As you may have gathered from my Facebook posts of late, we’re vacationing in Portland, OR. Fine place, as long as you enjoy eating and drinking. If there are other activities to be enjoyed we must have missed them. We did do some brief sight-seeing, for instance driving down to the coast and heading up highway 101 for a bit. Took lots of pictures, cursed lots of drivers, fun stuff like that. We went to Vancouver WA today, only to find it doesn’t open until 3:00. Seriously, there were all kinds of nice looking restaurants, all shuttered up until the magical hour of 3:00. Odd little town. We finally found a small diner which was open UNTIL three, go figure, and had a tasty lunch. Now we’re back in the hotel regrouping to see what this evening brings.
Author Archives: Phil Kenagy
Winter Blues
Whew we’re in something of an entertainment funk. Eh, it’s February, what can you do. I did get a nice lil’ respite from the weather on Friday, so I rolled down to the Brooksider to hang out with the boys on the patio. It wasn’t exactly warm but it was passable. Donette came down and joined me later, or more accurately joined her friends inside. After that we headed home for some movies. We kicked it off with The Avengers. It seemed a little slow moving and put me to sleep in about 30 minutes. Donette says it was actually pretty good so I might have watch it again. I woke up as the credits were rolling, and decided to watch Ted. I’ve already slept through it two or three times, but made it to the bitter end on Friday’s showing. Honestly I should have just gone to sleep and deleted the movie. What a sad, sad disappointment of a film. This is a man who ran with the Funky Bunch, a man who brought us Dirk Digler, and he’s now reduced to this? Fame is fleeting, people.
Saturday wasn’t much of an event. I spent the morning thinking about going to the gym, and rationalizing why I shouldn’t. Around noon I walked up to 75th Street to watch the Missouri game. I stayed about 10 minutes, remembered it’s possibly the worst place to watch a game in the area, and walked back home. Luckily the game was on TV (which begs the question of why I went to 75th in the first place…) so I hunkered down on the couch for an afternoon of entertaining games. Later on Donette had a night out with girls planned, so I stayed home and stared at the TV. Martins brought their new puppy over to hang out, so that was fun stuff. The pup played very well with Teagan, although they had be reigned in a few times. (He only goes about ten pounds… Little small to be playing too rough just yet.)
Sunday was a complete loss of a day, or very near so. I got up pretty early, and for no discernible reason started messing with my web server. Ever woken up on a given Sunday and suddenly thought “Boy I sure would like to switch from mysql to sqlite today.” Yeah can’t really explain that one. I sat there all day though, and made some decent progress. I actually had it up and running for a while, then gave up on the few last tweaks when I realized I really had no interest in it in the first place. Unfortunately by that time it was 9:00 at night and I’d wasted my whole day. Not the first time it’s happened, and likely won’t be the last.
Super Sunday
Humbug. Lame weekend. We’re making a rather half-hearted attempt at dieting, which doesn’t mesh well with my entertainment schedule. For the most part I played video games all weekend. It’s cold, I’m broke, and there’s nothing lo-cal in the world that interests me.
We did watch the game, and a fine game it turned out to be. We actually sat through the whole thing. I was rather indifferent as to the outcome so I just needed it to be moderately entertaining. And, in true Superbowl Sunday fashion, we made a big table full of appetizers to graze on while watching it. I won’t go into the actual details of the appetizers though, it’s too sad to talk about. There was lots of celery and greek yogurt involved, and that’s all I’m saying. (And, I will grudgingly admit, it was all pretty darn good too.)
Chipotle-Lime Chicken Tacos
Ingredients
- 1 bone-in, skin-on whole chicken, rinsed and dried
- Kosher salt and freshly cracked black pepper
- 1 lime, zested and juiced (lime halves reserved), plus 1 lime, zested,
- 1/4 cup water
- 1 cup crema
- 2 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce, finely minced into a paste
- 8 (6-inch) corn tortillas, warmed
Directions
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Generously season the chicken, on the outside and inside of the cavity, with salt and pepper, to taste. With your fingers, put some of the lime zest under the skin of the chicken. Sprinkle the lime juice over the chicken and put the halves into the cavity. Put the chicken in a roasting pan, breast side up, and add 1/4 cup of water to the bottom of the pan. Roast the chicken until the internal temperature registers 165 degrees F on an instant-read thermometer, when inserted in the thickest part of the thigh.
Remove the chicken from the oven to a carving board, let sit until cool enough to handle.
In a small bowl, combine the crema, minced chipotles, remaining lime zest, and salt and pepper, to taste.
Once the chicken has cooled, pull the meat from bones and shred.
Put some of the shredded chicken on each tortilla, top with chipotle crema and garnish with some zest from the remaining lime. Serve with lime wedges.
70 Degrees??!!
Wow, what a fine morning. I can overlook the 100% humidity and cloudy skies for some 70-degree temps. Not that it makes a whole lot of difference from the confines of a cubicle.
That was a moderately entertaining weekend at best. Friday I did a grand bunch of nothing. What, like went to the Brooksider, Jalapenos, and home? No, like nothing. I was pretty darn sick for the better part of last week. I’m no doctor, but I do have the Google, and a little quick research indicated that recommended cures for the flu don’t include sitting on a patio in 40-degree weather smoking a cigar. Rats. So, Donette and I went up to the gym for a bit, then I went home and played Wii games all evening. It passed the time just fine too; I miss the ol’ Wii games.
Saturday I felt considerably better, due in no small part to my quiet evening Friday I’m sure. I headed up to the gym for a few hours, then got a call from Martin with the super exciting news that he was heading to midtown for the day. His description of the days plans were advertised as “Have a hotdog at Hooper’s.” Indeed we did enjoy a few $1.50 hotdogs, then his plan somehow morphed into a tour of Waldo. The final damage included Hooper’s, Tommy Farha’s, Patrick’s, Bobby Baker’s, and Quintons. Those links are about the best I could come up with; These aren’t really the kind of places that waste a lot of resources on websites and advertising and all that other crazy stuff. I particularly enjoy that Farha’s shows up as a “Cafe.” What exactly makes them a cafe; the beef jerky for sale by the cash register? Who knows. Donette, meanwhile, was out with the girls. They went out to dinner, then saw Billy Elliot at Music Hall. We have different tastes in entertainment, what can I say.
Sunday somehow disappeared on me. I don’t know what happened. Matter of fact, I woke up this morning convinced it was Sunday. (Which, I suppose, will make the day seem even longer than usual.) We went to Costco and got a few items I guess, which is always good for passing a few hours. I made a pot of beans and roasted a chicken for some tacos, and I guess that was about it. Woo hoo. Closed out the day with some movie on Netflix that was so horrible I can’t even remember the name.