1st Lost Weekend

Hooray! My Buckeyes won! Crap!! Beanie Wells is out! I must say this, though: I feel terrible for the guy and the team, but I am getting quite sick of hearing the news coverage like it is the end of the season for the Bucks. It is a team sport. It takes the whole team to make him look that good. We'll be ok. We are knee-deep in the best of the best at OSU.

Great moment today during the Kentucky/Louisville game:  A 310# defensive tackle from Kentucky picked up a fumble and returned it 70-something yards for a touchdown. He was being chased by the 309# L'Ville center. I love those plays. Any end-zone celebration is one of amazement. Announcer: "You could time that race with a sundial."

13 Wasted Saturdays

Ahhhhhh. Football season again!!!!

Smacked

Based on a recommendation by Columbus Foodie, I tried Sunday Brunch at Smackie Smokehouse. Was a no-go for Mr. S and he want with a pull pork sand while I hit the trough. The selection was small and let's just say low on fiber. I tried collard greens for the first time. I liked them, but it could be the flavor of something swine-related that made them tasty. I learned that the combination of fried chicken and waffles originated in Harlem, which was cool because I asked that very question just the other week. The fried chicken looked tasty, but unfortunately was veeerrrryyyy rubbery. Didn't finish it. Passed on the waffles. The mac n cheese was ala Velveeta. There were a couple of items I did really like: the brisket was very tasty and is better than any I've had in C-Bus. The "banana puddin" was scrumptious, as was the sausage gravy. I do not see us going back for dinner or brunch, but I could see us picking up some brisket on occasion. The man at the table next to us had a problem with mucus. A very loud problem. To be honest, it probably negatively impacted our impression of the restaurant. Not necessarily fair, but it was the equivalent of someone blowing their nose every 30 seconds throughout the entire meal. The service was very good, timely and friendly. Check another one off.

The perfect dinner

I had read about Pistacia Vera from several local food bloggers, but never made the trip. A local restaurant organization, Dine Originals, has a gift certificate sale a couple times a year and PV is a member. I put my dessert-lovin' foot down and purchased one. Talked with J&D and they agreed a dessert happy hour might be worth a try. Well D was all like "perhaps we should have some sort of dinner before dessert". Whatever. Ok fine. Then I guess we should have a beer too if you're going to get all normal. So we had a bev at Club 185, the club voted most likely to look like a crack den from the outside. I like it on the inside, although they could use a more rounded beer list. next, Katzinger's for a sandwich (Reuben, yum, half of which was wrapped up for lunch the next day). Finally, PV awaited. Also known as my new favorite place in the whole world. The store was adorable and the desserts were amazing. There were 12 flavors of macarons. We settled on white chocolate coconut, strawberry balsamic, chocolate bergamot and mint chocolate. They have these gumdrops they call pate de fruit that are just amazing. We has cherry kirsch and grapefruit campari. We had a sweet wine tea cookie, a cashew caramel, a pistachio nougat and a pistachio mascarpone dacquoise. For the love of Mike. I can still taste every bite. I think my faves were the cherry kirsch pate de fruit and the pistachio mascarpone dacquoise. The former was this intense burst of flavor and the latter this light creamy nutty cloudy misty spongy stack of amazingness. Lookie:

Catching Up

I'm going to play catch-up. Part of the reason I dawdled was the enormity of the task. So I'm going to start from the present and catch up as I feel like it. Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah.

Starting Back Up

Testing Windows Live Writer on my new laptop.

Today I was amazed to learn that someone I always felt was reaaallyy cool was even more awesome.

Today I learned that Julia Child was a spy. As if being a fabulous chef, entertaining personality and all-around interesting person wasn't enough.