Good Times

What a crazy week. I normally wind up celebrating my birthday for a week or more at a time, but this year was really almost ridiculous! Not that I'm complaining! It started the night before my bday - the BF made delicious jerk pork chops with black beans. Then, on my actual bday, I went out that night with friends to Pi(e) lounge for drinks + pizza. It was great to see some old and new friends there. Thursday night, I went to Downtown After Dusk and then Babalu with another group of friends. Babalu has some of the best food in town, and great atmosphere + service. My friend Rachel took much better pictures and blogged about our night here.

Friday I went back to Pi(e) to see another old friend who came to town this weekend, and then later that night the BF took me to Spice Avenue, the best Indian restaurant in town. I'm disappointed that they don't have a website, but just trust me, it was delicious. They are a little overpriced in that you have to order rice and Naan separate, but you can eat well on the cheap if you know how to order. We got the vegetable biryani and chicken tikka masala, and the biryani comes with rice. It fed us for 2 meals!

Saturday, the BF and I met my sister, my niece and my parents at the zoo. After some convincing that it is safe to go to the zoo, that is. I'm too tired to re-hash it right now, but my conversation with my mom about meeting us at the zoo (instead of meeting at my house, which a year or so ago was considered in a "non-safe" neighborhood according to her - now suddenly it is the safe house?) started with her story about a "terrible thing that happened" one of the last times she was there, which was about 25 years ago when my sister was a toddler. The "terrible thing" that happened was that a strange man was trying to talk to them in the parking lot. Horrors!! Anyway, I grow weary of defending my city to my parents, particularly my mom, who is afraid of everything and has nearly no basis at all for her fears. It is smart to be cautious, to not be naive, but it's a whole 'nother thing to be so scared of everything that might possibly ever happen that you barely want to leave the house. I love my mom, but she wears me out with that nonsense. We did get to see the sweet baby giraffe though! Isn't she cute?

I also took a picture of the train at the Zoo:

It always reminds me of the opening credits for the show "Black Gold," which used to come on when I was a kid. A local version of "Soul Train," Black Gold was filmed here in Jackson and hosted by Lee King (who is still around Jackson and worked at the Auditorium restaurant until its demise a year or so ago). The train was featured in the opening theme, maybe as a nod to Soul Train, I don't know... if I can find a video I'm posting it here.

Anyway, I digress. Saturday afternoon I went to BeBop Record Shop for what was probably the last time. The BF got me a gift certificate for my bday on the day before BeBop announced it was closing its last remaining store in Jackson. It was a wonderful gift, but bittersweet. I loaded up with vinyl and wound up using the entire gift cert. + the same amount in cash. The store was packed when I went in, which was strange to see because even on Record Store Day a few weeks ago it wasn't this packed. I saw people that I never usually saw when I shopped in there, loading up on CDs. Now, call me crazy, but I decided to go vinyl-only. CDs just don't hold a lot of nostalgia for me, but albums are one-of-a-kind. Plus, most of the ones I bought came with a code to download the digital album for free, and one even came with the CD inside.

Here's what I got:

1. Van Morrison - Tupelo Honey
2. Super Furry Animals - Dark Days Light Years*
3. An Introduction to Elliott Smith**
4. Jolie Holland - the Living and the Dead***
5. The Jam - This is the Modern World
6. El Obo - Oxford Basement Collection
7. Cheap Trick - Live at Budokan****
8. South Pacific - soundtrack

*(45! And a Double Album!)
**I introduced myself to Elliott Smith about 13 years ago, but this album has a lot of the greats on it, so I could not pass it up.
***My "twin" Jed-0 (we share the same bday, just a couple years apart) gave me a CD that he burned for me with some of Jolie Holland's music on it. I had not heard her stuff before, but oh my word. She is fabulous! I set out on Saturday hoping to find something of hers on vinyl, but was honestly shocked when I found this one. It's the latest album, but she's not uber well known, so I really didn't think I'd see it there. Thanks BeBop.
****If you aren't familiar with this album, you almost can't call yourself a rock fan. I haven't owned it until now, but I've been a Cheap Trick fan from the get-go.

While I was shopping, Prince was playing loud on the overhead soundsystem, probably a little louder than usual because, hey, they're going to be gone in a week, so who cares if it bothers anyone? People were bobbing their heads along with "Alphabet Street," and "Kiss," but when "Purple Rain" came on, it was hard not to tear up a bit. I mean, come on... BeBop. This is the end of an era. I remember shopping at the one by Metro in my college years, buying tickets to Jubilee!JAM and other concerts there, buying CDs at the one near Northpark, and of course in the last few years at this one in Maywood Mart. The BF and I could ride bikes there from his house. I was so happy to know they still had vinyl and even carried new vinyl. Now I don't know where I'll get the new stuff.

I'm thankful for people like DJ Young Venom (although I'm sad he's not on 97.7 anymore) who has organized a great record swap called 4 The Record, which is happening next weekend. There was one a month or so ago too, and I'm hoping this will be a recurring thing. My collection has grown since I got a record player a year ago (imagine that!), but I'm always on the lookout for some new stuff.

Saturday night, a group of us gathered at Parlor Market to celebrate a friend's birthday. His girlfriend arranged for him to be able to work in the kitchen for a night with the staff, which had been a dream for him. He's a great cook in his own right, just not professionally trained. It was fun to see him in chef's whites, and we could tell he was having a good time. The food was excellent, albeit pricy, but it was worth it to spend time with good friends and celebrate May birthdays. I joke about not liking to share my bday month with so many others (I used to hardly know anyone with a May birthday), but in reality it is a lot of fun.

After all of this partying, though, I am worn out! It has been nice to sit at home with the dog and listen to records. This week is going to be busy, but short. I'm definitely looking forward to the long weekend that awaits at the end.

Before I go, I also have to give props to my friend Anna Kline and her Grits & Soul band. They wrote a song about Ol' Man River, and it was featured on NBC affiliates throughout the country this past weekend! She is a super talented musician and has found some great people to play with. I'm proud to call her my friend.

I have a few famous friends. My friend Martha and her beau Mott Roland were featured in the Weddings section of the New York Times this week, too. The New York Times y'all!! It's all about Mott Roland moving cows away from the flood waters so's they can still get hitched. They're getting married next weekend and I am so happy for them. Martha is a new friend, but she is already one of my most favorite people in the whole world. Read their story here.

I'm also going to post some of my pictures of the river at Natchez from last weekend to close this week's post:

#34

So I didn't think there was a song, or any other pop culture reference, for my 34th birthday. But I was wrong. I should've just gone back in time a decade or so ago, to my Dave Matthews groupie days. Say what you want to about the DMB, they had me in a trance for my entire college/grad school existence. And they do put on a damn good show. And I still can't believe LeRoi (the sax player) is dead. Surreal.



Sometimes I want to go back to those days, where my only responsibility was an abnormal psychology exam and a phone bill or something. Some days I can't believe that was 10+ years ago, it seems like I should be cramming for something right now. Or shoving my books under my bed and heading to The Dock with the girls for ladies' night. Dock Rockers all the way!!

Trivia: I had never flown on an aeroplane ever before in my life, and I was 23 years old. The first time I flew anywhere was in April of 2001, 10 years ago, to meet up with a bunch of strangers I met on the interwebs, to attend a DMB "reunion" show of sorts in Charlottesville, VA. I didn't even tell my parents I was going. It was so much fun, and Neil Young opened, which was a total bonus. I don't even listen to DMB much anymore, but back then it was kinda like following the Dead around. I saw them 4 more times in the span of a year or so after that. I also caught the travel bug, and have tried to take at least one fun out-of-state trip every year since then.

God, was that really 10 years ago? It's weird to be this age, and I'm not sure how I feel about it, but it doesn't matter. It's here to stay, at least for a year (then you have to re-adjust all over again). I don't feel young and spry anymore, but I'm not an old lady yet, either. I still think that there's a lot I have yet to experience, and I am excited to find out just what those things are. At the same time, there's still that little something gnawing at me, saying, "Ok, you're really an adult now, and there's no going back."

Scary!

Anyway, I've had a wonderful day filled with friends, food and laughter. That's all a person can ask for, whether they are 21, 34 or 94. I talked to my 83 year old grandmother tonight, who can't even dial the phone to call me anymore, but she can still sing "Happy Birthday" to me. I'm gonna make "drunk chicken" for her next weekend, and we're going to stuff ourselves silly and have a good time. And that's what it's all about, really. Having a good time while you're here, with the ones you love (and enjoying some good snacks along the way).

Granny cookin'

I've had a hankering for my grandmother's "Drunk Chicken"* lately, and since I gave up meat for Lent, I decided to treat myself to this dish post-Easter.

I tried to make this once before and keep it healthy, and that just didn't cut it at all. No, the only way to make this dish is the same way Maw Maw made it: whole cut-up chicken, bone-in, skin-on, in a dutch oven.

First, I soaked the chicken pieces in a little milk to take out any "gaminess." Chicken shouldn't be game-y, but you never know. If I'd had buttermilk I would've used that (and that is a must for fried chicken), but I didn't, so skim milk had to do.

Next, I drained them and added salt & pepper, and then dredged in a little flour. After heating a bit of olive oil in the dutch oven, the chicken was ready to be browned. My dutch oven was not as big as I thought it was, so I had to brown the pieces a few at a time. No biggie - you're not cooking the chicken here, just browning and adding those great gribbenes (the yummy, crusty cooked parts) to the pan.


After all the pieces were browned, I tucked them all back into the pan, took it off the heat, and poured 1 cup of red wine + 1/2 or so of water over the chicken. Covering it with the lid, I put it into the oven at 350 degrees to bake for about 35 minutes.

In the meantime, I mashed some potatoes and fried up some green tomatoes. No big whoop. Hey, if I'm going to have Maw Maw's drunk chicken, I have to go all out.

After pulling it out of the oven, a familiar scent wafted out of the pot. There was the chicken I remembered from my formative years! Even though some pieces weren't touching the bottom, the whole bird was steamed with delicious flavors of the wine. The meat was so tender and nearly falling off the bone. I snapped a picture before I settled down to devour it!

I was so happy, it tasted almost exactly like Maw Maw's. I under-salted, which I usually do, but it was delicious otherwise. The juice in the bottom of the pan is good for pouring on the mashed potatoes, and if you were really ambitious you could make a thicker gravy out of it, but I was tired and hungry at this point.

I am thankful that I learned Southern cooking from my grandmother. She also taught my mom to cook so I picked it up from both of them. My other grandmother (who is no longer with us) was a good cook, but by the time I was born she didn't much care for cooking anymore and was enamored with newfangled TV dinners and fast food. I gained a love for junk food and fast food from her, for better or worse. But Maw Maw R. taught me that any vegetable can taste good when cooked with bacon and/or butter, she taught me the right way to make a fried green tomato, and bless her heart, she could never cook for less than 5 or 6 people at a time, so I learned how to make big meals too.

Mother's Day is coming up, and I plan to make a brunch for Maw Maw R., my mom and my sister, who is also a mother. I've learned to eat much healthier these days so some of my dishes won't be butter-laden - but if there's one more thing I learned from my mom and grandmother, it's how to cook with love and care.

Love on your mamas and grandmamas this weekend y'all - they deserve it. And Maw Maw J., I'm going to eat some french fries just for you.

(*She always called it Drunk Chicken, but I learned years later that this is really a simplified version of Coq Au Vin. Fancy!)

It makes me mad

...that there isn't a proper video for this song.



(P.S. I'm baaaack!!)

All the Way to Memphis

The BF and I took a much-needed trip to Memphis a few weeks ago, partially to celebrate my birthday, partially to see Big Star, and also just because we both needed some time away. It was a lot of fun, and the trip made me realize how much I miss living in Memphis (or just living in a bigger city, period). The city has changed and grown even more in the 7 years since I lived there, but thankfully I still know my way around.

We arrived on Friday and got settled in just as a huge rain storm started up. We just hung out in the hotel until it slowed down enough to not need a kayak to get anywhere, and then we decided to find some grub. We wound up at JG's Trattoria, which used to be Grisanti's, but now Judd Grisanti has transformed it somewhat into something a little more modern. Our meal started with a thick slice of Bruschetta topped with sun-dried tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella and arugula, and then a cup of butternut squash/zucchini bisque with pesto, which sounds weird but was a delicious combination. Our main courses were manicotti (me) and Tuna Puttanesca (him). My manicotti was deliciously rich, with italian sausage, veal and ground pork, topped with lots of melty cheese and swimming in a red sauce that really would make you slap your momma. The BF's Puttanesca was equally good, the tuna seared perfectly. I'm just not that into olives and capers, so I didn't eat much of his dish.

Saturday I had to get up and run 3.5 miles on the treadmill as part of my 8K training, and it was hellish, to say the least. The exercise room was adjacent to the indoor pool, so the air was thick with chlorine and there was little air circulation in the room. I was determined though, and I did it with minimal walk breaks. Afterward, we made our way toward Brother Juniper's with the intention of having a nice breakfast and then doing some shopping at Tiger Books next door and wherever else our hearts took us. Bro. Juniper's has always been popular, but it seemed to be more popular than ever on this particular day, and there was a 45-minute wait. Since I had just burned a few hundred calories and the BF was ravenous too, that wouldn't work. We did hit up Tiger Books, though, since they were right next door, so that he could get a sweatshirt. (He's getting cold-natured in his old age.) Then we decided to try out the Blue Plate Cafe. I don't know why I never ate there when I lived in Memphis, but I wish I had. Our wait was minimal there and the food was amazing. Simple, country breakfast, but good. He had a fried bologna sandwich with hash browns, I had scrambled eggs with ham and cheese, hashbrowns, and we shared some biscuits and gravy. It was perfect.

After Blue Plate, we started our hunt for a turntable for me. I have been wanting one for quite some time now, seeing how I have this decent collection of LPs and nothing to play them on. We went to Shangri-La records, which is an awesome vintage record store. They didn't really have anything in our price range for a turntable, but I did buy an Echo & the Bunnymen album and Stevie Wonder's "Songbook" album. I could have stayed in there forever, they really do have just about anything you could want, plus tons of rare 45s and singles.

We decided to go out to the suburbs (gasp!) to Best Buy for a turntable. There just really wasn't anywhere else to go, and after stopping in some music stores where the BF nearly spent all his money on a Marshall amplifier/cabinet, we figured Best Buy really was our only option. We found something good there, and in the process, had the opportunity to check out BB's musical instrument section. In a word, it was kind of sad. It was as if they stuck a small Guitar Center on to the back corner of the big box store. The person who helped us did seem to know a lot about the turntables, but otherwise it just felt weird to think about buying a guitar or amp from this place.

We had wanted to go to the Rendezvous for dinner, but the BBQ Fest was going on the same weekend, and the night before our attempt to park downtown was foiled when we realized it was going to cost us $20. I wasn't willing to risk that again, and besides, I knew of another great BBQ joint in Midtown. The BBQ Shop was my 2nd favorite place to eat BBQ when I lived in Memphis, and they just happened to have won "Best Pulled Pork Sandwich" in the Memphis Flyer this year as well. We went before the Big Star show, were in and out in an hour, and it was some of the best BBQ we've had in a long time.

The show, the show. I will have a whole 'nother post about the show. Suffice to say, it was a great time in spite of the rain, and an experience I will never forget.

Sunday came too soon. We had lunch at Huey's, my favorite burger spot in M-town, hit up Whole Foods, where I got some Meyer Lemons and a free box of chocolates, and then hit the road. It was such a nice time, we really needed it. The BF and I travel so well together, I think we're really lucky. Travel is the ultimate test for a relationship, and we've taken several trips, long and short, in the 5 or so years we've been together. I am not sure we've ever fought on any of these trips. Growing up in a family where vacations were routinely cut short because of my parents' inability to get along, I count this as a major blessing.

This post is a bit retro since the trip was about a month ago, but hang tight - I'll catch up soon enough, including this year's trip with the fam!

Y'all want some 'maters?*

Ouiser: Tomatoes!
Clairee: Why give all these to me?
Ouiser: Somebody’s got to take ‘em. I hate ‘em…
Annelle: Then why do you grow ‘em?
Ouiser: Because I’m an old Southern woman and we’re supposed to wear funny looking hats and ugly clothes and grow vegetables in the dirt. Don’t ask me those questions. I don’t know WHY. I don’t make the rules.

I am not an old southern woman (yet), but I'm well on my way now I guess because I'm growing some tomatoes! They are doing really well so far, in spite of the fact that they are thirsty critters and I am forgetful. Luckily this evening there was a nice summer storm that took care of them for me.

I stayed inside cooking crunchy kale in one pan and "slow kale" in another, all thanks to my weekly stash from Flying M farms. This is the first time I've made crunchy kale with the flat-leaf kind, and so far, so good. I plan on freezing the other for the not-so-salad days later in the summer.

I've really been enjoying the turntable the BF got me for my birthday. I shanked a bunch of his LP's and am currently listening to a Pretenders album, which, strangely enough, was printed in Portugal. So instead of "Side A," it says "Lado A." Pretty sure in nerddom somewhere (or just on ebay) this is worth some $$! But me, being a modern woman and "nice girl," I will not steal his albums like his girlfriends of 20 years ago did. Bitches! I know that's what happened to all his Cure albums!

Since work has been so insane lately, it sure is nice to come home to happy plants, yummy veggies, and good tunes. Not to mention a happy doggie. Just 3 more days and I'll be off some more, this time for a much-needed trip to the beach with the fam. Just hope I'm not dodging tar balls the whole time. That whole situation makes me so sick and sad. And no, not just because it could ruin my vacation. :(

*There used to be an old man in my hometown of Crystal Springs named Pope Bell, and he grew and sold his own tomatoes. He had a unique style of advertising, which was basically to go down the phone book, call everybody in the town and say, "This is Pope Bell. Y'all want some 'maters?" I imagine it actually worked very well for him in that small town.

Rolling Rock

"From the glass lined tanks of Old Latrobe, we tender this premium beer for your enjoyment as a tribute to your good taste. It comes from the mountain springs to you. '33'"

Last year I commemorated my birthday with a song. This year all I could come up with is the slogan from a beer bottle, albeit a decent beer. The 33 is mysterious - there are many stories as to what it stands for. I'm not nearly as mysterious, but I like to think I at least have pretty good taste!

I'm not at all bothered about turning one year older. This last year has been mostly fun and a lot of work, but a pretty good year overall. I feel healthier than I have in a long time, thanks to my new crazy running habit. I've got a great new place to live, a place that finally feels like a home. I have a great bunch of friends, a wonderful boyfriend who loves me, and a strong family that loves me too. My job may not be perfect, but I have a roof over my head. There are tomatoes growing in my yard and herbs on my porch. And I have a sweet black and white puppy dog to snuggle with every night.

I think that's a lot to be thankful for - fine lines, gray hairs and stretch marks be damned! Can't wait to see what "33" has in store for me!