I am a Woman, and I love Nerd Culture: Zanzabar

Sonofabitch.

Yeah, I know I normally try to steer clear of expletives on this relatively family-friendly blog, but trust me, that's the most mild expletive I can come up with to describe my frustration.

Few things irk me more than when I go to bat for a person, an organization, what-have-you... only to turn around and realize that they've failed in some other, major, egregious way.

In my last blog post, I went to bat for Zanzabar over the idiocy that blew up in response to their (brief) decision to invite only U of L fans to view the game last Saturday. I defended their choice. And I said:

Zanzabar is my favorite place to see live music.  Their food is awesome. Fabulous beer selection. And best of all: TATER TOTS!! I'm totally looking forward to seeing Diego Garcia there again in a couple of weeks (April 14). I am sending the folks at Zbar my very best wishes for a NOT STUPID game day. I really hope that all this shizz is a bunch of online troll bluster. And I hope all this bluster doesn't scare people away from a great venue to watch the game. Godspeed, Zanzabarers!

This evening, the Guy and I were chit-chatting about said flare-up, and he mentioned that one of his female friends was a little bit pleased that Zanzabar was catching some sh*t about something because she was disgusted by their most recent LEO WEEKLY ad.

I had no idea what he was talking about.

But a little noodling on his iPhone produced this image promoting their pinball tournament. (The Guy, who was recently called "the funniest actor in Louisville" said, "But see... you couldn't even play pinball with her straddling the machine like that. She's covering up the bumpers.")

No, I'm not going to import it to the blog. I don't want that crap to grace these pages.

Seriously, Zanzabar? What the holy hell?

I am a woman, and I love nerd culture. And one of the many things I love about Zanzabar is all the nerdy shizz that they engage in. The vintage video games. The pinball tournaments. The spelling bees. The 70's promotional posters for Louisville that grace their walls.

But when they bust out the ugliest, most stereotypical pandering to nerd-dom, they've lost me.

I don't play pinball. But that's not because I am a woman. It's because I was born hand-eye-coordination challenged and that has been complicated by the lingering neuropathy associated with my chemo treatments a few years back. I wish I could play pinball. I wish I could play video games (although, I am secretly glad I can't... I'm just obsessive enough that I could see me getting so sucked in that my "real life" would suffer).

With this ad, Zanzabar is saying "'we assume that most of our players are [heterosexual twenty-something-year-old dudes], so we're not even going to pretend we care about anyone else.' That sucks. That's a problem. And that's what needs to start changing."

The quotes there are because I am quoting a particularly awesome episode of MovieBob's "The Big Picture" vlog called GENDER GAMES. The battle between feminists and nerd culture has been visited and revisted ad infinitum. And maybe I am biased because MovieBob is my cousin, but I think his take on it is particularly brilliant (embedded left).

Zanzabar-ers-- Stop it. Just effing stop it. Gender-ing a game as basic as pinball is lousy and cheap. Why is it that twenty-something-year-old hipsters these days seem to be as misogynistic as my sixty-something-year-old uncles?

On the Big Game

I've discovered these past few weeks that, for me, college basketball is a really social thing. Roommate has been out of town for almost all of the NCAA tournament, and I just can't seem to muster the will to watch a game alone.  Or more accurately... to watch a game without him. I won't go so far as to say it would feel like "cheating" to watch a game with others-- it wouldn't, and I'd be happy to hit up BWW's with some other friends. But the thought of doing so does kind of make me miss him more than I already do. (Everybody, all together now: "Awwwww.")

That being said, I am pretty much "on the bench" for the Dream Game 2 or Battle of the Bluegrass or what-have-you. My Meatspace Workplace job has me running a high school prom that night at 9pm. So even if I could find a viewing party to crash (and I have a feeling that wouldn't be a problem), there would be no beers involved for Lou, and that's kind of unacceptable.

Not really sure where that leaves me for Saturday's game, but honestly... some of this asinine rival hysteria is getting to be a real turn-off, in general.

I was a Cards fan before I moved to Louisville because Roommate really loved Pitino, and he made me read one of Pitino's inspirational book (either that or the book was in his bathroom in Knoxville when I briefly lived there with him, and I ended up reading it on my own; I forget which). I'm less of a Pitino fan now since he had sex with That Woman, not because I think it's any of my (our, your) business what he does with his sex life but because there was so much that was just so downright sleazy about the whole situation that I really have a problem looking at him without cringing.

But the fact that I am a Cards fan had no influence over my reaction to seeing Zanzabar's Facebook post about hosting "U of L fans only" on Saturday night.  I thought it seemed like a totally reasonable idea.  This IS Louisville. It IS pretty close to campus. And when they said that they did it because they didn't want fighting, I never once thought that this was Zbar wagging their finger at "dangerous" UK fans. U of L fans can be knuckleheads too. And just a little while ago, we had a bar right here in town called Big Blue Country-- not exactly laying out the welcome mat for Cards fans.

Well, the hoo-hah that descended upon the poor Zbar on their Facebook page? Oh sweet mother of Crumb. Ugly. Vicious. And ignorant as all get-out.

I was going to go into the controversy  in greater detail, but it looks like the illustrious Kenny Bloggins has already taken on this issue.  I urge you to check out his take down of the "OCCUPY ZANZABALLS" movement spawned by this business decision.  A business decision that has been reversed.

And settle the hell down, basketball fans!

Zanzabar is my favorite place to see live music.  Their food is awesome. Fabulous beer selection. And best of all: TATER TOTS!! I'm totally looking forward to seeing Diego Garcia there again in a couple of weeks (April 14). I am sending the folks at Zbar my very best wishes for a NOT STUPID game day. I really hope that all this shizz is a bunch of online troll bluster. And I hope all this bluster doesn't scare people away from a great venue to watch the game. Godspeed, Zanzabarers!

And geez Louise, people.  All this ridiculousness, as I said, is a huge turn-off.  Instead of feeling psyched about all the attention our city has been getting from the sports world, I'm starting to feel like I wish the spotlight didn't shine so bright.  Because right now it's highlighting a lot of the idiots.

I know that this doesn't mean much coming from someone who could still be considered an "outsider." I know it hasn't happened since 1983. I know it's super duper exciting. But can our fan groups not beat up on each other quite so viciously?? -- especially not so damned publicly??  It makes the rest of us look bad.

Seriously, super fans. What do you think this city is? A dialysis clinic?

Summer Adventures 2011: Nerd Camp is a Wrap

A very rare blue first edition of Huckleberry Finn.

If you're a taxpayer in the United States-- yes, you-- then, thank you.  Thanks for a lot of things, of course, but a very special thank you from me to you.  You funded my trip to Nerd Camp.  Or, specifically, you funded the National Endowment for the Humanities, which in turn granted me this three-week, uber-nerdy, life-broadening, brain-fortifying adventure.

Every year the NEH sends dozens of American K-12 teachers to these various nerd-programs, and every year these dozens of teachers return to their classrooms renewed, refreshed, and with new skills and knowledge to impart to the youth-that-are-our-future.

That's a beautiful thing.  The very kind of beautiful thing that is probably in jeopardy in our current economic crisis.  

But I digress.

I spent three weeks in intensive study of Mark Twain, specifically of the Mark Twain where Sam Clemens became Mark Twain-- Virginia City, NV-- and the Mark Twain of Hartford, CT, where he wrote most of his most famous books.  And I came away understanding that Twain is both more and less  than I had always imagined him to be. More creative. More clever. More warm and charming.  Less kind. Less successful. Less modern.  

Twain wrote because he was compelled to write.  To this day, we discover an average of three new letters written by Twain each week.   But he was not compelled to be an author.  Twain was an author for the paycheck; he hoped each book he published would be the one to set him up for life, so he'd never have to write another book again.  All of his many (many, many) failed financial ventures were get-rich-quick ploys.  

Twain didn't want to work.  He wanted to play.  His dreams of "big money" weren't for himself, a humble boy from Hannibal; they were for his family.  He wanted make sure his wife, Livy, could live the way she was accustomed to living, wanted to live up to the New England moneyed class he'd married into, but he wanted to do so with as little work as possible.

And writing and public speaking were his only successful ventures.

My feelings of kinship with Twain went beyond the connection forged by spending three weeks of all-Twain-all-the-time.  Went beyond the connection forged by walking where he walked, getting to bypass the velvet ropes and stepping deep into his rooms, looking at personal items normally only viewed by museum archivists.  

If you've been reading this blog while I've been away, you'll know I suffered financial and technological distress, stresses that he wrestled with all of his life**.  Most importantly, though, Twain's conflicts between work and play spoke to my soul.

I learned a lot about Twain these past few weeks, but after spending just about every waking moment with 23 other teachers I learned lot about teachers and teaching too. The most disturbing thing I learned: teachers everywhere are struggling.

Keep in mind that this group of teachers were some of the best of the best.  They're the (ill-paid) teachers who spend their own money to buy t-shirts for the Math Club because there's no money in the budget.  They're the (ridiculously overworked) teachers who are the first to get to school and last to leave so that their students can have all the extra help they need.  These aren't the teachers who phone it in, who teach their classes and get out, who chose to be teachers for the summers off.  They're the kind of teachers who choose to take three weeks out of their hard-earned summers to, essentially, work.  Hard. (No lie, but a lot of it was fun too.) They came from all over the country, from all different kinds of schools.

And out of 24 teachers, only two or maybe three were happy.

And the problem was never "the kids." You know me: I'm a passionate defender and advocate of teenagers. And these were my people. To a person, what these teachers loved most about their jobs were the kids.  The problem was all the other hooey. State mandates. Standardized tests that dictate curriculum. Overbearing parents. Poor pay. Administrators that behave like CEO's. Overcrowded classrooms. Job insecurity. Meaningless budgets.

It's been a bad year for teachers. We've been told by politicians and the mainstream media that we are "part-time employees."  That we're "overpaid." That whole school systems of us can be pink-slipped at whim. I remember rocking the boat at my old job, once upon a time, and being told by the headmistress of the school that "English teachers were a dime a dozen." That cut me to the core; it felt so personal and so demeaning. And now all teachers are essentially being told that.

And if you think it's not sending shock waves through our society, that it's just the rhetoric of some blow-hard tea partiers, you're wrong. You better believe that parents are hearing this and buying into it. And you'd better believe that they're passing these sentiments onto their kids.

Despite only having a 5th grade education, Twain was a fierce advocate of public schools.  He said, "Out of the public schools grows the greatness of the nation." I'm not a public school teacher, but most of my Twainiac (apparently that's the accepted term for a Twain nerd) friends are. We need more Twains; heck, we need more Matt Damons. Michelle Malkin, on the Fox News Website, wrote an article called "Matt Damon's Silly Teacher Rant" and epitomizes all the anti-teacher sentiment that I'm talking about. It literally hurts me to read these kinds of things.

For the first time in eleven-plus years of being a teacher, I'm not really looking forward to going back to school. My Twainiac teacher friends fired me up and inspired me to do better, to be more creative, to give even more of myself. But their stories amplified my own gnawing feeling that it's not a good time to be a teacher. That we're under fire. That teaching is no longer a "noble profession."

I learned a heck of a lot at Nerd Summer Camp. If you're ever curious about the social and technological developments during the Comstock Era of silver and gold mining in Nevada, buy me a beer, and I'll chat your ear off.  If you want to know how the Colt gun manufacturer not only made Hartford the richest city in the East for a time but also helped make manifest Manifest Destiny in the West, I'm your girl. But what I'll probably remember most about my Nerd Summer Camp experience is that teachers are an amazing lot, and I'm honored to be counted among them.

[calls for a minion to bring a step ladder and then steps off her high horse]

**When all was said and done, Chase Bank did a reasonably decent job dealing with my account hacking. The upshot was that I dealt almost exclusively in cash this past month and was exceptionally more frugal than I normally than I usually am.  And that's not a bad thing.  But the stress was paralyzing at times.  And the computer thing was almost an unmitigated disaster, but I ended up being very lucky.  On the downside, I lost the use of my computer for three weeks, lost precious writing time, and lost upwards of a year's worth of pictures, writing, and music uploads.  On the upside, my computer was rebuilt almost from scratch and Apple waived all fees even though I was 55 days out of warranty.   Big gold stars to the Genius Bar at the West Farms Mall Apple Store in Connecticut.

Not Always Good News Lou

Admittedly, I've had my panties in a bunch all day.  I overslept this morning (not for anything in particular, but it set my day wrong from the start).  Then I woke up and saw that someone was bitching about my grammar on last night's blog post and then excusing her bitching by saying that she "had to comment" because she was a teacher (Yes, folks, I'm a teacher. An English teacher, to boot. The grammar issue was that I had used "that" instead of "who" when referring to a group of people**.). And then Roommate was still so sick, and I felt bad because I basically made him come out to the Waterfront show on the 4th when he really should have stayed home in bed.  (It was really fun, and he had lots of fun, but still... bad best friend).  And then, and then...

But even so, I'm not always the Good News Blogger.  (That's here-- and by the way, she won 3rd place for Best Louisville Website from Louisville Magazine this month... and while I'm gearing up to bitch: THIRD place? Really? We can do better folks.)  So there's this:

I can't believe more people aren't talking about the fact that we had THREE murders in Louisville on July 5. Them's New Orleans numbers, folks. There was a murder-suicide at LG&E this afternoon, and two young men were shot in the middle of the night at Sheppard Square in Smoketown. Totally tragic. Three murders on the same day means that yesterday represented 10% of the murders for the whole year so far for Louisville.

And barely a peep.  Heck, you know that I love WFPL with a burning NPR-geek love, but the Sheppard Square homicides didn't even warrant a mention on their news blog.  (If the Courier-Journal is in a downward spiral-- which it is-- we need to look to someone to pick up the slack, and I'm hoping it will be WFPL.)

But you know why we didn't hear torrents of dismay on the Twitterbox and in the mainstream media in general?  Because everyone and their sweet little Auntie Mae were frothing at the mouth about the Casey Anthony verdict. This generation's OJ Simpson (who wasn't even a sexy former-NFL-player/actor before the crime-- oh come on now, he was sexy) hogged the airwaves and threatened to crash the interwebs.

Remember what I said about media not existing in a vacuum?  That every newspaper (like the C-J) is moving closer to being the mutant offspring of Sports Illustrated and People Magazine?  The media is giving the People what they want.  The Nancy Graces of the world exist because people WANT THEM TO.

According to Twitter (and I have no evidence that this is spot-on truth, but the number seems reasonable), in 2008-- the year that Caylee Anthony was murdered (or died in a pool, or whatever)-- 569 children under the age of 4 were murdered.  Heinous, tragic, awful.  As someone who is not necessarily childless by choice, I always have a steaming, irrationally extreme hatred for anyone who mistreats a child.  A child is a gift and a blessing and a miracle.  If you're lucky enough to have one (or two or nineteen), be the best parent you can possibly be. It's the most important job you'll ever have.

We did this, folks.  We created Casey Anthony, "Media Superstar."  And not only did she overshadow all national news today (oil spill in Montana, anyone?), she overshadowed the important news that 10% of the murders for 2011 in Louisville were committed today.  And that made this already-too-cynical blogger more cynical than ever.  We need to be better than this.

*gets off soapbox, kicks it over, and exits stage right*

** Yes, the grammar was wrong.  No, I'm not going to fix it.

(If You Can Afford To) Buy Nothing Day

Two weeks from tonight is Black Friday: the day that every big box retailer under the sun offers huge discounts; the day many folks haul their turkey-stuffed bellies out of bed at the crack of dawn or earlier for doorbuster sales; the day that-- inevitably-- some poor soul gets trampled underfoot of a $5-crockpot-crazed Walmart crowd.

As reliable as Black Friday is, so are the emails, blog posts, posters, and websites reminding us it is also Buy Nothing Day.

And the part of me that abhors abject consumerism, Walmart, and the idea that people actually get mauled-- sometimes to death-- on their way to grab an XBox for their kid really wants to throw my support behind Buy Nothing Day.  In fact, for years I did buy in.  Spent the day after Thanksgiving nursing an over-full tummy and just generally chilling out.

But then came the year that I decided to buy Big Mama Lou a dvd player for Christmas.  And Radio Shack had a sale... a really good sale... like 50% even its best sale prices.

See here's the thing-- and I know I'm hardly the first person to voice this opinion-- the idea of Buy Nothing Day is a good one, but it comes from a place of privilege.   I totally support you if you decide to abstain from Black Friday and subscribe to the Buy Nothing Day ideal, but I don't endorse it.  And I likely won't embrace it myself.

Most of you know that my Meatspace Workplace job is teaching.  And I'm sure ALL of you know that educators (noble profession, helping the chirren, paving the road to our collective futures... blah blah blah) get shit for pay.  (I won't even honor that statement by adding my usual asterisk-- "sh*t"doesn't do it justice.)  But many, many millions of folk out there make do with significantly less than my salary, and often have children, spouses, and extended families to support.

And the hard truth is: stuff is cheap on Black Friday.  Plain and simple.  And I know many people who do the bulk of their Christmas/Holiday shopping on Black Friday for that reason.  I'm related to many of those people.  And heck, some years I am those people.

If you want to buy your mama a dvd player for Christmas and can get one on Black Friday for $29, you shouldn't be made to feel morally and spiritually and culturally inferior for saving $20 the day after Thanksgiving.

Now, I'm not the least bit adverse to the idea that we've turned these winter holidays into crazy fraking STUFF-GIVING shells of the spiritual occasions that they are SUPPOSED to be.  Amen.  I hear ya.  And I'm with ya.  But I do know that if I am the lone relative to show up at the Lou Family Christmas sans gifts, I will not be thought of as the "Lou who gave the family the gift of her love and presence" but rather as the "Lou who was a stingy bitch this year."

Yes, it would be lovely if there were a culture shift.  But that hasn't happened.

Yes, I solemnly swear that if there ever is a Baby Lou, I will raise him or her differently.

But no, I'm not going to trumpet the Buy Nothing Day cause.  That being said, I will wholeheartedly encourage you to bring a winter coat to the Green Building at 9am on Buy Nothing Day.  From the press release:

The event will be hosted and coordinated by The Green Building and Ted Loebenberg, of Brokers Unlimited Inc Professional Auctioneers.  Ted coordinated several years of successful coat drives in his native Rhode Island, and is now excited to bring the initiative to Louisville.

Anyone wishing to donate a winter coat, or many winter coats, as often churches and community groups collect coats to bring to the event en masse, is encouraged to bring it to The Green Building, 732 East Market Street, on November 26th, 2010 at 9a.  

Anyone who needs a winter coat, or winter coats for their family, is most welcome to come to the event between 10 AM and 2 PM on the 26th and take what coats they need.  

Change Your (writing) Life in Ten Days

I've written about Writers Retreat Workshop before. The last time, it was a bit more nuts and bolts. (Click on the link in the first sentence for that entry) But I'm going to pitch it again because it's such a huge, important part of my life.

Eight years ago (almost), I attended my first WRW. I won the Robin Hardy New Student Scholarship (PDF application) and got to go for free. But even when I found out that I had won free tuition, I was super skeptical. I think I was having a Woody Allen moment: Did I really want to be part of a club that wanted me as a member? But I got over my insecurities, in no small part due to some long and involved email correspondences with one of the staff members: a very patient, very persuasive man who will henceforth be known as "Roommate."

Yes, that Roommate.

WRW is a ten-day, very intensive (think "boot camp") residential program for aspiring novel writers. But in the past eight years, I've seen memoir writers and screenplay writers and short stories writers go through the program and benefit as much as I did.

For the past blue million years (well, ok, the program was founded in 1987, so that's hyperbole), WRW has been held at the Marydale Retreat Center in Erlanger, KY. And honestly, even back in 2002 when I first attended WRW, if you'd asked me what I thought about WRW, I would have said that I had had ten of the most perfect days of my life... except that the facilities were kind of shabby.

So this year, WRW has BIG news. The program is relocating to the Saint Joseph's Retreat Center in Owensboro, KY. And holy cow, this place looks GORGEOUS. And, best of all, Louisvillagers, it's still basically in our back yard!

Listen, WRW changed my life in so many ways. I know I've taken some time off from "serious" writing lately for any number of reasons, not the least of which has been the after-effects of chemo. So I may not strike you as a "serious" writer. But I used to be. Pre-cancer, fiction writing was part of my daily life. And I hold out so much hope that this summer I'll be able to be a "real" writer once again. But before WRW, my writing was a hobby. Like scrapbooking or collecting troll dolls. After I went to one WRW, I felt legit. I felt validated. I felt like I knew so much more about not only the craft of writing but the business of writing. And don't kid yourself, kids, writing is very much a business.

But no smoke and mirrors here: WRW gave me so much more than that. WRW gave me Roommate, my very best friend and partner in crime since 2002. A couple years after I first attended, the founder retired and handed the reins over to Roommate, and he has run it ever since. And I have to admit, when I see Roommate teach the new student classes, I get chills.

WRW also gave me a new family of all of the attendees since 2002 and the core staff. It gave me a built-in cheerleading section for all of my successes since 2002, and a source of support for all of my trials since then.

And, frankly, I think you'd be hard pressed to find an attendee who didn't feel exactly the same way.

Do you need a "name" to attract you to program? How about this one: Michael Palmer. Palmer is the author of 14 medical thriller novels, some of which have ended up on the NYTimes bestsellers list. Palmer and his son, Daniel, a debut novelist, will be there teaching classes. In past years, the program has featured teachers/guests (both in person and via teleconference) such as Dean Koontz, Ayelet Waldman, Nancy Picard, Gregory McDonald, and Trish McGregor.

Folks who have been through the program and gone on to success include: Janet Chapman, Christine Goff, Jack Getze, Kimberly Frost... and many more.

You fancy yourself a writer? A fiction writer? A novelist? Gosh darn, kids... I promise you, you won't regret attending the Writers Retreat Workshop. You just won't. Expert advice. Thoughtful guidance. Good damn people. Always.

You want to know more? Email me at lou (at) loueyville.com. I will answer your questions and give you more personal testimony.

In the meantime: This year's WRW is June 10-19 in Owensboro, KY. I'm 99.9% sure that the new student scholarship is still accepting applications. Pass this along to your writer friends. I would sure love to welcome them into MY WRW family.

Visit the website at: Writers Retreat Workshop

BOGO: A Rant

So, it's another chilly, yucky night here in Louisville, hot on the heels of another chilly, yucky day, and I'm crankier than usual. Despite the awesome weekend spent with my best friend, Cousin Lou, and the four day week, I feel like I did two days of work today at my meatspace job, and I'll have to tackle the same workload tomorrow.

And all I really want right now is to bundle up in my big puffy down coat and head on out to a local eatery and have me some beers and comfort food. It's Tuesday, so the logical choice would also be the closest: Buy One Get One Burger Night at the MonkeyWrench.

But the problem is obvious: I'm flying solo tonight. There's no "get one" option for me. Sure, maybe back in the 90's when I had an awesome metabolism and food flew through me like mercury, leaving no trace on my gut or my hips, I might have been able to scarf down two burgers. But now, I can barely finish one.

And this just seems to always be the case for discounts on food here in Louisville. Every year, I buy the Entertainment coupon books, and almost all of the restaurant offers are BOGO. Today the Louisville Originals had their several-times-a-year discounted gift certificate sale. Ignoring the fact that it's nigh impossible to actually snag the certificates to the more popular restaurants unless you log in right when they go on sale, the certificate dollar amounts (which don't cover drinks, usually) are too high for a single diner. I couldn't possibly spend $50 at Avalon, by myself, without drinks (include the drinks, and that's another story entirely). Restaurant.com often features gift certificates at 80% off, but most of the certificates require a $35 minimum purchase, before drinks.

All of this is fine and good when Roommate is in town. When he's around, we pretty much do most evening stuff together, and that includes dinner. But-- and it makes me a little misty just thinking about it-- 2010 may very well be the year that our seven year cohabitation draws to a close. And then I'll be a solo diner more often than not.

I know what you're going to say, Dear Reader. "Get some goddamn friends, Lou!"

2009 was the year that I finally got some friends, thankyouverymuch.

The point is that I like being a solo diner. Sometimes, more often than not actually, there's nothing better than a pint and a burger in the company of a good book.

Just last night, I actually lied to Big Mama Lou and told her I was "meeting friends" for dinner and a late movie. I had no intention of meeting friends. I hadn't even made the offer. But Big Mama-- though she's been single since 1977-- thinks I'm weird for enjoying my own company so much. To the best of my knowledge, Big Mama has never gone out to dinner alone-- at least not in her hometown. And I know for a fact that she's never been to a movie theater alone.

So, this isn't a "Poor Lou doesn't have anyone to play with" rant. This is a rant about the fact that discount restaurant offers don't work for us singletons (oh, I hate that I just typed that word) because they're created with couples (or more) in mind. Let's face it, us solo diners are also obviously living in single-income situations-- who needs to save money more than solo diners?

Last Friday, I took advantage of Dragon King's Daughter's nightly late night happy hour (10p-12p) where they have a large menu of discounted sushi. It was lovely, and I'm going to do it again very soon. But, only after I ordered my drink (hot sake) did the bartender tell me that I could take home the rest of the $10 bottle of wine that was on sale. So, that's a solo diner win. But their ginormous sushi rolls are a bit of a challenge for one stomach. One isn't enough and two is too many, and when you have sushi it's really nice to have a couple of different things to eat.

What's the solution? In a perfect world, I'd love to see sushi restaurants in general, and Dragon King's late night menu in particular, offer half-rolls. It's a total win for everyone. For the single diner. For the adventurous diner who doesn't want to commit to a full order of a roll he/she hasn't tried. For the restaurant for any number of reasons. Just a thought.

And BOGO restaurants? How's about just saying half-off? I promise you, Monkeywrench, give me a half-off burger, and my bar tab will make it worth your while. And all you discount restaurant gift certificate folks, would it kill you to include alcohol? Or to create different options for the single diner? $20 for one person? $35 for two?

My tummy is growling. Off to figure out the food situation. And despite having hundreds of bucks in gift certificates and coupons at my finger tips, I'm sure I'll pay full price.

Desiring a Streetcar

Whenever I tell someone that I am a New Orleans transplant, inevitably that person says something along the lines of: "Wow, that must have been culture shock." And that inevitably leads to me spouting off all of the reasons why Louisville is kind of like New Orleans in a lot of subtle, but important (to me), ways. Great arts scene. Good music. Good food. Very neighborhood oriented. Walkable. Victorian architecture. Blue oasis in a sea of red. Wonderful bars (and late night closing). Not to mention the whole fleur-de-lis thing.

Today Broken Sidewalk features an article about a proposal for a Bardstown Road streetcar from the Douglas Loop to Baxter (and beyond!). And all I can say to that is: YES, PLEASE!

I miss a lot of stuff about New Orleans and on that list of myriad loves is the rattletrap sound of the streetcar clattering down St. Charles. It's a sound that became all the more significant to me (and I daresay all New Orleanians) after Katrina because it was silenced for so many months. I still remember the first day that I heard the streetcar resume its abbreviated route after all of the post-Katrina repairs. I cried. (Of course, EVERYTHING made me cry in the months after Katrina)

Not only does a streetcar make excellent sense for commuters and neighborhood consumers, but the St. Charles streetcar is one of New Orleans's biggest tourist attractions. In Louisville, too many convention-goers don't venture much further than Fourth Street Live, and Lord knows none of us want Mr. and Ms. Convention-Goer to return to their hometowns thinking THAT'S what Louisville has to offer. No more than your average New Orleanian wants tourists to go home thinking the French Quarter IS New Orleans. (Not that you can compare the two: historic national park vs. Cordish chain mall)

A Bardstown streetcar would bring tourists and conventioneers to the "real" Louisville and plunk them right down in the middle of a sea locally-owned businesses. That means dinner money spent at Ramsi's rather than TGIFridays. That means cocktail hour at Avalon and not the Hard Rock. That means a book for the plane ride home bought at Carmichael's and not at Borders.

I'll say it again: yes, please!

Friday Night Randomness

Thoughts and blather...

• Wow, the whole Pitino extortion story gets all Weekly World News-ish weird. Okay, maybe not THAT weird, but still wicked weird. The allegation is here.

• I have a big ol' Portuguese family, so the odds were pretty good that more than one of us would put our gift for useless but uber-nerdy knowledge to use in a blog. I'm pretty proud of my baby cousin MOVIEBOB, though. He's been nominated for at least one super geeky award. (Although big cousin Lou just surpassed him by two on her Google reader subscriptions-- take that, geekchild!) Check him out. He kind of rocks.
  

• City Block is closing. The only concert I've ever felt compelled to attend there was Hanson. And I didn't. But, come on... "Mmmm Bop" makes you smile, doesn't it? Smile big and perky? I need to go download that right now.
  

• The tix for the Holy Trinity at Slugger Field are a whopping $69.50. If you've been thinking about asking Lou out for a date but have just been too shy or too nervous, now's the time. Yes, I'll go to see Dylan/Willie/Mellencamp with you. And I'll even buy the hot dogs... if you'll just snag us a couple of tickets.
  

• Big Mama Lou is visiting for the weekend, and as I dropped her off at the Residence Inn (where I lived in Ike-delivered exile for nearly six months... it was actually awfully nice to see the place, especially the front desk crew, again) I was happy to see that Market Street from DCE to Baxter was hopping. Big Mama and I will be hitting the Cherokee Triangle Art Fair tomorrow in this absolutely blissed-inducing weather.

Hope the weather induces bliss in you as well this weekend.

An Open Letter to Local Business Owners

My dear purveyors of good stuff,

Right now, I live in a hotel. And before you ask, the answer is: No, there's nothing glamorous about living in a hotel. I used to think living in a hotel would be sexy. Manny Ramirez lived in a hotel the whole time he played for the Sox. Kelsey Grammar's character in the tragically short-lived sitcom "Back to You" lived and loved in a hotel room. Heck, it worked for Zack & Cody for three seasons until they took their game onto a cruise ship. (Please don't ask how I know this. Let's just say that convalescing makes strange TV bedfellows. FYI: Dan Savage brilliantly eviscerated said show on This American Life last year, claiming Zach and Cody were turning his son into the worst kind of heterosexual.)

Alas, the Residence Inn is not the St. Gregory from that mid-80's Aaron Spelling show starring Brand Walsh's dad/Babs's husband (are they still married? is anyone still married?).

Last Friday, I came home from work to find that the housekeeper (and yes, having a housekeeper IS sexy-- that's the best thing about hotel life) had left a flyer for 32nd Annual Old Louisville Holiday Home Tour on my coffee table. And when I went downstairs to check about my mail, there was another full-color flyer for the Home Tour displayed on an acrylic stand. And I thought, "Oh how nice. I'm a little broke right now, but I can always hit it next year."

A few hours later, it dawned on me that I've been living in this *&^%^&* hotel for almost three months now-- Ooohh! No, today is my three month anniversary! I've now lived in a hotel for 1/4 of a year. Sigh.-- and that was the very first piece of local advertising I've seen pass through the doors of the joint. Sure, there's the obligatory "brochure shelf" tucked out of sight down an unused corridor, but the Home Tour folks put that full-color photocopied, attractive, festive ad in my face-- both in my room and right on the front desk-- all weekend long. And if I hadn't been a Villager, hadn't known that I'd have another chance to go at the 33rd Annual Home Tour, I would have jumped at it.

At least a couple times a week, I'll be hanging in the lobby or waiting in line at the front desk, and I'll hear some tourist or business person ask for dinner recommendations. If they're looking high end, the answer from the front desker is always the same: Jeff Ruby's. If they're just looking for something to fill their bellies, the front desker always directs them to... you guessed it: 4th Street Live.

Sometimes I stick my nose in. Sometimes I don't. I almost always stick my nose in when I hear folks mulling over dinner options in the elevator or in the hallways. (This takes a lot of effort as Mama is painfully shy around strangers.)

There are lessons to be learned here, Owner friends. First of all, there are 140 guest rooms in the Res-Inn. If the Home Tour people paid 15-cents per color copy, that meant that they spent in the neighborhood of $21 to blanket my hotel and get a brochure into the hot little hands of every single person staying at the hotel that weekend. A single, day-of-purchase ticket for the Home Tour was $30. If one Res-Inn resident hit the Tour, the Tour still made $9.

There are approximately 17,000 hotel rooms in the Louisville Metro area. That's a lot of color copies, sure. But if you're having a special event and you can share the cost with other businesses (Trolley Hops and Bardstown Aglow and Buy Local First and Louisville Originals folks, I'm looking at YOU), you've got quite the captive audience in hotel dwellers, whether they be tourists, businessfolks, or townies like me.

Secondly, if you're a local business within comfortable walking distance of a hotel, why don't you drop off some discount coupons for the front deskers to give out to arriving guests? It's only because I'm such a 'net nerd that I discovered the ill-fated Park Place's awesome Happy Hour deal. Heck, if Park Place had put a little ad in every Res-Inn welcome packet saying: "Hey, we're a high end eating establishment, but you can enjoy fine cocktails and appetizers at half price EVERY DAY and eat and drink like a classy person for the same price you'd pay at TGIFridays" they might have lasted a bit longer. Likewise, it's only through active interweb hunting that I've found out about the daily deals at the BBC Taproom and Artemesia. You don't even need to make it a discount coupon. Why is there no 1/4 page b&w photocopied flier on our brochure rack advertising BBC's daily specials? That's nutso!

And finally, I love me my front desk friends. They're a super sweet group of folks. I have no doubt whatsoever if you, Local Owners, scratch the front desk folks' backs a little, they'll scratch your backs A LOT. Just after Hurricane Ike, I was in a Highland coffee shop (Highland Coffee, to be exact) and a woman from one of the neighborhood Irish pubs came in and handed the baristas coupons for free beers on a particular night. I was behind her in line, so I didn't hear everything she said, but it was something along the lines of: we're thanking our neighbor businesses because we had power and were able to serve food during the dark days and our neighbors sent a lot of business our way. Aw. That's classy, folks.

There are approximately seven or eight people who work the front desk at the Res-Inn. Give them each a gift certificate for $25 at your eating establishment (you know they'll spend more than that). Give them a 25% off coupon for your store. If you're a tourist attraction, let them in free. And don't just do this once-- do it aggressively-- there's all kinds of turn over in the service industry, and you want to keep YOUR business at the front of their minds.

I'm still sick about the fact that I've seen six restaurants within walking distance of the Res-Inn go belly-up in the past three months: Primo, Market on Market, Melillo's, Jenicca's, Park Place, and Browning’s (she intones the litany of the dead). I’m trying to do my own broke-girl part by signing (and abiding by) the LEO’s Shop Local pledge. As soon as I’m finished with my work (if you can call this “work”), I’m heading over to Wild and Wooly to submit my 10 Buy Local receipts to enter their Holiday Passport contest.

But Local Owners, you gotta put yourselves out there a little more. Us Loueyvillagers don’t want to see you croak. We don’t like driving by the Spaghetti Warehouse (or whatever it’s called) and seeing it full to bursting, while 301 Bistro across the street has empty tables. It’s not that we don’t like the Warehouse—it’s yummy and cheap. We’re not unhappy that 4th Street now has a Panera Bread, as long as Panera doesn’t put Toast in jeopardy. Lou will probably end up spending her New Year’s Eve at one of 4th Street Live fine establishments. So, I’m not anti-chain. I’m just pro Local, for all the reasons one should be.

Rant over.

Lots of love,
Lou