suburban pacific

There's a line in the Shawshank Redemption about how the Pacific Ocean "has no memory". So I am wondering if the suburbs are like the Pacific? There is a vastness, a blankness, that makes the landscape interchangeable, to the point where one restaurant can turn into another overnight and you cannot remember what was there the previous day. Where Ventures turn into Circuit City, and soon to something else. I'm not saying that suburbs have zero character, or that the cityscape cannot be wiped clean and rebuilt into something unrecognizable. Just that some of the qualities that may draw us to a suburban environment, the openness, the blank slate quality, can also render it more generic, more transient.

This weekend...

Peoria.
Synphoria.
Pitchfork.

The extinction of the black cow

Old news, probably, but relatively new for someone who rarely frequents fast food joints these days, and hasn't been to an Arby's in almost three years - the news is, no more black cow milkshake. A black cow is basically a root beer float (a proper float, as I envision it, involves ice cream actually floating in the root beer, whereas a black cow is the same ingredients blended together).
Anyway, there's two ways I could look at this. Either "damn you Arby's, now I have no reason to go there", or, I can take personal responsibility for the shake dropping from the menu since I haven't been there in so long to get one. And that might have made the difference.
Sadly, I have yet to see a petition to resurrect the black cow. I guess there may be more important things going on in the world.
Perhaps I should wait for a nice hot day this summer (if summer ever gets here, even spring is currently being chased off by stark winds and an icy snowshower) and have a milkshake party.

Car crash

On the Tribune website right now...I would have to agree with both captions for the pictures.




trib_2-20-09.jpg

Did you miss me?

Hey, world.
I've been gone for a while. Maybe I didn't have much to say? Or maybe I had too much. And this may only be a momentary resurfacing.

We are going to see Kodo this week.

I will be getting two teeth prepped for crowns. I am so excited about that I could just about drink myself into a stupor.

Went to Meson Sabika last night. Very nice, it is a tapas restaurant in a restored large house/mini-mansion. Had a bottle of parellada, which I do not think I have had before; it was quite nice. Sweet but crisp and fruity, not overmuch in any particular direction. By contrast, I like a nice riesling but they can be a little too sweet sometimes.