Birthday RAMPAGE Month!

It's less than a month until my birthday...let the RAMPAGE begin!!

Thursday, March 27 - We went to see Ready Player One at the Opry Mills IMAX  tonight with our buddy, Wayne.  It was a fantastic film that we just might go see again! 

Saturday, March 31 - We spent a good part of  the sunny and beautiful last day of March today buying a new car.  Welcome, "PK Subaru" (Go Preds) to the family!!  We had to have a new car and Ashlee did a great job researching several makes and models until we landed on this  2018 Outback after a lot of deliberation.  We love the color, the gas mileage, the all-wheel-drive,  the safety and all the whistles and bells.  We look forward to taking him on his first road trip later this month down to New Orleans (or just Birmingham - see below).

Instead of burning up the road in our new car, we drove PK straight home and enjoyed the rest of the beautiful day and evening in our back yard sipping wine by the fire admiring our new purchase.

Sunday, April 1- We decided to indulge in a boozy Easter brunch today at Tansuo, a relatively new high-end Chinese Restaurant over off 12th Avenue in Nashville.  We came for the bottomless mimosas which were tasty, but we were floored at how good the food was too.  Above in the foreground is the pork belly fried rice (my personal favorite) and behind it was the tasty and creative General Tso's Bubble Waffle, a unique take on chicken and waffles.  We also had some tasty bao buns, dumplings and wontons from their serving carts.  We must come back to this place!

We hit the movie theater next and saw the somewhat sweet, but overly depressing film, The Leisure Seeker at the recliner theater at the Green Hills Mall.

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We ended the Sunday fun-day by checking out the newly refurbished Noelle Hotel in downtown Nashville and its brand new  open-air rooftop bar, Rare Bird, which just opened this weekend.  The outside seating was closed due to some rain earlier in the day, but we were able to a get a couple seats at the heated bar and enjoyed some libations, house-made chips and a nice cheese plate.  The views are outstanding here and we will try and come back to enjoy the outdoor seating soon.

Saturday, April 7 -  We celebrated Ashlee's mom, Evelyn, and her 79th birthday today with a party at her house with lots of friends and family in attendance.  Despite several medical set-backs, "Evie-baby" rolls on and is able to live at home again which is very important to her.  

Overall it was a nice long weekend in Chattanooga with tasty meals (and a few libations...you know...dealing with family and stuff) at Heaven and Ale Brewing, the Frothy Monkey and the Breu Haus.

Friday,  April 13 - We went and saw the late showing of (Cock) Blockers tonight at our local Roxy 10 Theaters with the recliners seats.  It was hilarious from start to finish.  Thanks again, MoviePass!!

Wednesday, April 18 - Congratulations to Ashlee for winning her first (and our first, collectively) HQ Trivia game last night.  Granted, she only won 55 cents, but given the fact the game started with over 1.7 million players and she answered 12 questions in a row to win along with about 9900 other people is still pretty darn good!  I flamed out on Question # 11 and gave the wrong advice on Question # 12, so this win was all hers!

Friday, April 20 -  My birthday didn't go as originally planned since our nephew, Matt, and his fiancee' Sherrae, decided to get married today down in Chattanooga (4/20 get it...yeah, they like to smoke pot..) which we were obligated to attend and then while driving back we got to listen to the Preds lose at home in the first round of the playoffs to Colorado extending the series another game back in Denver.  Tomorrow will be a better day...I PROMISE!

Hey, what else do serve at a 4/20 wedding?  We brought these as kind of a joke and they were gone in 10 minutes!  

All grumpiness and joking aside, it was a beautiful day for a wedding and the couple picked a pretty spot at the base of Lookout Mountain in Rising Fawn, GA, at the take-off and landing strip for hang gliders.  We wish Matt and Sherae (and baby, Phayden) the best of luck and all the best for a happy future together

Saturday, April 21 - My "official" birthday celebration started today down in Murfreesboro with an early lunch (and beer) at The Green Dragon Pub and Brewery, a few more beers at Mayday Brewing, and then a couple hours at the Flashback Arcade playing the classic arcade game (and my all-time favorite), Rampage, plus many more.

We followed playing Rampage by watching Rampage, the movie based on the game and starring the always-great, Dwayne Johnson, back in Lebanon in recliners at the Roxy Theaters.  It was a hoot and a holler to say the least.  We ended the evening back at our place sitting around the patio and the fire pit laughing and enjoying life deep into the night.  Thanks to my great friends Craig, Alison, Wayne, Danny, Brenda, Nate, Ginny, Bethany, and, of course, my true love, Ashlee, for hanging with me and giving me such a fun and memorable day.  

Sunday, April 22 -  The birthday celebration continued today with a delicious brunch at City Tap in downtown Nashville.  Thanks to more of our friends, Doug, Charly and Wendy, for joining us today.  The weather was rainy so most of us headed to catch a movie next over at Opry Mills.  We caught a showing of the new Amy Shumer comedy, I Feel Pretty.  It was a pretty good flick.   Afterwards, along with just Wendy and Charly, we went to the SOLD OUT show of Billy Gardell (of Mike and Molly fame) at Zanies Comedy Club as part of the Nashville Comedy Festival.  He was great as were both of his openers.

We ended the evening a few doors down at Cilantro Mexican Grill noshing, travel planning and watching the Predators finally take the Round 1 series against Colorado with a resounding 5-0 beat down in Denver.  On to Round Two!!  What an absolutely great weekend with my friends to celebrate this old man getting even older.  Thank you, everyone, for attending and sharing in the fun and helping stay as young as I can (at least in my mind)! 

We closed out the month with a long weekend trip to New Orleans to finally get a chance to attend the always-enticing Jazz Fest and Heritage Festival.

Friday, April 27 - We were going to drive down to NOLA in our new Subaru Outback and then Ashlee had the brilliant idea that since we were going through Birmingham anyway, why not just ride the inexpensive Amtrak Crescent Train (like we did back on New Years 2014/15) and take away some of the stress (and danger) of driving another 5 hours.

What a great idea!  We kicked back and relaxed and let Amtrak do the driving as we imbibed in some adult beverages, made friends with our seat-mates and gazed in wonder at the beauty passing by like this sunset on Lake Pontchartain as we made our way in to New Orleans.

We decided that once we  had checked in to our nice hotel, the Marriott Metairie at Lakeway, we would just turn in early and prepare for a long day tomorrow in the Crescent City.

Saturday, April 28 - The music and festival didn't start until 11 AM, so we had time for a leisurely breakfast near our hotel in the New Orleans suburb of Metairie (that "Metry" dawlin') at Russell's Marina Grill.  The food was amazing starting off with these sweet potato beignets.  

After breakfast, we Ubered over to the Horse Racing Track and Fairgrounds where the The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival is held.    It was easy to get in and the festival is laid out really well.  We were very impressed.  Lots of shade, plenty of great food and not real long lines either.  The first new-to-us band we checked out was Tracksuit Wedding out of Denver who were terrific.    We sought out a little of that plentiful shade next in the Economy Hall Tent with the Paulin Brothers Brass Band who were terrific.  We met up there with our friends, Danny and Brenda, who have been to the festival before.

Our next new-to-us band we discovered was, Sweet Cecelia, from Cecelia, Louisiana, a couple hours west of New Orleans.  This lovely and talented Cajun trio and their band are terrific and their cover of The Zombies classic hit "Time of the Season"  (sang completely in French) was very cool.

There were several colorful and joyous New Orleans krewe parades going on throughout the day.  How these folks stand marching and dancing in the heat in this amazing costumes is beyond me.   Before heading to the main stage to close out the evening, we grabbed some food from the numerous vendors.  It's New Orleans, so, of course, it was all delicious.  My cup of  shrimp  and okra gumbo was so good, I went back for another one!

The main stage area was already packed and Bonnie Raitt was already playing on stage when we arrived.  We moved up into some grandstands for a better view of the closer, Sir Rod Stewart (subbing for the ailing Aretha Franklin) who put on a great show.

I had to steal this shot from NOLA.com because it really shows the energy and showmanship of Sir Rod during the show.  Not bad for 73 years FOREVER YOUNG!   (Photo by Brett Duke, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune)

Since the festival is in the city limits and their are noise ordinances, it's over by 7 PM every night.  Not a bad thing for us aging folks I guess!  We walked back to the French Quarter and along the way took in the unique beauty that is New Orleans.  We also bought Jello-shots from some ladies selling them in front of their house (ahhh, N'AWLINS!) 

When got to the French Quarter, we headed over to the historic Golden Lantern Bar and met up with Ryan, a friend and past neighbor of Ashlee's mom in Chattanooga, who is living down here now.  After that we headed over to the famous Clover Grill and had huge cheeseburgers steamed under a hub-cap  (don't think about it, just go with it).  We closed out the night afterwards since we had a pretty early wake-up call tomorrow.

Sunday, April 29 - The train back to Birmingham leaves at the bright and early time of 7 AM so we upgraded our ride home to a "roomette"  that allowed us to do some snoozing on the way north.  The upgrade also included free breakfast and lunch (what a deal!).  The drive back home was smooth and uneventful.  Just the way you want it.  We will DEFINITELY be doing this trip again.  It's just too easy, too fun and New Orleans and the Jazz Fest are just too awesome!

Another scenic stop for the Amtrak Crescent...Roll Tide....no, not really...