July 25, 2005
Are We Amused?
Decided to show myself a good time last night (get your minds out of the gutter) so planned some of my favorite things...
First up was Chinese food. I originally planned to go to The Silver Dragon which I think is the best Chinese in the Valley, but decided I wanted a drink or two so I went to the Golden Phoenix instead. Usually their drinks are better, but last night this was not the case. How do you screw up a strawberry daiquiri? I should have stuck with the original plan - Silver Dragon's Kung Pao is exceptional, Golden Phoenix's Kung Pao is OK - I remember them as being better in the past, off night or going downhill? Anyway, passable food, passable beverage - moving on.....
Down to the Biltmore Fashion Park for some live music. The Coffee Plantation there has performers most every night and I was pleased to see they had a jazz trio last night. But then I sat for a while and watched and, um, well....pretty bad when the best thing you can say about them is that it was cool that they had their logo on the drums..... The guitar player was just beating the crap out of his guitar - the bass player was really busy in his lines - and the drummer was on top of them both. Then they would finish a song and fiddle around in dead silence for 2-3 minutes, and start playing again. No stage presence at all. No acknowledgment of the audience what-so-ever. Bah!
So I went over to Border's, 'cause you can't beat a book store on a Sunday evening. But I couldn't find anything I couldn't live without and their prices, especially on music, are just too high.
So I went back and listened to a little more music, got a strawberry smoothie and left. Stopped at WalMart on the way home to get a new car adapter for my MP3 player - Yay!
And you know what, as grumpy as this post sounds - I had a really good time. And I got home early. And I got a good night sleep so maybe I won't be as grumpy today 