stay in the shallow end

The latest chatter leads us to believe that while trophy was initially abducted, he now may be acting of his own drunken accord. Fortunately, several members of Viva la New Mexico! are elite forensic scientists. (In fact, C.S.I. is actually a documentary about their work.) After an extensive profiling session, we now have a deep understanding of what motivates trophy and have formulated a plan to reclaim him:

In what could be a startling breakthrough in the case, our team image analyst has uncovered the face of a perpetrator captured in a reflection. We are currently working on enhancing this image and will reveal it as soon as it becomes available.

Last Sunday, an atrocity of unspeakable egregiousness was committed. Our team, Viva la New Mexico!, is the Charlottesville Rec League Kickball Champion. As a symbol of our triumph, we were awarded a trophy. Witness me enjoying the sweet taste of victory out of said trophy:

Some local DC’s decided to try to steal our glory for themselves. After stalking us to our celebratory banquet, they blended into the background unnoticed (as the ordinary always do) waiting for the one moment we turned our backs.

Then today, 9/11 (coincidence? I think not), our fearless captain received a communication from the perpetrators depicting our trophy in several compromising positions.

But are their legs any stronger? Their throws any further? Do they not know that the trophy itself is nothing? It is merely a symbol of our dominance. Have they not read Deathly Hallows? They have not defeated us, so they cannot lay claim to what is ours! The trophy is ours! It’s the wizard, not the wand! Viva la New Mexico!

Thursday: Lunch at Blue Ridge Country Store: I never even knew this place existed! On the pavilion side of the ball, the Blue Ridge Country Store houses one of the biggest salad bars I’ve seen in Charlottesville. While I do like salads, I suck at making them. I think it’s because I just put everything on the salad bar that I like on to the salad, and then I’m surprised when it doesn’t taste good. In any case, if you have better salad-making skills then I do, it’s worth checking out.

Friday: Lunch at Marco and Luca: Despite the price increase, Marco and Luca is still a bargain. My friends came downtown for lunch, and I had some dumplings and soup. We sat outside, and given the insane heat, soup was a poor choice. It was good, but sesame noodles would’ve been a better choice.

Saturday: Dinner at Amigo’s (Seminole Trail): On our way to a party in north Charlottesville, we stopped by Lime Leaf, but the line was too long. We went to Amigo’s instead, and I ordered the Chili Verde, per usual. It was not the same as the 5th Street location, and not nearly as good. It tasted more like Carnitas tossed in the verde sauce rather than the 5th street location where the pork is simmered in it. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t nearly as delicious as the 5th Street version.

Kate and I went down to Richmond to hit up Costco and Stony Point a few weeks ago. While were at Stony Point, we had P.F.Chang’s for lunch, and I ordered the Kung Pao Chicken. As usual, I asked the server to make it extra, extra, ridiculously super spicy. First of all, P.F.Chang’s has more people working there than any restaurant I’ve ever seen. I feel like we never saw the same person deliver food around us twice. In any case, when our food came out, the girl who brought it to our table looks at my dish, and says, “Absolutely do not eat one of those peppers. They are insanely hot. I know you’re brown and everything, but they are insanely hot.” She was brown as well, so by the unwritten rules of who’s allowed to stereotype, this comment was perfectly acceptable. Having been warned by a fellow brown person, I was a little apprehensive. I waited for her to get out of sight and slowly put a chili in my mouth. Boy was I disappointed. Hot, but nothing notable. I reversed my previous position and made a mental note that she was racist.

When we went to Costco, it was a Saturday afternoon, which is prime sample time. You could have two meals in Costco when they have all their samples out. One lady was offering three varieties of Tasty Bite, which makes pretty decent instant Indian food. As I approached the table, she held out a small cup of lentils and said, “Would you like to try some of your food?” She was perfectly friendly, and honestly, I don’t even think she realized she said it. It made my day.

Sunday: Appetizers at McGrady’s: More post kickball appetizers. Fried things and $4 pitchers of Yuengling for everybody!

Monday: Lunch at Timberlake’s: Everytime I’ve walked by Timberlake’s, the sign on the front of the store beckoned me in. I just knew it was a place that I would love. I finally make it in today and sit down at the counter, and so far it’s everything I dreamed of. I asked for a pastrami on rye with kraut and mustard and I’m disappointed for the first time. The ingredients were nothing special, just bagged loaves of bread and deli meat. The sandwich tasted exactly as if I’d made it myself. Now on to the good part: I also got a chocolate malt, and this was delicious. Ridiculously thick, super malty, and enormous. My previous downtown mall milkshake of choice was the mint chocolate chip at Chaps, but this is up there. It’s nice to have choices.

Tuesday: Dinner at Amigo’s: I had a coupon for the Fajitas, so I ordered the chicken and steak combo. They tasted just like cheap mexican fajitas. I made a mistake. Next time I’m going back to the Chili Verde.

Wednesday: Lunch at St. Maarten’s: This was an excellent meal. The sausage Poboy special was a piece of spicy sausage, onions, peppers, and cheese. I topped it with some Tabasco, and I was very impressed. We also ordered the frizzled onion appetizer, which was thinly sliced onions batter-fried and tossed with a buffalo wing sauce. I dream about food like this. Too bad they were both specials, as I may never have them again.

Thursday: Dinner at Christian’s: I had a slice of Spicy Chicken. Now that I’m working above Christian’s, I’m really apprehensive that the opening of new locations will impact quality. That would suck.

Friday: Dinner at Orbit: Chicken wings. Extra hot and extra crispy. If you don’t know Evelyn, she’s a bartender at Orbit and one of my favorites in town. When she’s around, I know that my hot and crispy request will make it to the kitchen. When she’s around, I know I’m going to have some damn good wings.

Saturday: Lunch at Marco and Luca: I start working downtown, and Marco and Luca raise their prices by 50 cents.

Sunday: Appetizers at McGrady’s: We are the champions of kickball! To celebrate we ate lots of fried macaroni and cheese. Ease said she would blog about it, but then she did not. Ease also said she had Chron’s Disease, but she actually doesn’t. Ease is a liar who is awesome at kickball.

Monday: Dinner at Texas de Brazil: I’d been waiting all week for this. Texas de Brazil is a Churrascaria (Brazilian steakhouse). They barbecue huge skewers of meet and the servers run around the restaurant with them. You get a little disk on your table that is green on one side and red on the other. Turn it to green, and the servers come over and start hacking off pieces of meat on to your plate. In addition, they have a massive salad bar with fancy foods like sashimi grade seared tuna, which I ate a ton of. I’ve been to other Churrascaria’s before, and I’ve had excellent experiences. Unfortunately, compared to my other experiences, Texas de Brazil doesn’t match up. We decided to go there because they sent out a 50% off coupon, which brings the price down from $42/person to $21/person if you go before 6:30 or after 8:30. I don’t know if it’s because we went at 8:30, but the quality of the meat was just not up snuff. They were dragging the same skewer of pork tenderloin around the restaurant the whole time we were there, and after a half hour, it looked all shriveled and dried up. There was nothing tender about it. Most of the other meats were also overdone, and you had to specifically request extra rare pieces. For me the highlights were: top sirloin (their speciality), spicy sausage, bacon wrapped chicken. The disappointments were all entirely due to their being overcooked: bacon wrapped filet mignon, pork tenderloin, lamb chops, and leg of lamb. It was still well worth $21, but at $42, I’d have been pretty annoyed. I still walked out of there in a coma, so mission accomplished, I guess. They sent out another coupon for September, so Kate and I may head down there again with Michael (who was supposed to blog about this meal) and Elizabeth (who was supposed to blog about this meal also).