The One Hundred and Seventy First...

Number One Hundred and Seventy One:

WRIR 97.3 studios, Lunch, Cafe Ole, Burrito

Coming into the WRIR 97.3 studios to do my mic managing shift for the Spring Fund Drive a few minutes early not only meant getting my stuff together and prepping, but also enjoying one of the many fine meals offered at the station over the course of the Drive. This time it was Cafe Ole, burritos and chips available. Yum.

Now is the time. If you have ever given a shit about the First Amendment and the very idea of independent radio, the kind of radio you USED to enjoy (if you are old enough) or STILL enjoy (because you are young enough), NOW is the time to donate to one of the most creative, energetic, knowledgeable and AWESOME group of volunteers to ever invest their time in something great. Richmond Independent Radio can be heard across the world via the internet stream too.

Richmond has been a great musical town for as long as I can remember, and this radio station reflects this. Not only do we have people from the older scene, but new people as well. And it is not just about music, news and talk kicks much ass as well. So, keep this thing rolling and DONATE!

I managed this 'stache during my shift on the microphone during the 80s show hosted by Bil L. and P-Swann. Solid!

Radiostache!

The One Hundred Seventieth...

Number One Hundred and Seventy:

Tastebuds American Bistro, Dinner, Sliced Sirloin with Blue Cheese Red Bliss Potato Cake, Haricot Vert & Smoked Tomato-Red Wine Sauce

Yes, this meal is worth mentioning in its entirety. I really like ALL the places to eat in Northside pretty much equally, but some days you just really LOVE places. Tonight was right on with Tastebuds. Such a great restaurant. Go, really, I recommend it.

I called around 5:30 to see if we could get a table at short notice, they recommend reservations on the weekends. Andrew, the owner, answered. This place is family run and the waitstaff is awesome and friendly. I asked if we could still land a table, he said it would be fine and that it wouldn't be too busy tonight because of the Nascar races going on. No one would want to venture Northside as a result. I told him I live Northside, so I wasn't afraid. He laughed and recognized my name. We have spoken many times before, usually me having a beer waiting at the bar for my pizza order, so we have gotten to know each other fairly well. He loves WRIR on Sundays, even contributed dinner for this coming Sunday for the Spring Fund Drive, so good on him! (BTW, this is the portion of the blog when you shuffle your ass to wrir.org and CONTRIBUTE to some independent free radio! Please help support radio that is independent, local and cares!)

Anyway, we arrive and have a terrific dinner, familiar setting and staff and food and just great tasting, perfect for a Friday evening. Plus, the place actually started filling up, despite the rednecks trying to thwart off local eating! Yay!

Tastebudstache!

The One Hundred and Sixty Ninth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Nine:

Home, Dinner, Leftover Full Key

After failed negotiations with the teen over where to go OUT to eat, she settled on biking to Subway, I had leftover Full Key, watching the Walking Dead AMC series based on the pretty cool graphic novel series. Worked out pretty well I'd say!

ZOMBIE!

The One Hundred and Sixty Eighth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Eight:

Riverbound Cafe, Lunch, Burger

Home of the lighthouse motif.

The One Hundred and Sixty Seventh,,,

Number One Hundred and Sixty Seven:

Home, Dinner, Greek chicken wrap

After putting together an IKEA nightstand, which we always do a two step forward, one back about once, it was time to grill up some chicken for dinner.

The recipe, well sort of:

- Marinade chicken in a bit of olive oil, oregano, cracked pepper, sea salt, and feta.

- add onion, green pepper, mushroom.

Grill it! Well, the chicken first, then throw in the vegetables.

Lisa, who made the hard dish, made some tzatzki, which is awesome.

1 cuke grated, dried a little with a towel

A little more than a cup of greek yogurt

small clove of garlic, stir and let set for a few minutes. Hey, maybe while you're grilling!

Then heat up some flatbread of some kind, like they make gyros with, or whatever the ones they sell at IKEA, and you are ready to make your wrap. Mmmm! It's the tzatzki that makes it so good on a warm day.

Tzatzkistache!

The One Hundred and Sixty Sixth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Six:

Panera Bread, Lunch, 1/2 Sandwich 1/2 Salad

Panera Bread, pretty much your plethora of sandwiches, salads, soups. You have to wonder how much of this stuff, like the soup, comes from some can or big bag 'o lettuce, or if they actually make it fresh there. Either way, there might be a lot of lunches here in the future. I am thinking about doing a thing called Summer of Salad for lunches. Hopefully to maybe drop a pound or two, but also because "Summer of Salad" sounds kind of funny...

The One Hundred and Sixty Fifth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Five:

Full Key Restaurant, Dinner, Chicken Peking

Being Easter Sunday, every place we hoped and planned on going to pick up a pizza pie were close. Full Key? Open! They have a lobster tank, you can pick your lobster, then feel weird about it.

The One Hundred and Sixty Fourth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Four:

Aunt Ernie's, Dinner, Lasagna

After touring D.C., going to Ford's Theatre (more like a lesson in crowd controlling and a theme ride), the National Museum of American Art and National Portrait Gallery (One of my favorite museums now, the moving image stuff and Alexis Rockman is awesome), then the treacherous with children run amok Museum of Natural History, we metro-ed back to my Aunt Ernie's house where she made us some great lasagna, then talked late in the evening. She was fairly amused at the blog, but wasn't going to stache it. That's okay, this look I give is kind of funny.

The One Hundred and Sixty Third...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Three:

Eileen's Bakery & Cafe, Lunch, Monte Cristo

After a college visit to Mary Washington, it was off to old town Fredericksburg for some lunch in a former church that Lisa remembered eating at when she was here on some museum business. Good sandwiches, friendly service, the people here for lunch though were a little slow. The well to do lady in front of me, manic with her college aged daughters, all wearing lots of make-up and fishnets, were with the lone cashier half rung up with lunch when she decided to let her girls go look at the dessert case for 5 minutes instead of pay for what she had, then come back. Unapologetic and never said a word to the line building behind her. Ass. Anyway, the place had some cool decor, note the anchor in the stained glass window.

The One Hundred and Sixty Second...

Number One Hundred and Sixty Two:

Famous Dave's BBQ, Lunch, Rib Tips

Lunch on the road with Gina, was the same table we always have when Gina and I lunch on the road. Like that sentence? Ha. Anyway, MIGHT have napstache post issues for the next few days, but we will see. Computer troubles (again, HP sucks) and travelling, but WILL do one each day.

The One Hundred and Sixty First...

Number One Hundred and Sixty One:

El Caporal Mexican Restaurant, Lunch, Burrito Azado

This place has been around for a while, but we have only recently discovered it for Bookmobile lunchtime. Of course, we have to park at the Kroger parking lot, formally known as the Ridge Theater (*sniff*), then play Frogger across the street, battling Cookout traffic and general West End craziness, but worth it. Inexpensive and a unique taste.

The One Hundred and Sixtieth...

Number One Hundred and Sixty:

The Mill on MacArthur, Dinner, Po' Boy

Lisa and I took a bike ride to this place, which we could smell last night while doing yoga next door at the studio; the delicious aroma of garlic and herbs. The place has some good food and specials, even Bev's Ice Cream for dessert if you choose. There is limited seating, by the time we left around 6:30 or so, they were scrambling table space. It was starting to fill up, people are liking this place. They kept showing up. Maybe Dots run off, but I don't know, they might actually be establishing themselves among their tattooed hipster friends that hold up the waitstaff from getting to me, and the Northside family crowd, and people that like decent food. A good combo.

I think the key to their flavor, at least as I have experienced so far, has been that they do sauces well. Lisa had the chicken sandwich again, which has a great sauce, and the po' boy I had, while good, it was the sauce that really made it. We'll have to try their pizza some time and I hear their tofu sausage is awesome. I think this restaurant has a real potential to fit right into the Northside, right in there with Dots and Northside Grille and Tastebuds. Millstache!

The One Hundred and Fifty Ninth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Nine:

India K' Raja, Lunch, Buffet

Great Indian cuisine, buffet style so you will walk a little slower on the way out of the door. Also, televisions sets with either Bollywood music videos, or Indian soap operas. It happened to be some Bollywood grooving nicely, lotta woofer bass to the tunes. When Justin and I were leaving, I noticed they were REALLY cranking it out on the strip mall; so loud we could hear it from the Bookmobile parking space. Holla for some Bolla!

The One Hundred and Fifty Eighth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Eight:

Dots Back Inn, Brunch, Pigs in a Blanket

We went for a bike ride in Bryan Park then hit Dots. Lisa and I split the pigs in a blanket because if you DO finish one by yourself, you are pretty much done for the day. The andouille sausage gives the pancakes a unique spicy feel, yum! Then it was off to Spring Bada-bing to say hello to MonkeyDogStudio, then a dream visit to La Diff, Lowe's, Azelea Garden Center, then home for some gardening. Designed and random plantings of cukes, tomatoes, peppers and a hosta. Let's hope they all do well! Spring!

The One Hundred and Fifty Seventh...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Seven:

Home, Dinner, Steak

By popular demand! Plus the thunderstorm/buckets o' rain / tornado fun ended in time for me to do some grilling outside. Then we watched the Mushi-Shi live action movie. Not as good as the anime series but a B- for trying, since it's a hard series to nail down. Not really action, but extremely engaging. Like solid anime fantasy drama. The scroll keepers segment is amazing in both the anime and the movie.

Mushi-stache?

The One Hundred Fifty Sixth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Six:

Mekong Restaurant, Dinner, Spicy Crispy Chicken

After a nice visit with Beth Brown, author and my co-conspirator with Richmond Macabre, at a local author showcase (with: Rich Babbit, Roger Bruner, David H.C. Carter, Edward Wright Haile, Walter Griggs, Shara Lanel, J.S. Lee, Lee Rice, Bill Roberson, Douglass Walter and Richard Wenzel) it was off to Mekong for an early dinner. After all, I had been up since FOUR this morning; insomnia kind of sucks!

One of my favorite, most unassuming, easy to get along with waitstaff in Richmond is Thui (or Tooey) from Mekong. I know I am probably spelling it wrong but okay fine. She is familiar with us, daughter of the equally awesome Lian, who is brother to most the awesome An --a great great example of fine family restaurant. Thui without question took a photo with me doing the napstache. After some tasty beer, yes, the BEST beer taps in Richmond, hands down, we headed for the bar to chat with An for a bit. He has grown into his celebrity status wonderfully. A man that knows his customers, his staff, and his establishment, and runs the joint well. A good man. Cheers!

I'm gonna give this one a...

Thuistache!

The One Hundred and Fifty Fifth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Five:

The Crazy Greek, Lunch, Spinach Feta Pizza

Carolyn and I split a small pizza and some salad, good stuff. We also overheard they are opening another location across from Chesterfield Mall. Good for them. Corned beef and cabbage day = geezers galore. A beautiful thing! It was a waitress warp; one of them saw me do this photo and laughed and said it was hilarious. As we were leaving, I also saw our Dot's waitress from the first napstache post having lunch there!

I meant to get a photo from an event that Hope and I went to this evening. Tonight was the Virginia Historical Society's Member Appreciation reception, which meant a lot of geezers in khakis and hair product horking down free buffet food and wine and acting like they are smartest historians ever. We naturally joined them. Hope quote from the evening, "Virginia Historical Society achievement: youngest person in the building!" Always a fun and interesting time at these events, plus we got a look at the new interactive exhibit, "An American Turning Point: the Civil War in Virginia" which was pretty cool. My only complaint amid a lot of the unsung heroes and common folk, dabbled with some well known figures, was that there was no Elizabeth Van Lew! I was really disappointed by that. My friend Cathy who works there explained that she thinks they were trying not to focus too much on the more popular figures, but I still disagree. Van Lew needed something more than an anonymous picture among the other "traitors" area, she needed a blurb. Anyway, a great time, they even gave away free old timey style measuring cups, I grabbed 5! They were begging us to take them!

The One Hundred and Fifty Fourth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Four:

Riverbound Cafe, Lunch, Chicken Wrap

Matt and I have cunning plan for the VLA Conference this year: give our presentation that we gave during Staff Development Day. Only make it better than it was before. Better. Stronger. Faster. We hammered out some of the plan over lunch, I think it is a shoe in. If not, it damn well should be! We did submit two presentations, so one has to pan out. Two would be great though. It's in Portsmouth in October, and it would be more or less paid for if we got in. Sweet!

Planstache!

The One Hundred and Fifty Third...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Three:

Home, Dinner, Pizza

After family errands, we made a quick call to Arianna's Grill for some pizza pick up. 20 minutes. It'll take only 10 to get there. So we swing into the Triangle Park shopping center so I can go into Corks & Kegs and pick up a couple of Great Divide Titan IPA singles and some kooky looking Bourbon Barrel Aged Barley Wine. That kills 5 minutes, followed by a nice leisurely drive down Monument, and we're put right there for some warm pizza pie pick up. FYI, Lakeside Arianna's now serves wine and beer!

The One Hundred and Fifty Second...

Number One Hundred and Fifty Two:

Home, Dinner, Fajitas

After a deliciously invigorating, challenging Yoga Session with the kick ass Iffet, it was time for dinner, fajitas! MMMMM, fajitas! Come on, say it with me:

F A J I T A S!!

The One Hundred and Fifty First...

One Hundred and Fifty One:

Asados Los Catrachos, Lunch, Enchiladas

Mark R. knows a lot about good places to it, especially Honduran, Central American, etc. He lived out of country and also goes to the Dominican Republic every so often to do great work as a Family Doctor for places that need it. So today he and Janet took us here for some great authentic Honduran food, then to a great ice cream place called La Michoacana in the same area with some awesome ice cream called the Tiger's Tail, which was chocolate, vanilla, butterscotch and pecans. They had a ton of flavors and the owner was more than happy to let you try all of them if you wanted!

Great ice cream here!

Then it was off to the Byrd for some James River Film Festival where we saw Gary Lucas soundtracking the Spanish language version of Dracula; said to be better than the Lugosi version. Here is some peak footage I took, the moment when we first see the Vampire, and the first moment when Lucas really brought some great intensity to his performance.

Dracstache!

The One Hundred and Fiftieth...

Number One Hundred and Fifty:

Balkan Restaurant, Lunch, Goulash

A great restaurant with some seriously good Hungarian Goulash. The waitress, basically the same gal I have seen working every time I go laughed out loud when I clandestinely tried to get this one. Also, the OTHER waitress was very familiar, then I realized she used to work at Zorba's till it burned. She told us they were hopefully fixing Zorba's soon, but every time the Bookmobile goes by, it looks far from finished. The goulash here is homemade as well as the mashed potatoes, and it is served together on a cozy almost teardrop shaped dish.

Clandestinestash!

The One Hundred and Forty Ninth...

Number One Hundred and Forty Nine:

Mekong Restaurant, Dinner, Claypot Tofu

Double date with Mark and Janet this evening. Fun times at Mekong, king of beer lists and great atmosphere. Tofu plates all around, Lemongrass tofu, two tofu noodle bowls and a claypot tofu. Dang fine stuff and company! Hey, here is the beer on draft list, well a sample of it:

Draftstache?

The One Hundred and Forty Eighth...

Number One Hundred and Forty Eight:

Sprout, Dinner, Hoppin' John Dragon Bowl

Okay, so Ceci and Lindsey and I met at the localvore Sprout for dinner, drinks and discussion about some WRIR 97.3 volunteer stuff. We had a hilariously grand time! Owner and chef, Laurie was in the house mixing it up awesome too! By the way, anyone that ever goes there should have the Dragon Bowl! It's an amazing combination of beans, rice, ham and seasonal veggies spiced just right for kick and taste. My first, and not my last! I can't believe I talked Lindsey into a 'stache! And while Ceci is still dubious and getting flack from people I am sure, she did manage to grab the decorative rosemary off the table for this, so it'll count!

The One Hundred and Forty Seventh...

Number One Hundred and Forty Seven:

Home, Dinner, Leftover Lasagna

Paint by Numbers, the sixth, another nice seafaring theme. I really enjoy the reflection of the light house in the water and the neat action of the gulls. The kind of ruined feel of the boat and dock in the foreground give it a nice touch as well. A very happy, uplifting kind of PBN. So awesome. You know what else is awesome? Leftover lasagna I made from Sunday! So good. Garfield had it right!

The One Hundred and Forty Sixth...

Number One Hundred and Forty Six:

Home, Dinner, Pork Tenderloin

Daffodils in Blue. Spring is here, but the chill of weather still gives you that not quite shorts and flip flops feeling.

Daffodilstache!

The One Hundred and Forty Fifth...

Number One Hundred and Forty Five:

Don Pedro 3, Lunch, Tacos & Burrito

Carolyn wanted to try this fairly new restaurant, I like chips n salsa with a meal. The price was right, the food was nothing special. Great space though and I am pretty sure whoever worked on the interior got a super super deal on lighting; it was a freaking chandelier corral in there. Take a look, seriously, it was like 2 per table, and then some! Maybe not only do you get chips and salsa with a meal, but you also get an extra light fixture! All lit up!

Chandelierstache!

The One Hundred and Forty Fourth...

Number One Hundred and Forty Four:

Dots Back Inn, Lunch, Corned Beef Hash

At the bar Seek and Find! See if you can find:

Pale Ale

Happy Easter

A Toaster

A lonely smiling Pear

Betty Boop Hair

My Napstache

FDR

Bacon

2 Water Pitchers

The One Hundred and Forty Third...

Number One Hundred and Forty Three:

Home, Dinner, Lasagna

So apparently the VCU Rams are in the Final Four for this year's NCAA Basketball tourney. I loved going to VCU, I was a punker dude, I majored in English, I went to the library to sleep sometimes, I never participated or went to any VCU sports event, they misspelled my name on my college diploma. Do I really care about the game tonight? No, not for real, really really, but it is kind of cool to see them go this far and I hope they win. We're watching the game, I made lasagna! I can say "Ram it!" and it now has two meanings! Here is my black and gold 'stache.

Ramstache, I guess.

The One Hundred and Forty Second...

Number One Hundred and Forty Two:

River's Bend Grill, Lunch, Chicken wrap & She crab soup

So the agenda for the Bk staff today was to get to a Chesterfield Public Library to sign up for cards in order to get access to Overdrive, basically an ebook (etc.) distributor with App capability; something our library is supposed to be getting as well. I Yelp search a restaurant for lunch and this place came up with some good reviews, heavy on the good lunch and great waitstaff vibe.

We go. It was.

It is in a new century type strip mall and as we pull up a ton of people are leaving, which is a good sign. We wait a few moments for someone to seat us, then this older gal with cool crazy hair poofed up in the back, our hostess, comes a chatting and seating us. I tell her I like her hair, she goes, "Really?!? Cuz (the other older waitress) thinks I look like some sort rooster, I get that from her. Hey (the other older waitress), he says he likes my hair!" "Shoot, you are crazy" Hilarious banter between the two happen and we all wind up getting in on it. The other older waitress, our waitress, is equally funny and joshing with us with the best of them. There was a lot of talk about the "crab balls" on the menu and how difficult it must have been to pry their little legs apart. Also some jokes were made about the mixed drink called the "stinky pinky". Super fun place with some great food. This would be a regular for us if it were only closer! Anyway, this is the hostess with the crazy cool hair. I asked her to turn her head a little, I think you can make some of the style going on there.

Waitstache!