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…

Last night we headed out and watched the lovable loser home team at the ball park.  Hey, I guess the weather was nice.  We got out there about 5:30 and enjoyed a little dinner at Rival’s, then picked a few of the 20,000 available seats to watch a little baseball.  Wow, they are hard to watch.  We made it through the fifth inning though.  I watched the rest of it on the couch at home, and it didn’t get any better.  Donette is going Thursday & Friday too;  Truly a glutton for punishment.

So I finally picked up a new bicycle last night.  I’ve been wanting one for a while, but being a bit cash-strapped it’s been on the back burner.  I saw one on Craig’s List I liked last week and decided it was “me.”  It’s an older Trek 2300;  Pretty nice bike, or it was in it’s day at least.  Now we shall see if I actually do some riding.  My rule starting off this summer was “If I ride at least a 1,000 miles I will buy a new bike.”  But, I guess I got impatient as always.  Here’s a picture of it, as well as a bunch of random other pictures I put up last night.

Wow is it Monday already?  My sense of time is all messed up again.  I think I need (another) week off.  Most of last weekend was spent at a BBQ competition up in Platte City.  Team TFB was competing in our first contest of the year.  I headed up there Friday after work to find Martin & Brown well into the set-up phase of things.  We actually had a pretty good turnout for the event;  Quite a bit bigger than I expected, especially given the weather.  It was a long, chilly night out in the lawn chair tending the fire.  At least Brice kept me company this time;  It actually was only moderately miserable.  And how did we do?  Well…  Team TFB really doesn’t enter for the whole competitive cooking aspect of the thing.  We enjoy the party, getting outside, some great guitar music with sing-alongs by the fire, and just the general camaraderie of being with some friends you might not have seen for a while.  That little spiel should give you a pretty good idea of how we did.  I didn’t come away totally empty handed though;  I left late Saturday afternoon in a sleepless fog with a cooler full of tasty leftovers and a nice sunburn.  Oh, and a heart full of camaraderie.

Sunday, of course, was Mother’s Day.  Hopefully that revelation isn’t an “oh crap” moment for you.  We met Donette’s parents down at good ol’ Sharps for a nice breakfast.  We got there at 9:00 and got a table immediately, which I thought rather remarkable.  Such was not the case by the time we left;  There was the usual mob scene at the front door waiting for seats.  After breakfast we headed back to the house, digested for a few minutes, and then I headed out to my Mom’s for some lunch.  Two huge meals in 3 hours…  Not a good idea.  Oh I managed though.  We grilled some burgers with all the sides, then topped it off with a Cold Stone ice cream cake.  A feat of gluttony not seen since…  Well, I guess since Friday night at the BBQ competition.  Gee I just don’t understand why I can’t lose a little weight.  After lunch I raced home in time to get the lawn mowed before the weekly monsoon started in.  I am so sick of mowing the lawn that I’m at a bit of a loss.  The fact that it’s only May makes it even worse.  Gonna be a long season I’m afraid.  I got it knocked down though, and then decided to reward myself with a little hot-tub time up at the gym.  As my usual luck would have it, the hot-tub was closed for maintenance.  Figures.  Since I’d gone to the trouble of driving up there, I sat around and watched the Royals game for a while, then called it a loss and headed back home.  Whippee.