Paul Ryburn's Journal

If you plan to attend tonight’s Peabody rooftop party and you want to get the most bang out of your drinking dollars, your best bet is NOT to drink at the Peabody itself. Five bucks for a 16-ounce bottle of Bud Light? Hell no.

Here’s what I’d recommend instead. Get downtown about 6. That’s when the party starts, but don’t go there yet. Instead, go across the street to Big Foot Lodge and drink a couple of 34 oz. Big Foot Beers. You can get a Coors Light or Bud Select for $4, or a Blue Moon for a dollar more.

Drink as many of those as you can put down in an hour and a half, then head to the rooftop (you want to be sure to get there by 8, so the ladies in your group can get in for free). By now you should be sufficiently buzzed to make it through the rest of the party.

Here’s a bonus fashion recommendation for tonight’s party too: Dr. Zarr, a disco cover band, is playing. Now, of course, disco was big in the late 1970s. Around the same time, TUBE TOPS were the thing in the world of fashion. So, ladies, why not put on a tube top and be prepared to party in style! Don’t worry about going to some trendy boutique and spending $100 on a tube top; the $12 ones at Target work just as well.

It’s cold outside (52 according to my WeatherBug); wondering if they’re going to move the party indoors. If I hear that they will, it will reduce my probability of going from 100% to 60% (it would drop to zero if it was anyone other than Dr. Zarr). We’ll see.

Another post to come in the lunch hour, so check back.

I’m contemplating getting a second plate at the Flying Saucer.

You get your plate on the wall by drinking 200 different beers, using computer-scanned receipts to record which ones you’ve already had. When you finish the 200 you get a plate party and a $100 bar tab. As you can see in the image, I completed my first plate on November 29, 2005, after two and a half years of work. Since then I haven’t bothered to start on a second one, even though I’m at the Saucer almost every day.

(Actually, it’s not a second plate, but they change your first plate to a different color. It’s yellow for the second time, green for the third and I don’t remember what comes after that.)

Up until now, I’ve thought, “My name’s on the wall, my work is done, now I can drink what I want.” But as long as I’m drinking what I want I might as well get credit for it on the second go-round. And, if I get to 200 that’ll be an extra $100 gift certificate to throw in for our next Rapscallion party.

If I do it I’m going to try to get a little something extra whenever possible: I’ll drink the $2.50 Pint Nite drafts, the $2.50 Fire Sales, the “Buy the Beer, Keep the Glass” beer when I want the glass, the Happy Hour drafts where you get an extra 7 ounces at regular price, the bonus-points beer during trivia matches. And I’m going to skip the beers which, from the first time through, I know to be disgusting. That means it’ll take me longer to finish, because I’ll have to wait for the Saucer to get new beers in and add them to the list, which they do at the rate of several a month, so it shouldn’t be a big problem.

My UFO Club card isn’t scanning any more though. I’ll have to talk to one of the managers about getting another one. Guess I’ll do that tonight, since I’m heading up there in a few minutes.

I heard a funny term for the first time this morning – “beauty combat gear.” It refers to the outfits that women wear when they get all dolled up to go to bars, clubs, etc. I had a good laugh and immediately thought of the Peabody rooftop parties.

Speaking of which, I’ll be there tomorrow night – I have to get my hair cut after work, but should be up there around 7:15, 7:30ish. (Ladies get in free until 8, not that it does me any good.) Dr. Zarr’s Amazing Funk Monster will be playing and I’m ready to get down to a little disco. Unfortunately my leg is hurting again, due to sitting all afternoon at work yesterday without taking a break to walk around, so my dancing ability may be affected. I’ll make the best of it though.

Ya know, I remember when I first moved downtown, in 2002, and was all excited that I’d be able to go to the rooftop parties. I was like, “Oh my God I’ll be hanging out at THE place to see and be seen, THE place to meet and greet, THE place to mix and mingle, where all the beautiful people are!” I think I actually ironed the shirt I wore the first night there, and if I remember correctly that’s the last time I ironed any of my clothes. I have a little portable travel iron that’s tucked away in some box in a closet. I last saw it four years ago when I moved to Number 10.

These days my attitude is more like, “Yeah. Rooftop parties. Hmmm. I imagine my ‘I’m really excited to be here’ T-shirt will see a lot of the rooftop this year.” Maybe if I want to dress it up a little I’ll wear my navy blazer over the T-shirt. Maybe not. I could care less about “dress to impress” (hey, that rhymes); I’m just going to have fun.

Damn these chili cheese fries are good. All right, time to log off Blogger, check my MySpace account, and then head back to work.

An article in the Commercial Appeal this morning lists the 10 most dangerous intersections in the Memphis metro area. Care to take a guess where almost all of them are?

If you guessed “East Bumblefuck,” give yourself a gold star. Hacks Cross Road alone accounts for six of the ten. What a surprise… the part of town where the automobile (or, really, the obnoxiously large SUV with the “W” sticker) is king is the part of town where you’ll find the most wrecks.

What’s the solution to the problem? Well, according to this article in the Memphis Daily News, Young Heritage is holding an event with “smart growth” in mind (you’ll need to scroll about halfway down the page to see the story). They took 700 aerial photos of pre-World War II Memphis neighborhoods, back before subdivisions were designed around the car, when the places people went were a five-minute walk, rather than a five-minute drive, away. City planners (notably, Germantown) are beginning to think it’s time to get back to that model of “smart growth.” I think that’s a great idea.

In other news… my favorite blogger/MILF posted that she *might* head downtown one night next week. Wonder if that has anything to do with my mention of Cadbury Mini Eggs? The title of her post was “Tube Time,” and I got excited and hoped maybe she was posting a pic of herself in a tube top, but no, it was about her favorite TV shows. Darn.

Posting from the Second Street branch office today. I wanted their chili cheese fries last night at trivia but forgot to order them, so I’m having them now. The Fire Sale today is Shiner Bock, in case anyone is wondering.

Another post to come before I head back to work.

All right, so you got the 24″ rims. You got the gold necklace. You got the gold teethes. But you ain’t truly bling-blingin until you got this.

Now, I ain’t never been to Raiford’s (his personal home, not his club) but without a doubt, he’s got one of these in his kitchen, if not several.

Word.

Today’s post is of an educational nature. Here’s a link to an article that will teach you how to make a cootie catcher.

The captain of the Mormons for Gay Polygamy trivia team was running around the Saucer all weekend playing with one of these. Now, that may cause you to think that the Mormons’ captain is a 7 year old girl, but no, it’s a 28 year old male.

The weekly trivia contest is tonight at 7 PM and let me assure you, the Rapscallions are ready to open a can of whoop ass like we never have before.

Just checked the tracker… geez… this blog got 460 hits yesterday. I guess people like reading drunk posts, inside jokes with friends and info about what all the bums are doing downtown. Oh, by the way, there’s a new bum on the streets. He carries a harmonica around and plays it – badly. He’ll follow you around blowing on that stupid thing until you give him money so he’ll go away. Now that’s a bum gimmick I’ve never seen before. I posted a list of bum gimmicks a few years ago – I need to update it.

Hungry… think I’ll stop at Quizno’s and pick up an Italian sub on my way back to work. You know one of the things I hate most about having an 8-to-5 job? I have to go to lunch at the same time everyone else goes to lunch, and stand in long lines. When I had non-traditional jobs I’d always go at like 2:30 and have the entire restaurant to myself. I miss those days.

Blah. Back to work.

I’ve just decided, I’m hungry for BBQ nachos. But it’s after midnight and I’m not sure where I could still get them.

Obviously the Redbirds game ended hours ago. The Pig on Beale is closed. Big Foot has them but their kitchen shuts down at 11 on weekdays. Neely’s would require driving a car and they’re closed anyway. Denny’s is still open but do they serve BBQ nachos?

It’s been a while since I took a date to Denny’s. The “come on, I’m taking you out for a nice dinner” date, usually made at Raiford’s at 3:45 in the morning. Never fails to impress. The “Moons Over My Hammy” sandwich is always a winner.

Okay, I just found their website. In particular the “Mini Burgers” (6 mini burgers with mustard and onions surrounding a mound of crisp golden-fried onion rings) sound like a winner.

Damn a lot of their menu is actually starting to sound good. I need to get to bed before I walk down there.

Despite this being a drunk post it actually contains useful valuable information. A couple of weeks ago Mikey the Camera Nazi borrowed my camera to take some pics of a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. He gave the camera back to me and said, “Just let me get the pics from you whenever. I’ll buy a memory stick or something and you can put them on there.” Of course, life got busy and it never happened. Not the first time. Back in the winter the Nuh-Uh Girl waited more than a month for me to get her some pics that were on my camera, and she lives within 2 floors in my building. I’m lazy about downloading and exchanging pics, obviously.

Never fear – Otto to the rescue. He told me about this site called yousendit.com where you can upload files for free, up to 100 MB in size, and then e-mail people and tell them the files are ready for download. So I uploaded Mikey’s file and sent it tonight. Otto is the man.

I got to the Saucer around 6:00 and left at 11:43. I outlasted the “I have to be home by 8:00 in time to watch 24” crew (no it wasn’t Terry who said that, although I can understand how you might think it was), and the “let’s throw darts and listen to Jarrett talk shit” crew. My tab was $22.50. On Pint Nite. Maybe I need to slow down. It won’t happen until 2012 at the earliest though.

This morning it was finally time to deal with the flat tire. I looked in the phone book and found a tire shop at 455 Union, about half a mile from my parking garage. At that point I had a decision to make – put the spare tire on the car (which I’ve never done in my life, and don’t know how to) or just drive with the flat tire and hope it makes it? Of course, I chose the option which required the least possible effort – driving on the flat. Luckily the car got there. It was one of the scariest drives of my life though.

The Majestic was PACKED for brunch yesterday – apparently everyone decided to go there after Easter services. I tried one of their Easter specials, the lamb with new potatoes, asparagus and sugar glazed carrots. Lamb is one of those dishes that can come out either really good or really awful. The Majestic’s was really good – the way they cooked it really brought out the flavor, and the sides complemented the lamb well. The portion was so big that I couldn’t finish it, although the Nuh-Uh Girl was happy to step in and assist. Even though the place was busy, we (the brunch crew) were unusually quiet, mainly because our show-tune-singing diva was absent.

After brunch we walked into the Saucer the very MINUTE it opened – 4 on the dot – and hung out there for a few hours, then some of us went to McGuinness. And that was about it… just another Sunday.

Kicked some ass at pool this weekend… I’ve gotten pretty good over the past year. Need to find my pool mentor Kenny (from the 1990s Six-1-Six pool room) and play a few games with him, to see if I’ve made it to his level yet. I also threw some darts this weekend, and discovered that not only am I not improving, but I’m actually getting worse.

It’s the day after Easter, so candy is on sale. Think I’ll run by Walgreens before my lunch break ends. Maybe I’ll pick up a large bag of pastel-colored Cadbury milk-chocolate Mini Eggs to try and tempt my favorite blogger to come downtown and hang out. There’s a good chance I’ll eat them myself before she does though.

Pint Nite at the Saucer tonight. I should be there around 6.

Geez… this was a boring post… I need to start posting drunk again.

Check out this article in today’s Commercial Appeal, where the results of a new poll show that Mayor Herenton is even more vulnerable than people realized.

The article has a quote from a South Memphis resident which is absolutely on point: “He acts like he owns this city.” EXACTLY. Mayor Herenton, summed up in one sentence.

In one of the poll questions, voters were asked to rate the mayor’s performance on a report-card scale, and he averaged a C-minus, with more than 40% giving him a D or an F.

Looks like King Willie may lose his crown when the October elections get here.