From Yahoo: Chicago Says Farewell To Foie Gras.
[tags]chicago, foie gras[/tags]
Category: Friends
Scotsman
The Scotsman (a friend of my brother’s), his lovely wife fiance (who I’d heretofore thought imaginary, given her absence during my two previous visits to London) and a few of his friends were in town tonight, so we popped out for dinner and a drink with them. They’d had a bit too much to drink the night before, and The Scotsman has misplaced his lunch earlier after a flight (sort of), so it wasn’t quite the night of debauchery that it might have been otherwise.
We had a drink at the Irish Embassy, walked over to Golden Thai for some dinner (which was very good…handy to know, since we’ll be living nearby very soon) and then hit C’est What for a beer. That was about all they had in them, and we us. Hopefully we’ll see them again when they return on Saturday.
[tags]scotsman, irish embassy, golden thai, c’est what[/tags]
Ass-whuppin' indeed
My good friend MLS — who at this point must be staring at her pregnant belly and yelling, “Get the @$%& out!!” — wrote something today that made me howl:
“I’d like to compare how I am currently feeling, to what I imagine a small boy whould feel like who was just told by the school bully to meet him by the flagpole after class for a beating…Waiting is almost worse that the actual butt-kicking you are about to receive.”
She was due over a week ago; I was hoping she’d hold out until the 30th so her baby could share my birthday, but that date’s come and gone. Maybe she’ll match me in another way: I was 28 days overdue. Just kidding, M; I’m sure my mother wouldn’t wish that on anyone. Not only was I late, I was more than eleven pounds.
[tags]overdue babies, giant babies, giant overdue babies[/tags]
Bacchanalia
Haven’t…blogged…in…48 hours…must…catch…up…
Friday night five of us went out to a dinner organized by my lovely wife: we two, CBGB and T-Bone. It’s appropriate that T-Bone accompanied us that night; dinner was at The Fifth Grill (formerly just The Fifth, the top-notch Fench restaurant that started the Toronto careers of Didier Leroy and Marc Thuet, among others) and the menu item of choice was steak. We were meant to have a drink on the terrace, but it was blindingly hot outside, so the only place we could find a breeze was the smoking section. This simply was not on, so we took to our table a bit early.
After that, it becomes a blur of meat and wine; I had grilled tiger shrimp to start (others got mushroom ravioli and the tuna ceviche), and I went big on the steak: the 18 oz Delmonico. That’s a ribeye on the bone, and the chef’s opinion was that the bone counted for at least 2 of those ounces, while I would estimate that the fattier cut accounted for at least another ounce of waste, so I justified it to myself as a 15 oz steak. CBGB both got the New York strip, T-Bone got the bison ribeye and Nellie got the Filet Migon; while the flavour of my steak was excellent (thank you marbling!), GB and I had a bit of Nellie’s filet and agreed that the texture was impeccable. We were also allowed a choice of toppings on the steaks (I abstained, but others got scallops, shrimp and foie gras) and sauces (we had one of pretty much everything, but my favourite was the brandy peppercorn).
Did I mention our plan to becomes vegetarians?
Anyway, dessert was next; we took our time, imploring our stomachs to digest faster and make some room. CB and Nellie split a cheese plate, while T-Bone and I split the roasted hazelnut dacquoise with praline ice cream (GB got one for himself; he still had room for it, having found the willpower to stop eating his steak). It was good, but not great; however, they had written — very expertly, I might add — “Happy Birthday” on the plate in chocolate (it’s my birthday today, and was T-Bone’s birthday yesterday) and our server somehow snuck up the piano player and had him sing to us.
After all that food, I was ready for hibernation, so we took the back elevator down to the street…which was filled to overflowing with club-goers. We said our goodbyes and jumped on the subway.
.:.
Yesterday was a bit more low-key: CBGB came by post-karate and we popped over to the patio at The Pilot; thankfully the beer was cold, ’cause even in the shade it was microwave-hot. We sweated a while, bought some cookies from The Dessert Lady, got CB an icy drink from Starbucks and walked over to the Cumberland Theatre where we watched An Inconvenient Truth (imdb | rotten tomatoes). It’s less a movie or documentary, and more a very well-done Powerpoint presentation; I consider myself reasonably well-informed about the environment, so there wasn’t too much new for me, but Gore did manage to present it in a very compelling way. Hopefully a few folks will see it for whom it’s news.
After the movie we all lounged around our place for a bit before calling the Biryani House (the small one around the corner, not the fancy one at Wellesley) for some Indian food, and scarfed it down as we watched a few episodes of Arrested Development. It was a fun day with them. As Nellie and I were pretty wiped we just watched a movie — Derailed (imdb | rotten tomatoes) — after they left and fell asleep.
.:.
Speaking of food: I’m liking the new Chowhound design…especially the RSS feed for Ontario (which seems to mostly be Toronto)
.:.
Today — my actual birthday — been a nice one as well. Nellie took me to brunch on the patio at The Duke, bought me some gifts and is now busy in the kitchen making me a cake. How good is my life? 😀
[tags]fifth grill, didier, thuet, dessert lady, an inconvenient truth, biryani house, arrested development, chowhound, kickass wife[/tags]
I am not afraid of you and I will beat your ass
Just when I was getting my music inbox under control, it’s ballooned again, mostly because I finally got around to reading an Esquire article that I’d ripped out and left on my desk a month ago. It listed a few bands — the Cold War Kids and Murder By Death — whose myspace pages intrigued me enough to download their albums; if I like them (and early indications are that I will) I’ll begin the search for way to buy their obscure albums.
There are still more myspace pages in that article too; for now here’s the current playlist (including what might be the greatest album title of all time, courtesy of Yo La Tengo):
- johnny cash – a hundred highways
- yndi halda – enjoy eternal bliss
- yo la tengo – i am not afraid of you and i will beat your ass
- mates of state – bring it back
- ladyhawk – ladyhawk
- murder by death – in bocca al lupo
- cold war kids – up in rags
- cold war kids – with our wallets full
- cold war kids – mulberry street
.:.
Connections seem to be popping up for me all over the place on LinkedIn.com. My brother invited me…more than a year ago, I think, and I didn’t pay attention until recently, and suddenly everyone seems to be using it. My friend Joe pointed out that it’s almost as gay as Friendster. He’s right…but it’s still funny to see all the ex-Delanoids and remember some names from the past.
[tags]esquire, johnny cash, yndi halda, yo la tengo, mates of state, ladyhawk, murder by death, cold war kids, linkedin, friendster, delano technology[/tags]
"Yes, absolutely…what?"
As I lay on the couch last night, trying desperately not to feel like crap, Nellie popped in Shopgirl (imdb | rotten tomatoes). It was better than I thought it would be; I’d heard poor reviews when it first came out, and the trailers made it look like more of a cliche than it turned out to be. I’d say “elegant” is a pretty good word for it, perhaps “minimalist” fits as well. However, I’m doomed to always associate it with light-headedness and mild nausea.
.:.
I’m feeling better this morning, but hope to feel even better by tonight as we have dinner at Canoe (finally!) with T-Bone and I don’t want the experience to be muddied by, you know, feelings of impending death.
[tags]shopgirl, canoe[/tags]
Anglos make me spit
Last night we called up CBGB to see if they wanted a bite to eat. They did (after some phone tag) and we met them at The Auld Spot, which is quickly becoming a favourite spot. CB brought her mother along, and also arrived with some impressive news: she has passed her black belt test. Anyway, it was a good, jovial time, topped off by Nellie spitting her drink on CB’s mom when I told the story about confusing the waiter in Quebec City. Good times.
.:.
This morning I felt like crap. It wasn’t from overindulging last night; I felt the same as I did on Monday when I barely made it through a Summerlicious dinner. It actually got worse throughout the day, and we had to cancel our plans to attend T-Bone’s party. Speaking feeling sick, I’m getting lightheaded. Gotta finish this and lie down.
[tags]auld spot, feeling like ass[/tags]
Queasy
Well, we’re an unhealthy bunch here at the Dickinson ranch. I felt a little wonky all day; around 3:30 I felt fully wonky and left work, came home and laid on the couch until Nellie arrived. We had a summerlicious dinner tonight with some friends and I didn’t want to miss it, but didn’t really feel up to eating. I was actually a little dizzy until we got to the restaurant (Goldfish) and I had some bread and water. Now that I’ve eaten (it was pretty good, but not great) I feel better, but still just a little off. Nellie, on the other hand, started feeling nauseous toward the end of dinner and got progressively worse. I’ll just be happy if we can make it through the day sans vomit.
.:.
A phrase I never thought I’d type: Mogwai will be on the Miami Vice soundtrack.
.:.
More than 200 dead in Lebanon now, including several Canadians. The Guardian seems surprised that western powers haven’t intervened, but they shouldn’t be. The US has always back Israel very heavily; they won’t move to stop any Israeli attacks (within reason), and no other western or european country will do anything unless America makes a move first. Or perhaps what seemed in the Guardian like surprise was just veiled criticism?
I just bought a copy of Munich yesterday and began watching it today. I wonder if Ehud Olmert struggled with the moral justification of his reciprocal response as much as Golda Meir struggled with hers? I’m amazed anyone runs for political office in the middle east, knowing that you could — and probably will — have to make decisions like that.
[tags]goldfish, mogwai, miami vice, lebanon, canadians, israel, ehud olmert, golda meir[/tags]
8 oz. USDA Prime Beef With Brie de Meaux, Grilled Porcini & Shaved Summer Truffles
Last night kicked off this year’s Summerlicious fun. For the third time in as many years we went to Bymark, accompanied by T-Bone and #4 (as I believe he’s known). Let’s face it, we were there solely for the burger; it was as good this time as it had been in years past (I didn’t miss the foie gras). It normally costs $37, so you’d expect it to kick ass…and it does. Every time. The only bad part was that, due to our late reservation, we didn’t get to the burger until about 10:30 at night, so this morning when I woke up I could still feel the burger’s in my stomach.
We also got to try some Francis Coppola wine, followed by a bottle of Pacina. If a bottle had come out labelled “Brandino” or something it might’ve freaked me out.
.:.
Any plans I had of sleeping in a bit late this morning came crashing to a halt at exactly 7 AM when some yahoos started running jackhammers across the street. It was so loud the cats freaked out and hid in the den, and even closing the double windows couldn’t drown out the sound. I could even hear some guy out his balcony yelling, “Hey, shut the fuck up!!!!” at the jackhammering dudes, but to no avail. If anybody couldn’t hear, it was them. Anyway…it seemed a little early for such nonsense. Surely there’s a bylaw I could reference if I weren’t too lazy to complain…
.:.
After staying pretty much quiet for the whole offseason, the Canadiens have finally made a move or two: they dumped Richard Zednik before signing Mike Johnson and Sergei Samsonov. Zednik-for-Johnson is a good equation; adding Samsonov gives them more depth at centre, but it sure as shit doesn’t give them more size. They might be going for some sort of record; has any team ever started the year with 4 centres under 6 feet? If they dump Radek Bonk I believe they’ll manage it (’cause no way on God’s green earth is Mike Ribeiro 6 feet tall).
The Raptors have made some minor moves as well, adding two European players (Jorge Garbajosa and Anthony Parker) and signing John Salmons this afternoon. And, of course, there was the trade for T.J. Ford a while back.
.:.
If you watched The Daily Show last night you saw Ted Stevens, the Senator from Alaska, make a fool of himself trying to explain net neutrality to Congress. As this ABC article says, “It’s too obvious that this man has no idea what the Internet is exactly and no idea about the issues behind Net neutrality. It seems like a miracle that he can even find the crapper.”
You can hear the pitiful shilling here. By the way, dig how he pronounces “Deutsche”.
.:.
Also on The Daily Show last night: Shawn Wayans, star of the upcoming Little Man, which appears to be a right piece of shit. It has a 20% rating on Rotten Tomatoes right now, just slightly worse than the 22% sported by You, Me and Dupree.
.:.
Finally, and obviously most troubling, is what’s happening in the middle east. Israel didn’t want their soldiers to be kidnapped, but they’ll certainly sieze the opportunity to go on the offensive. The US will obviously back Israel should anything escalate, just as Syria and Iran will back Hezbollah activity in Lebanon. The question, in my mind, is whether Saudi Arabia and/or Egypt would intervene if Israel moves more aggressively into Lebanon, or even against Syria. If the US found itself trying to decide between Israel and Saudi, all while fighting a war in Iraq and rattling sabres at Iran…it could get even messier (if that’s possible).
[tags]summerlicious, bymark, francis coppola, pacina, canadiens, richard zednik, mike johnson, sergei samsonov, anthony parker, john salmons, daily show, ted stevens, net neutrality, little man, dupree, israel, lebanon[/tags]
Tension
We’re sitting on the patio at the Duke of York right now, having just watched England and Portugal play to a 0-0 draw after 90 minutes. Extra time coming up. There are large number of anxious England fans, and two not-so-smart Portugal fans.
We got out to the Rebel House last night, and CBGB came along. The British among us were jet lagged and left early-ish; we had a few more drinks and went back to our place…where we talked about socioeconomics until 2 in the morning. Seriously.
[tags]world cup, england, portugal, rebel house, duke of york[/tags]
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 