Last night, for a little change of pace, we hit the “Brewmaster’s Dinner” up at 75th Street Brewery.  We’ve been to one of these events before, but it’s been quite a while.  They sell about 40 tickets, and sit you at group tables for the dinner.  It’s a rather obscene amount of food, but it’s all so good I can actually put it all away.  I noticed several people boxing up their last few courses last night;  I maintain that is cheating.  Anyway, the whole dinner is usually based on some kind of theme.  Last night was in honor of “American Craft Brewer’s Week,” which it just so happens to be.  They bring all these dishes out one course at a time, and then walk around to the tables and tell you a little something about it, why they paired it with the selected beer, blah blah blah.  It’s quite interesting actually, not to mention delicious.  The whole thing takes like two and a half hours.  Here’s a scan of last night’s menu.  My favorite dish?  I would be hard-pressed to pick.  I’ll say I didn’t care for the “roasted root vegetables” but I seemed to be in the minority on that one.  Beets, blech.  Everything else was so awesome I don’t think I could pick out the best.

After many years of talking, I finally rode my bicycle to work this morning.  After all, it is KC Bike Week you know.  So, at least for one day, I went from 70 mpg on the scooter to none at all.  Oh yeah, reduced that carbon footprint way down there.  I took off from the house (late as usual) around 6:45 this morning.  I haven’t exactly been training very hard for this little experiment, so luckily Family Bicycles was hosting a rest break at Gregory & Wornall.  Had a nice little snack break and chatted a bit, gave me a chance to catch my breath.  Nice Lady:  “So, do you bike to work much?”  Fat Phil:  “No, first time.”  Nice Lady:  “How far have you been this morning?”  Fat Phil:  “Oh ’bout 1/2 a block, my house is the green one right over there.”  I’ll have to be sure and stop by this afternoon again on the way home, I think she’ll be pleased (or surprised) that I’m still kicking.  The ride went remarkably well actually, especially considering my total lack of planning.  I wasn’t entirely sure what route to take.  But, seriously, how lost can you really get between Brookside & Downtown?  I took Brookside down to the Plaza, then went east a few blocks and kind of meandered up side streets the rest of the way.  This “plan” ended up taking me through a few, shall we say, less than desirable stretches, but whatever.  No worries.  I think with a few tweaks I’ll have a good, low-stress route worked out.

Wow this rain is getting a little ridiculous.  May showers?  I don’t believe that’s how the saying goes.  I went ahead and rode my scooter to work today though, like a dummy.  In a rather astounding display of foolishness, I can actually convince myself it’s not raining.  I’ve done it quite a bit this Spring.  I’ll open the front door and look outside, and see that there is wet stuff falling from the sky.  The skies are black.  Small creeks are running down the roads.  Everybody walking has an umbrella in their hand.  It’s raining!  Then I will go upstairs and look at weather.com and say, “Ah, only a 30% chance of showers, I should be OK on the scooter.”  And then I sit here in my sopping wet clothes and curse the weatherman all day.

Well, predictably, that was a pretty lame weekend.  Hard to do much in this weather.  Friday was OK I guess;  Sat on the deck at the Brooksider and watched the baseball game.  Donette was at the game with her Mom.  Not exactly a bang-up wild time on my part at least, but it beat sitting on the couch watching TV.

Saturday we must never speak of.  Pretend it didn’t happen.  And, in a sense, it really didn’t.  I was stranded car-less at home watching it rain.

Sunday we were both getting a little stir-crazy I think.  I wanted to go cycling, but I don’t like riding those skinny little tires on wet pavement.  Bad combination.  We sat on the couch staring at the TV for most of the morning, then finally decided we had to go somewhere.  We opted for a little breakfast at Eggct to get things started.  Donette’s been there a few times but I never had, mostly because I find their name a little odd.  It was insanely packed when we got there, with a pretty big crowd standing outside waiting for a table.  I almost bailed out without even parking, but decided to at least check the wait and look at the menu.  In a rare bit of luck, two seats opened up at the bar as soon as we walked in, so we snagged them.  The breakfast was quite exceptional.  I had a chorizo omelet,  and Donette had corned beef hash;  Both were awesome.  After breakfast we went back home and settled in for some more boredom, but then decided to go watch the game down at the Brooksider.  I sat out back on the covered part of the patio and enjoyed a rather marginal cigar, and Donette sat inside and socialized.  Made for a fine afternoon.  Not sure why it would be any more entertaining than sitting at home watching the same game, but it was.  After the game we went next door and had dinner at Jalapenos, then went home and walked Gabe up to the movie rental place to get a flick.  We decided on “Couple’s Retreat,” which was…  OK I guess.  Sorta silly.  It was one of those where you can pretty much tell what’s going to happen within the first 10 minutes.  Had a few good one-liners though.  I actually stayed awake so it must have been at least moderately entertaining.

Yesterday I got the rare treat of leaving the office for lunch.  I try to bring my lunch generally, but every now and then it’s nice to see the outside of the building, at least for an hour.  So, when I got an invitation from some Facebook Friends, it sounded like an excellent opportunity.  Said “Facebook Friends” would be Julie & Tamara, some friends from back in the CMSU days.  Anyway, at my suggestion, we met up at “Thirsty’s” down at 5th & Walnut.  That made my third trip there for lunch, my meal selections so far being 1) shrimp tacos, 2) cheddar burger, & 3) pork enchilada.  Having nothing else in particular to write about today, I will offer up my review on Thirsty’s based on those three trips.

Positives:  The building is cool.  Original tin ceiling (at least to my untrained eye) and all-brick construction.  I like the location too;  Can’t beat the River Market area.  The three lunches I’ve had were all quite good, especially the pork enchilada.  The sides are kinda iffy.  The beans may well be straight from a can, which is OK because I rather like canned refried beans.   Plenty of tables and not too crowded.  And I like their slogan:  “I’d rather eat at a bar than drink in a restaurant.”  This is a fact.  I like bar food.  This could well be why I need to drop 25 pounds.

Negatives:  Too much dang food.  I suppose if the portions were too small I’d complain about that, but these are ridiculous.  The burgers are 10 ounces.  Seriously, who eats a burger that size?  It will ruin your day.  The enchilada was a 12″ tortilla.  ????  That would be a “burrito,” and a large one at that.  They have bread & butter pickles with the burgers.  Blech.  Double-blech.  And, perhaps the largest transgression, they have no Boulevard on tap.  This probably shouldn’t be a factor, as it’s lunch time.  But, I noticed it and couldn’t shake it.  If that wasn’t bad enough, they have several Schlafly offerings.  C’mon, you’re in KC, not St. Louis.  Get with the program.

Overall?  It might be a three-and-out place for me.  Compared to my baseline lunch (the Phoenix) it isn’t good enough to make me walk the extra three blocks.  On to the next place.

We took a rare little mid-week break last night.  We’ve all but given up on Happy Hour lately, at least during the week.  It’s gotten too expensive, and to be honest isn’t generally all that Happy.  A few factors led to taking a little break last night though.  1)  It’s already been a rather tedious, monotonous work week.  True, most if not all fit into this description, but this one seems particularly so.  2)  I rode the scooter to work in the morning, and didn’t really feel like riding it home in a monsoon.  The bus was an option, but by the time I walk clear across downtown to the bus stop I’m generally soaked to the point that I might as well have just ridden the scooter home.  3)  We hadn’t been to the good ol’ Flying Saucer lately, which made me sad.  So, short story shorter, Donette drove downtown to get me, and we headed over to the Saucer for a little R&R.  It’s just a fun place, I rather fancy it.  We went there every Wednesday night when we lived in Fort Worth, one of the few things I actually miss from our time there.  Maybe we should revive that tradition…