Walking in Memphis

My husband and I decided very last minute to go to Memphis for the holiday weekend, so I got on and got $150/night rate for The Peabody. I was thrilled!!

We got there Friday afternoon and checked in, but our room was not ready. I will warn you, it's $21 per day for valet parking and $16 for self park. We decided to duck across the alley to Rendesvouz to have some ribs. Husband and I shared a full rack and I must say we were less than impressed. Now we are bbq fans from way back, but these ribs were dry and not very meaty at all. The service was almost non-existant and seemed part of the show. After that, we walked back to the Peabody and got our room on the 9th floor which was very nice. The rooms are a bit smaller than some would expect, but we're used to it as we go to New Orleans quite a lot. The bathroom was VERY tiny, but nice. Very nice towels and plenty of them. Nice ammenities too, even duck shaped soaps! We relaxed a bit and decided to hit Beale street.

We floated from bar to bar to visit some places we had been to on previous trips to Memphis. I had a Call a Cab at Wet Willey's. Very nice! We then went to Silky O'Sullivans where Silky himself was holding court at a table in front of the bar. We had a drink there called a Diver. This thing is a gallon concotion of something they won't tell you the contents of. Hubby and I shared this over the course of the rest of the night. We were a little hungry by this point, but just wanted a snack. We shared some bbq nachos at Silky's and these were to die for!! Silky's has a great menu with very affordable prices. We listened to some music and singing there and decided to go over to Pat O'Briens for the dueling pianos.

We got right up front in the piano bar and were kind of shocked. It was almost 10pm and it's usually standing room only in there. Most places were like that. It seemed that people were just buying cheap drinks from the stands and walking the streets. I couldn't believe there were so many people with small kids and strollers! Beale Street isn't really the place for kids. We listened for a couple of sets and then walked around a bit before calling it a night. We did browse through all the neat shops as well. Also saw fireworks too.

Saturday we had breakfast in the room from room service which we had ordered the night before. Peabody was right on time with when we asked to be served. The breakfast was hot and good. We then went down and caught the Duck March and that was nice. We then went to Graceland with directions we got from the concierge.

As everyone knows, Graceland isn't in a great part of town, but not bad during the day. We chose the Platinum tour at $32 each so we could see the planes and cars as well.

What a tourist trap!!! Every exhibit exits through a gift shop. There are also restaurants there across the street where you load onto the busses serving overpriced, greasy food. Face painting and tattoos can be had as well while you wait.

We had to wait about 45 to get on our tour bus to cross the street, but it was a nice tour. The headphones are nice because you can start or stop if you need to if you haven't gotten to the next room yet. The meditation gardens are beautiful as well. Very informative tour.

We went back across the street and saw the Lisa Marie and the cars. The plane was gorgeous!

By this time, we were tired and ready for some FOOD! We decided to try Neely's bbq as I had read some reviews here and it was highly recommended by our concierge. It wasn't far from our hotel and we found it easily. Now this was about 3pm Saturday, so definitely not lunch rush by any means. It wasn't very crowded at all, however, we couldn't seem to get seated. There was no hostess, but the sign said "Hostess Will Seat You". I finally had to grab a server and she seated us. All around us were tables that hadn't been bussed. We sat there for over 10 minutes before someone came and took our order. We ordered a sausage and cheese plate for an appetizer. I had pork ribs and hubby ordered beef ribs. They brought out our entrees, but never the appetizer. They soon brought it out and comped it off the bill. No attempt at drink refills or anything like that. I will say the bbq was AMAZING! By far the best I have ever had. It made up for the lack of service!

We went back to the hotel and decided to have a few drinks in the hotel bar. Not very strong drinks and overpriced, but I expected it as it is The Peabody.

By this time hubby is quite tired so we decided to retire to our room after we had explored all the shops on the first floor, and that took awhile!

The Peabody charges a 9.95 service fee each day for all the various ammenities it provides such as daily paper, etc. One of these ammenities is shoe shining. You call down by 10 pm to have your shoes picked up and then call after 6am the next morning to have the shoes delivered. I called around 8pm, set out the shoes as instructed.

I got hungry by about 9pm and ordered up a club sandwich through room service. It arrived around 930 and the server noticed the shoes hadn't been picked up yet and said she would tell the bellman to come and get the shoes. The sandwich was nothing special, but good.

Sunday morning we are packing and preparing to check out. I go to retieve the paper and see that my husband's shoes were never picked up. I called the bellman and they appologized. I asked if they could be done by check out and they said there was no one there that could do the shoes.

I then get out of the shower and grab my Peabody robe only to discover there are no belts on either robe! Very frustrating. I notified them of these issues at check out and the 9.95 fee was removed for both days, which I thought was more than fair.

We checked out and wanted to eat breakfast at a cafe on Beale, but it was closed so we had breakfast at Miss Polly's on Beale. I had an omelet and hubby had the chicken fried steak. Hubby's was excellent, but my omelet was over done and lacking in filling. Also, the biscuits weren't handmade. How can you call your self a Soul Food restaurant in Memphis without homemade biscuits??? Still a good meal with good service.

All in all we had a great trip and did everything we wanted to. I will say the panhandlers were on the rise as compared to previous trips and more aggressive too.

Valentine's Day 2008

First to give you a little history...last year Frank and I had been dating only a month or so. He asked if he could come by and see me after work. He stopped to get me some roses and they were out! So he brought me a POTTED MUM! It was so hilarious to me but he was so embarassed that he hadn't planned in advance!

Well, this year he planned in advance!! All he would tell me yesterday was that we were going out to eat, but he wouldn't tell me where. We had our first date at Sazio's in Five Points. Next door is a grocery store. He dropped me off at the grocery store and told me to go inside and follow the directions. I went inside and the manager gave me a note. It said for me to got to the pizza oven in the back of the store. I went there and the man working gave me a pizza and a note (this grocery store has my favorite pizza in the world!) the pizza was my favorite kind (uncooked) and the note told me to go next door to Sazios and sit at the bar. I went to the bar and a waiter came and got me and said he was escorting me to my table. Frank had arranged for us to have the same table we had on our first date. This table is in an area that is now used for banquets so we were all alone in this room where he had fixed the table with candles. We had our own private waiter who took our order. Then, when I thought everything had been done, Frank pulled out a gift!! He gave me a circle diamond pendant! It is so delicate and beautiful! I was so shocked that he had planned all this! He said it had taken him 2 weeks to plan everything.

Also, when he came home from work he brought my mom flowers and aquamarine earrings and candy for my daughter. I can't believe how wonderful this man is! No one has ever done anything like this for me before. I thank God every day for bringing this man into my life!

I think tonight I'll cook that pizza and make a nice dinner for him for a change!

Tee Hee

Heaven Has A New Angel

A couple of weeks ago an aquaintance of mine from college lost his 2 year old son to an accidental drowining in the family swimming pool. What a cruel and sensless accident! All he wanted to do was play in the snow some more. Snow that is so rare in our part of the country.

His father gave the eulogy for his son at his memorial service. I, as a parent, couldn't even imagine having the courage for that. It's very moving. First is the slide show of William Bronner Burgess and next are the videos of Rick Burgess speaking.

The Woes of Being Female.....

Now all us girls know those things that we have to go through as women that make you go....ugh. Not screaming at the top of your lungs, not running around like a crazy woman; you just want to say ugh. I had one of those experiences yesterday.

I had to have one of those minor "female procedures" done and I really, really hate those. So much so, I didn't even see my lovely ob/gyn doc for about 5 years. I mean, hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? I get all undressed from the waist down, get into those lovely stirrups waiting for the doc to start the procedure. He gets everything in place and then pops up from under the paper drape across my legs and says, "See any good movies lately?"!! I wanted to die! I said, "yeah, it's called Count the Ceiling Tiles and I saw another one called Paint the Ceiling Beige". You'd think that Gynos would know by now that women don't want to talk while you're prowling around down there! It's hard for me to concentrate on your prattling on while I've got instruments hanging out of me!!

When we scheduled this procedure, I knew from previous experience that it could be pretty painful, so I ask for meds up front. Doc says just take some Advil. Umm, I can't take Advil, it's a NSAID and it will make what's left of my stomach disintergrate. He says, ok I'll give you some Lortab. Oh how my eyes light up! Much like that small child when they enter the candy store! Then I get to the pharmacy and the dickhead only gave me 2 pills! You'd think I was a freaking junkie trying to get dope!!! I know from past experience 2 will bearly cut it as one dose. Guess I'll have to supplement with some sort of Old Lady Pills from my mom.

My husband was so great. He bearly knows the tip of how the female plumbing works but took me to my appointment nonetheless. Even squired me to dinner afterwards. It's pretty fun trying to eat in a restaurant with a Lortab buzz!

A New Year, Same Old Stuff...

We made it through the holidays just fine. We added a Wii to the household and I think everyone's had Wii Elbow at least once since then! Frank also has gotten used to his bi-pap machine. Had to have it tweaked some, but it's good. He's getting a great night's sleep and I am for the most part too. I've had some health issues as well here lately, but nothing too major and it's under control. Morgan is doing great. She rocked her latest report card, improving in every subject. She's an awesome kid.

Reminiscing.....

People here I work with were talking about crappy vacations they had gone on in their lives and it reminded me of 2 of my vacations with my ex-husband. His mother announces that she's taking the whole family to Destin, Florida. It's exMIL, exFIL, BIL and his wife, me and my ex. I'm all excited. Of course, as you know, men NEVER get all the details. He "yeah, yeah's" me on everything I ask and I really should have talked to his mother. We had a condo. First off, this condo was across the street from the beach. I mean ya had to climb over rocks and stuff. Who goes to the beach and doesn't stay on the beach? Next problem. She rents a ONE bedroom condo for 6 people!! Her rational? One bedroom, pull out sofa in tiny living room and BUNK BEDS in the hallway. I politely told her I hadn't slept on bunk beds since 1974 and wasn't about to start now. I left, went down to the desk and rented our own condo in the same complex. I thought, this will be noooo problem, I'll stay out on the beach all day, we'll only see them at night really. It. rained. every. day. I was so close to slitting my wrists on day two. His dad can go in the bathroom and not come back for HOURS. He also has to control the tv. So what did we end up watching? Some movie on the Disney Channel about some skater punk. Over, and over and over again. I know I had to have seen it 6 times that week. Literally, the man's feet never touched the sand while we were there. I thought, I'll at least get some good food on this trip! The ex FIL would only go to steakhouses!! Who goes to the beach and eats a steak?? I was jonesing for some crab in the worst way! The BIL's wife is really strange. She's a veternarian and one of the first conversations I had with her is how you can kill someone with insulin and an autopsy wouldn't show it. Tell you anything about what I'm dealing with here? I told my ex that if he ever thought I was going on a vacation with his family again, he was crazy. No way, no how!

About a year before that we went to visit same BIL and his wife in NC right around New Year's. They live out in the boonies. No Wally World, now Mickey D's, no nothing. I'm not a difficult house guest, I can fend for myself. Good thing, they worked almost 24/7 the whole time we were there! Since she's a vet, she has 5 cats. Ex is Allergy Boy. Two sesame seeds away from living in a plastic bubble. I ask her if she's boarding the cats at work or if not we'll stay at a hotel. Not a problem she's going to take the cats to work with her. We get there and all 5 cats are lined up to greet us! She didn't take them anywhere and the whole house smelled like a big 'ol litter box. So I had to deal with ex's lungs about to shut down at every turn. So then it gets to be about 8pm and no one's making a move to so much as call a pizza! Ex rummages around and makes pancakes for dinner. They have almost no food in the house! Get up the next morning. No food and a coffee pot that could seriously blow up NASA. Unless you count a bottle of ketchup, packets of soy sauce and thousand island dressing. Remember, we're out in the sticks, closest food is 45 min away and I don't know my way around. I think we got food on day 3. Also, they kept talking about all these great restaurants to go to and how they have professional hockey,etc. Did we actually GO to any of these places? I think not. Oh, and also because they live in the sticks, sucky cable too. So not only are you stuck out in the sticks with no food, there's also no good television to watch! Another good benefit of that divorce...don't have to deal with that circus act anymore!