, Say Yeah, as well as infomercial product The Clapper, and a chance for fans to practice their golf clap with tickets to the St. Jude Classic. A lucky row of fans will win bobbleheads given away by Redbirds legend Stubby Clapp, and between innings there will be movie and music clips related to clapping and its history. Game is at 7:05 PM vs. the Iowa Cubs. I’ll give ladies who wear tube tops to the game a thunderous round of applause.

Gabby Johnson plays the Peabody rooftop tonight. Theme is “Caribbean Nights,” with Red Stripe and Bohemia as the featured beers, and a menu of shredded jerk chicken with BBQ sauce, beans and rice, and tropical fruit. In VIP there will be spicy jerk pork kabobs, tostones, sweet potato croquettes, and jalapeno mango salsa. Better get there early, before the Nuh-Uh Girl “tries” all the food and leaves the buffets bare. If you’re looking for an alternative to the rooftop, it’s trivia night at the Silly Goose (7 PM) and poker night at Calhoun’s (7 PM, but you better get there by 6:30 to get a box).

Still trying to figure out where I’ll be watching the USA vs. England game on Saturday.

Outta here for a quick lunch… will be out somewhere tonight, possibly the rooftop.

GREAT NEWS!!!! The Plush Club has been closed as a nuisance. It will stay closed at least until a hearing is held on the matter. Details here.

The Westin has announced a Tony Awards Watch Party in their lobby bar Sunday night. It’s a big year for the city, with Memphis the musical receiving 8 nominations and Million Dollar Quartet receiving three. Happy hour prices, and hors d’oeuvres from Sole. Bar opens at 5, awards begin at 7.

A few months ago, I talked with noted therapist Doctor Harold Toboggans at the “I Love Memphis” party at South of Beale. Doctor Toboggans counsels people and cures them of urges to volunteer, to make their community a better place.

At one time, Dr. Toboggans told me, I was badly in need of his help. I was a real do-gooder, serving on the board of MPACT Memphis, and leading a movement to fight panhandling Downtown. However, lately I’ve mainly lived a life of selfishness and hedonism, and Dr. Toboggans thought I seemed to have overcome my do-gooder ways. Still, he gave me a card in case I ever find myself backsliding.

Recently, I’ve been wondering if I need to call him. Yeah, I started Tube Top Month because of my perverted appreciation of tube tops, but lately I’ve been using phrases like “make Memphis a more beautiful place” when speaking of the month. Uh oh. That sounds like I’m trying to better the community. This could be the beginning of a slippery slope. What if this helping-others thing leads to next month being “Volunteer at the Church Health Center Month?” Or “Deliver Meals for MIFA Month?” Help, Doctor Toboggans!

So, I was thinking this morning… if the big conference realignments do indeed take place, what if we ended up in a conference that looked something like this: Kansas, Kansas State, Baylor, Iowa State, Memphis, UAB, Cincinnati, Marquette, Houston, and SMU? Yeah it’d be a sucky conference for football, but it’d be a basketball powerhouse. Could add UTEP and Rice if it needs to be a 12-school conference. Or UTEP and Southern Miss. Not real sure Rice adds any real value, other than what little prestige it has from being a former member of the Southwest Conference.

Then again, money drives realignment, and the big money is in football, not basketball, so this is all just wild speculation.

Time for a quick lunch then a 2 PM meeting.  I love meetings almost as much as I love cubicles.  After work:  Beer, somewhere.

I discovered something that may be of use to people who use the Facebook app for the iPhone. When I do a status update from the app, or comment on someone else’s status, or upload a pic, the app crashes. About half the time, the update, comment or pic makes it to Facebook before the crash; the other half the time, not. Very frustrating.

Here’s what I’ve learned to do. I’ve learned to open touch.facebook.com in the Safari browser when I want to post something to Facebook. It’s fast, no crashes, and then I can go back to the Facebook app to see what I posted and follow my timeline.

Last night one of my blog’s readers told me she keeps up with me on Facebook, and it made me think, maybe I need to pay more attention to Facebook and less to Twitter. I’ve been focusing on Twitter more lately because of the buggy FB iPhone app, but there are some advantages to FB: I don’t have the 140 character limit, and I have twice as many friends on Facebook as I do followers on Twitter. I think I’ll try to balance out my posting to both better from here on out.

I also want to comment on something I’ve been seeing recently: People getting all upset because people unfollow them on Twitter. This is the way I look at it: If people don’t unfollow me from time to time, I’m doing something wrong.

Like my blog, I view my Twitter account (and my Facebook account) as extensions/expressions of who I am. That means if you follow @paulryburn, you will get tweets about Downtown events and deals I discover from time to time. It also means, because I have my iPhone and my Echofon app with me all the time, that you also get Paul’s Drunkass Tweets, where I tweet about #tubetops I see when I’m out, the war on #douchebags, and stops for Paul’s Drunkass Food. You also get my Foursquare check-ins, which means you get notified that I’m at the Saucer a whole lot. I’m not afraid to drop the s-bomb or the f-bomb when I feel my mood calls for it.

I realize that’s not for everyone. So if you unfollow me, I have absolutely no problem with it. But I’m not gonna stop being me. When I was little, my mother taught me that I should strive to be thought well of by everyone. With all due respect to her, I think that’s horrible advice. You’ve got to be yourself, and let others think what they will.

All right, after six paragraphs, it’s finally time to get to the news. Tweet4Habitat is doing its first Tweetup ever. It will happen at South of Beale on Thursday, June 17. You’ll get to meet others interested in helping Memphis Habitat for Humanity, and you can make a donation if you choose. Don’t forget that a donation is also made every time you include the #tweet4habitat hashtag in your tweets.

Saturday I walked past Joey’s New York Deli & Pizza at 97 N. Main (in the Renaissance Apartments) and got a copy of their menu. The guy who handed it to me said they’re open “from about 7 to 7.” They serve breakfast in the mornings – pastries, croissant sandwiches, bagels. For lunch/dinner they have pizza, cold plates, and deli-style sandwiches. They told me that everything is made fresh.

Speaking of pizza, I continue to hear that the pizza at the new place around the corner from Crepe Maker (Third at Peabody Place) is outstanding. They sell it by the slice or the pie.

Gonna make a quick run to Target in the remainder of my lunch break… as always, I’ll be at trivia night at the Saucer, at 7 PM.

A lot of people misunderstand how mayorships on Foursquare work.  They think you can just keep checking in many times in the same day and it makes a difference.  It doesn’t.

The mayor of a venue is determined by the most checkins over the past two months, with only one checkin per day counting.  As you can see… I’ve checked in 60 days in the past two months at the Saucer.  Perfect score.  So, Lil’ Kim, Venus, and anyone else trying to get the mayorship, give it up.  The mayorship is on lockdown.

Home from Pint Nite.  Talked to Pam, who is going to try to make up for throwing a beer away at the March beer fest by wearing a tube top.  Good call.

Breaking news:  City and Performa have settled their lawsuit.  Performa will no longer manage Beale Street.  More details here.

I saw this on Facebook and thought it sounded very interesting:  A brewpub in Austin that is a co-op. You don’t have to be a co-owner to eat or drink there, but it’s pretty cool to think that you can own your neighborhood bar.  This idea has been discussed Downtown before, especially right after Sleep Out Louie’s closed, but nothing serious ever came of it.  Maybe we should look at copying the idea for Memphis.

The South Main Association is sponsoring a sidewalk sale Saturday, June 19 from 8 AM to 2 PM.  Residents and merchants can sign up for a 5′ x 10′ booth ($25 fee) between Nettleton and St. Paul, and sell whatever they choose within their space.  Go to southmainmemphis.net to register for a booth.

I’m making a list of Downtown bars that will be open and will have specials for the USA vs. England soccer match this Saturday at 12:30 PM.  If you’re doing something and want it in the blog e-mail me at paul@paulryburn.com.  Yesterday I saw that Local Gastropub will be open for all World Cup games and will have Ghost River specials during games.  South of Beale has already said they’ll be open for USA vs. England and will have free food samples from their new menu (wonder if the Nuh-Uh Girl will show up).

All right, time to hit Publish and head to Pint Nite.  Wait, am I forgetting something?  … I think I am!

There ya go.  Lauren from Calhoun’s in a tube top.  Don’t say I never did anything nice for ya.

Time for BEER!

I was surfing Amazon this morning and found this:

Wildfox The Trashy Tube Top in Black,Tops (Sleeveless) for Women

Last night I strolled over to Christine by Shelton Clothiers for their grand opening celebration.  I felt a little self-conscious about going to an opening of a women’s clothing store, but it turned out to be a great party, with lots of Downtowners coming out to congratulate our friend Christine.  I pulled out the camera, but experienced problems almost immediately – it gave me the “memory card full” error after only two pics.  So I had to rely on my backup camera, which is my iPhone.

A view of the store from the entrance

The front counter

Next-door neighbor Circa put out quite a buffet.  Too bad the Nuh-Uh Girl was out of town.

That’s Christine on the right.  Where’s the tube top section, Christine?

Christine’s husband Tom Shelton, on the right, entertaining guests.

Outside the store, a band played.

I don’t know much about women’s clothing, so it’s hard for me to give much of a review of the store.  I will say this:  I imagine it’s going to be a lot like Shelton Clothiers down the street, in that it will emphasize personal service.  If you need help picking out the perfect outfit, I’d bet Christine and her staff would be great people to turn to for advice.

Thanks to Christine for a great party, and I hope the store will be a key part of Downtown shopping for years to come.

All right.  This iPhone is not going to be sufficient for 4-5 days until the new camera arrives.  I have the 2005-07 camera on the charger.  It’ll be with me this week.  I hope I remember how to use it.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FH20 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 8x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 2.7-Inch LCD (Black)

I’ve been having problems with my current camera this past week.  It’s giving me a “memory card full” error after only about 50-75 pics.  Given that this is Tube Top Month and I need the ability to take lots of pics at any time, that is completely unacceptable.  So I ordered the camera pictured above, recommended by a friend who has the same model.  I’ll lose a little bit of optical zoom (8x, as opposed to 10x on the camera I have now), but it’s slimmer and won’t be so horribly bulky in the pocket it has to share with an iPhone.

It should be here by next weekend.  In the meantime I’ll do the best I can with my current camera’s limited firepower.