we’ve been traveling so i thought i would share a few places that we like to eat at not in nyc. again, not necessarily the best or whatever superlative…just places we go to regularly when we are in your town.
don’t judge! don’t hate! we like some chain places and this is one is not a howard county or even a maryland exclusive…but we’ve always liked bob evans. my parents, theresa’s family, me and more and more, theresa…we are boosters. the breakfasts are pretty solid and every non-breakfast plate we’ve sampled has been pretty comforting. good solid comfort food…….even if i did not grow up with this comfort food……plus the prices are reasonable. a bit of a time trip experience with the time machine landing in a different era.
some of our menu this fall morning: an egg skillet mashup, an omelet with sausage and home fries, gravy and biscuits, pasta primavera and a veggie omelet.
the southern tinged breakfast foods were the best. anything fatty and sausage-y or pork-y is recommended.
also get the pretty decent unlimited coffee. this is a good wakeup place and also a little ole place where my mother in law’s sister can meet zoe for the first time. this is not my mother in law with glasses. this is theresa’s aunt!
bob evans is a place we normally get to go to only when we’re on vacation…adding to the mystic and anticipation. we’ll be back, probably on a cold, frosty day.
zoe has logged a lot of travel miles in her short life including a few trips to md and this first roundtrip out to los angeles. people frequently ask how she does….super duper. in fact, when i think about it, there is nothing difficult about my daughter.
during this flight, she was giggling and charming other passengers who i’m sure were not happy to see her at first. babies and flights don’t mix. there was a baby in the back that sounded like she was being strangled throughout the flight. zoe couldn’t figure out what the big deal was and went to sleep.
some of the parents in my church have declared this situation, unfair.
when we got into the pit, a sweet-sweet young woman turned to me and said with enthusiasm that she hoped that this show would be one of my favorites. she was excited for the night. she had come with her husband and other family members, mostly alums of the university for an opportunity to watch u2 rock her campus.
this did turn out to be one of my favorite tour stops. first, set in a college town…it had a totally different vibe and energy. the kind of life that comes with youth. then people were not as uptight about lining up so after a nice leisurely lunch, we hopped into line…a very short line. good spots were guaranteed.
another cool thing about the venue is that you could actually see the stage from outside! so students camped out on a hill just outside the stadium and got a free show. brilliant move by u2 in their attempt to reach new fans. just over theresa’s right shoulder is the screen stretched out….
we got railing….a different kind of railing! back railing
we discovered that sightlines were actually better in the back of the pit and we also are able to see the band when they come out on the outer stage. in fact, we have toyed with the idea of doing front of the outer pit…but i think enough people have discovered that already and those spots are the first to go…maybe ahead of the front of the inner pit.
here are our clear views of muse who put on another impressive set. we will try to get into this band post tour.
…and some shots of the main attraction bringing a lot of energy to make their case for yet another generation of college students…some who are more likely into hip hop, american idol or perhaps, even muse. they do a pretty fierce setlist that alternates new songs with old favorites similar to the tight show the second night at the meadowlands. and a brave, brave choice…..
…your blue room…an obscure song that u2 has been courageously singing on the american tour to lukewarm responses. the blue room may even refer to the port a potties around the field level that people seem to rush for when this song is played.
it is entirely literary, metaphoric and mostly inaccesasible. but u2 busts it out for the college crowd. a shock for me…but i’m glad for my boy q who is in the audience for his one shot at u2360 this time around(we got ga’s for philly next year!)
the song contains lyrics sung by a member of the international space station named frank. more like recited by frank.
some random parting pics….always love catching adam playing the bass with one hand. wink. to his credit, adam is the most interactive of the band…but he is often seen….resting.
then there’s a shot of the band on the outer stage right near us. great views. better than right up front because back here, the stage is lower, at waist level whereas in the front, its way above my asian head.
the security at uva was top notch…especially our dude in the foreground who regulated pit flow, actually told people that they could not go deeper into the pit and sent them back to the sides, handed out ear plugs not knowing if he had a pair left for himself, welcomed guests to his town, chatted with people, told stories. wow. a security person who cared.
the lawn at the back of the venue was cool. literally cheap seats at $30. it added to an overall great vibe.
so yes, tiffany, we would come back. all you have to do is convince the world’s biggest band to encore in charlottesville.
i suspect that tivo would not decrease my television watching time but increase it. so alas, i still watch commercials but find fewer folks to discuss them with. i often get blank looks when i ask…have you seen…..?
i realized that if i posted commercials, my audience may actually be watching them for the first time…but then we can talk about them!
here’s the third video in my presentation of this clever campaign. i’ve never seen this one on tv but it has my favorite line about our hero being a lover…and a fighter! enjoy!
alcohol ads usually take one of two paths…clever funny is one. alcoholic behavior is the second with a possible third way being a hybrid. but most follow the play book of “hello, i am an alcoholic…and this is my life.”
these ads which have been running maybe trailblazing a new path….completely mad. i love these ads…..as opposed to the smirnoff ads that i have been mocking!
these are fun, snarky…and just plain mad!! i love madness.
my homage to rem’s its the end of the world as we know it and sport’s illustrated’s sign that the apocalypse is upon us…beyond a moment of zen, this feature displays wtf on steroids! leaving the realm of being humorous or laughable and entering the reality of really disturbing with(at least)one foot in evil territory.
happy thanksgiving!…..but don’t eat that much….you might get targeted! it might become a very different kind of black friday for you…
(Karel Navarro/AP) A police officer displays a bottle containing human fat during a press conference in Peru
Arrests made in ring that sold human fat, Peru says
November 20, 2009 1:21 p.m. EST
(CNN) — Peruvian authorities say they have arrested four members of a gang that specialized in selling fat obtained from dead humans.
Officials are investigating the disappearance of at least 60 people who may have been killed by gang members in two mountainous states in central Peru, the nation’s attorney general said in a release Wednesday.
The four suspects have been charged with murder.
Two of the suspects were arrested November 3 as they left a transport business with a plastic container with human fat in it.
The fat was sold in Peru and Europe and used for commercial purposes, Peruvian officials said.
a mentor teased me that when i moved to the dc area that i would no longer be a knicks fan…that i was now a bullets fan! i shivered and recoiled at that. especially since i had loved the lovable, winning but never able to win knicks of the early 90′s. i didn’t know any people who liked the bullets. that mentor was more of a prophet than i would know or admit. until today.
i bought tickets to the bullets to take my kids in the youth group to nba games. who wants to be a minister who offered kids a chance to sit in an office at the church to shoot the breeze? i didn’t. i wanted to ask kids…hey, want to see jordan, shaq, kobe, jason kidd, iverson, etc play??? those years i owned tickets were terrible….that is the team was terrible. most nights, they barely gave an effort. i almost fell asleep at some of those games. and one time, one of the kids actually did!
but i was also genuinely thrilled when they made the playoffs with webber, howard and strickland! it was a joyous affair. because i had gone down some long dark days with a team involuntarily….when there was light, i was taken for a ride…one that is usually reserved for diehards.
then more dark days for the team. then the jordan era in dc. then some more dark days. it was more dark than light. and i joined the masses in mocking their elderly owner, abe pollin. one radio personality constantly compared him to mr. burns on the simpsons. i delighted in those analogies. perhaps after giving him so much of my money…..i rejected his old school style of running a club. his seemingly bumbling ways. or was it just tough luck ways?
then i kept hearing quiet stories about him. his loyalty. his family first attitude. his heart for people over even winning. he made some moves that backfired but his motivations were pure(mostly). even in the midst of personal tragedy, he kept wanting to help transform his city. he built affordable housing. i think he paid for his own arena whereas other owners hold communities hostage…..see seattle/oklahoma. and it turned out that mj was an @$$#0!e….see hall of fame speech…so he was right to jettison that disease out of town. in short, he was a lovable loser type…a charley brown….good heart, right motives but never getting his moment in the sun…..which isn’t true! he did win a championship in the 70′s and was a multi-millionaire so you can’t feel that bad for him.
but he will likely be appreciated more in death than in life.
after michael jordan, he brought in eddie jordan along with ernie grunfeld, gilbert arenas, jamison and a few others. their initial rise was so important to the city and i think i’ve cheered for them and cared for this group of players as heartily as i did for ewing, oakley and starks. maybe it was after i started to appreciate mr. polin more.
here are some excerpts from his obituary: He arrived in Washington more than 75 years ago, the gangly son of a Russian metal worker named Morris Pollinovsky who came to America a poor man speaking no English. Through decades of hard work and a seemingly unstoppable will, Abe Pollin rose to the top of the worlds of business, philanthropy and professional sports. In the process, he transformed his adopted home town by bringing professional basketball and hockey franchises here and spending $220 million to build a massive sports and entertainment arena that has dramatically changed the face of downtown Washington.
Mr. Pollin, through his indomitable drive and fierce devotion to his adopted home town, left his imprint on the city as no other sports owner or businessman has done. In addition to building thousands of units of housing for a range of incomes, he was the pillar of countless charitable and civic efforts, culminating in his building MCI Center (now Verizon Center) in 1997 and triggering a stunning renaissance of Gallery Place and surrounding neighborhoods.
Strong-willed and sometimes cantankerous, Mr. Pollin adamantly refused to compromise his principles in the sports world, even if it meant losing. He got rid of all-star basketball players such as Chris Webber and Rasheed Wallace because he did not like their erratic lifestyles and work habits, and he suffered through a public relations nightmare in 2003 when he summarily fired Michael Jordan, then the most famous athlete on the planet. Jordan, who made a highly publicized comeback for the Wizards as a basketball executive and then as a player, had brought national attention and increased revenue to a mediocre franchise. But Mr. Pollin saw Jordan as a selfish and disruptive influence.
Mr. Pollin was well known for his philanthropy, which touched global efforts such as UNICEF, while never forgetting local causes such as the I Have a Dream Foundation. He championed improving the lives of children, considering it an obligation of those who could afford to do so, and his contributions over the years were believed to be in the multiple millions.
In December 1984, Mr. Pollin read an op-ed column in The Post about 40,000 children dying daily from malnutrition in Africa. He called the writer, inquiring whether the number was a misprint. Mr. Pollin was assured it was accurate and was given a phone number for UNICEF’s top U.S. official. Mr. Pollin organized a trip to northeastern Uganda to observe the pestilence first-hand and later spearheaded UNICEF relief drives for Africans, and then for Kurds in Northern Iraq, and for women and children to survive winter in Afghanistan.
“I don’t know of others who have the global perspective he has,” said Charles “Chip” Lyons, then president of UNICEF USA. “He’s as much hard-charging for children in Uganda and Afghanistan as he is for kids in the District. He just gets that in a way that most people don’t.”
and my favorite………
In a story he told The Post in 1991, Mr. Pollin was sitting by himself in a Washington restaurant. A man came up to him, tapped him on the shoulder and said, “Are you Abe Pollin?”
Mr. Pollin looked up, anticipating a complaint about one of his teams. “Yes, I am,” he replied.
“You don’t know me, but you changed my life,” the man said, “You built that Linda Pollin project, and I moved in there, and that’s the first decent place we ever had to live. That changed my life.”
so i asked our friend leo chen one day, if his name is short for anything or is it just leo? he said….just leo. it got me thinking where that name came from. then we just started making up origins of the name. and started calling him permutations of leo.
so once a week for nearly a year now, we have had a new name for leo. the year is quickly drawing close to its end……
this week…. i will call my friend leo, leometry as suggested by many! a classic that we saved for the end.
bonus for haters! we are doubling up as we head to the end….we are also calling leo…..leonia, as submitted by step on me….this is the place this picture was taken! no joke!
we’ve been traveling so i thought i would share a few places that we like to eat at not in nyc. again, not necessarily the best or whatever superlative…just places we go to regularly when we are in your town.
its no exaggeration to say that we have not fully moved to ny with maryland being our other home. some of our doctors are in the dc area including our eye doctor…who is also one of theresa’s bridesmaids and lifelong friends, julia. after grandma, theresa and i had our eyes checked for new prescriptions, dr. lee took us out for lunch. originally, i thought theresa might like potbelly’s since she hadn’t had that in a long time but julia said that this place was better.
with a disclaimer of birth in brooklyn(same here)and raised in dc(partially true), i was down.
this place is looking to franchise but it is the only one of its kind according to the literature.
look at this menu! this is the story here. its a winner! there were a lot of choices of things we wanted to eat. and of course, the prices…..everywhere we go outside of ny is a bargain!
i got the transplanted new yorker for fun….and it sounded good.
it also tasted great! the sandwiches were jumbotroned. and very flavorful. everybody was very happy and very full. my gut was busting. grandma could only finish half of hers.
and zoe could only watch.
but zoe had a fun day with her aunt julia….hoping to see her this week!
an excuse to go home or an excuse to see u2? either way, we made a trip south to see theresa’s family who are more than thrilled to take care of zoe while we go touring. to review: they requested that we drop off zoe for two weeks. when we said no, they then made a counter offer of a month. they are not good negotiators….maybe with money but not their offspring’s offspring. they had to settle for a night here and a night there; extended visits by us…but no crazy separations!
they have since proposed a dropoff of 10 days. the answer is still no.
the seats were pretty decent in the lower bowl and we got to see them as they moved around. but my dc experiences have been a bit lacking starting with my popmart show back over a decade ago. the two big themes that seem to pop up are issues with the video screen and the band seems to want to get the heck out of town as soon as they can. my imagination? or reality?
near the start of the show….the screen gives out!!!! they repair it but it is ominous. and sure enough, they play the shortest set so far in the states. two fewer songs than normal….and we know which ones! no unknown caller(theresa’s favorite)and no no line on the horizon(one of my favorites on the current album). in fact, it is the lowest number of songs played off the album all tour which is bogus since this is what they came to promote!!!
the energy level seemed to be fine as they name checked dignitaries and beltway celebrities giving off a real american feel to the show. but its hard not to notice the shorter set especially when its new songs that are left off.
what’s the rush? linger a bit! is there a curfew???
but energy is relative as is the experience….those of our friends who were in the pit had a fantastic time. when you are that close, it matters not what they play! we got together briefly for a world colliding reunion with people of different generations from mostly cbc but also new york. it warmed my heart to see everyone together and is really part of the magic of going out on tour.
