Friday's events and Dinner Review

Friday was a full day.
Breakfast was wheat toast and coffee and checking email (EE devotion) and prioritizing the day.

After printing the promo cards and writing and rewriting the into letter, I finally got all of my school packets done. Envelopes stuffed, addressed and ready to roll.
Made a few business calls and got a few things squared away.

Lunch was scrambled eggs and spinach salad and diet drink.

Dusted, cleaned glass, straightened bathroom, put up some new brackets, did dishes.
I talked to the company who screwed up my ad and I think I can get it straightened out via email. They at least seem willing to try. That's good.

Researched a couple of things online and reviewed some new photo lab info.

A friend came by to drop off my floor sweeper thingy he'd borrowed and left with my trash(thereby saving me a trip to the dump). Nice guy!

I took Elvis over to our favorite National Forest trail and had a pretty strenuous workout. I returned home to practice my martial arts stuff (I've GOT to get a kick-bag) and stretch thoroughly. I felt good(except for this headache I've had for the last 3 days-I don't know where that's coming from).

My friend B picked me up at 6:30 and we headed over to the Bistro. I enjoyed positively dreamy crabcakes (they make the best I have ever tasted) with sweet potato fries and a mixed green salad with excellent ranch dressing. This was accompanied by a most excellent Australian Shiraz. B partook of the Cajun Chicken Pasta. He enjoyed the Shiraz, as well.

My Review:

Crab Cakes: the inside consisted of tender lump crab meat of the highest quality barely held together by an almost non-existent sweet, creaminess which perfectly accentuated the natural sweetness and texture of the crab; slightly crisp on the outside with a bit of hot spiciness, but not too much...no, never too much.

Cajun Chicken Pasta: angel hair, cooked al dente, smothered in a sauce of pure cream, lightly salted butter and cajun spices, with baby spinach and chopped tomatoes to offset the heat of the red pepper. Perfect consistency, not too thick, and served in generous portions.

Absolutely delicious. It was just a lovely meal.
We got a piece of M's (the Bistro proprietor) excellent chocolate cake to take home as an accompaniment to the 10 yr old tawny port we sipped later in the evening.

The evening was made memorable, however, for reasons other than just the food. An older gentleman (whom I have since learned is a local leader in the banking industry), was setting up to entertain the patrons with live music--well sorta. He began by playing the sax tolerably well, but accompanied by only a recorded back up track-- karaoke style. O0hh-kay. Then he began to sing some old big band type numbers like "Ain't Misbehavin'" and "Where or When"-----VERY BADLY. I mean the guy was trying to scat, for garsh sakes! That was really something to see. 60ish, white, bald, a little paunchy, no eye contact with the crowd whatsoever, just sort of rocking/bouncing side to side, mostly under his breath--SCATTING.
And to make things a little more interesting, the whole evening was being broadcast online by a couple of college age computer-geek-looking guys with all there techno gadgets spread around the place. Probably the funniest part was that our banker cum karaoke bar patron cum entertainment-for-the-evening, obviously had a bunch of friends and family (and probably some folks just trying to suck-up to the old guy for, like free checking or low interest loans or something, I don't know) who were just clapping and cheering for all they were worth after every embarrassing performance.
It was really quite surreal. B and I just kept looking at each other with disbelief and discreetly giggling (well, I giggled, but B's was more of a manly chuckle, ahem). Funny stuff.

You know, I give a lot of credit to anyone who practices and hones their skills as a performer to a point where they can entertain an audience. That's gotta take some guts, to get up in front of all of those folks and do your thing. I would just caution that you might want to be sure your "thing" is good enough to actually ENTERTAIN the folks BEFORE you get up there.

Well, anyway.
I'm going to see an Irish band in Charlottesville tonight at a newly renovated theatre downtown. I hope it's good. It's a long ways to drive an a chilly, damp night. And I'm not really feeling all that great. Kinda headachey, stomach achey.

I need to get Elvis out for a walk and then finish some photo stuff before I start to think about the concert. What the heck am I gonna wear?

Gotta run. Chow!