Death of a Landmark
Okay, it's a fact. Based on a comment from Kim the other day, I cruised past Tony's Restaurant this morning on my way to church, and it's officially scorched. There's a big hole in the roof and every building in the strip is boarded up. So apparently my fireplace theory was off the mark. I apologize, local fireplace owners, you're very responsible, I apologize for implying otherwise.

For those of you that I hadn't dragged to Tony's yet (which is quite a large number of you), it is home of Missouri's Largest Omelet. Seriously ginormous omelets. Nine eggs easily. And while the promise of freakishly huge omelets gets you in the door, they also had some freaking spectacular (completely normal-sized) pancakes, too.

Watching Gilmore Girls Season 6 and noticing a variety of cross-over guest stars: Ari's daughter (from Entourage) was a guest at April's birthday party, Jan Levinson (from The Office) was Christopher's set-up, and a "My Name is Earl" double-play with Patty the Daytime Hooker as the snotty woman in line for "European Hot Chocolate" at Doose's, and a member of Liz's angry women's group ("Can I get you ladies anything? Compassion? Perspective?") and Gay Kenny as the Stars Hollow bike cop.

I suppose, now that more than a week has elapsed, I could give you the run down of the Pensacola trip.

Arrived on Saturday, after a pretty uneventful flight through Memphis. Can't remember dinner, but after church (no singing at ALL), we went to the Pensacola Little Theater where Gwen & George recruited us to fill out the usher staff. Grandma was FREAKIN'. She was terrified that she'd have to show somebody to their seat and not be able to find it. We put her on program duty at the top of the house (where nobody was actually going). The show was called "Bedroom Farce," and it took place in three bedrooms, with the three couples being tied together by their relationships to a fourth. It was funny. You could tell it was a British play, they didn't Americanize the Britishisms--somebody was scolded for being cheeky, that's the only one I recall right off. I can't remember anyone mentioning a "flat" so maybe it was just a half-assed conversion and they missed some.

Sunday - Drove into Alabama for brunch at the Gift Horse with Martin and Agnes, or as they are otherwise known (among the Freeburg contingent) as "Jinx & Aggie." They're talking about moving to Freeburg, to be closer to relatives. I just don't know if the sweet little old southern lady will be able to cope with Missouri in wintertime. They haven't lived in Missouri in decades.

Then we followed up with the outlet mall in Foley. I love outlet shopping in Foley around the holidays. I just come out of the dressing room with the stuff I want, hold it out, and ask, "Who wants to buy me this?" and they don't have to worry about finding my Christmas present. Fun all around. :)

Monday - Went for a run this morning. It was so cold that I got that rasping/choking/too much too cold air in the lungs phenomenon. Also, Gwen & George's subdivision is much smaller than I expected, so I didn't get quite the workout I was hoping for. Hit dinner at Logan's Roadhouse, one of those peanut-shells-on-the-floor steakhouses.

Tuesday - This is the day the weather broke. We'd arrived in the middle of a cold snap, but today it finally got warm. McGuire's for dinner that night (Motto: Feasting, Imbibery & Debauchery). It's an Irish pub style restaurant with fantastic burgers. We were seated in their new wine cellar room--it's probably the only room in the place (except the potties) that isn't covered in dollar bills. It's one of their "things," along with kissing the moose and the mislabeled bathrooms--which we had a great view of through the floor to ceiling windows in the wine cellar, so we could watch people deliberate on which bathroom to enter.

Wednesday - Headed into downtown Pensacola to visit the art museum. It's a tiny little thing, just two exhibits--Tiffany glass and 20th Century graphic artists. Didn't take long, but it was a nice way to pass the afternoon, nonetheless. Mr. Tiffany was an a-hole. Apparently he used to inspect all the work that had been done each day, and when you handed him a piece, if he didn't think it was up to the Tiffany standards, he would just let it fall through his hands and crash to the floor.

For dinner we headed over to Yamato's, which is a teppanyaki/hibachi restaurant (I never remember which is the cooking style and which is the grill), where they cook the food in front of you. They were closed the next day, we were disappointed to hear there would be no hibachi turkey for the day. Quoth Gwen: "I'm making the same thing tomorrow that I made today--reservations."

Thursday - The Hilton for Thanksgiving brunch. SO yummy. There was a salad station and a fruit station and an omelet station and a pasta station and a carving station and a bread station and an "other" station... I had mahi-mahi. It was good. Tried bits of a bunch of different things, and even stood in the really long line for some turkey. It was Thanksgiving, after all, and if you don't eat turkey on Thanksgiving the federal marshals can come take you away to the clink. I was kind enough to share a bite with mom & Gwen so the marshals wouldn't be after them. Everything was totally delicious.

BUT there was this crazy family that I think must have been staying at the hotel on vacation, sitting nearby. They weren't all crazy but... Anyway, the kids were in and out, which is what makes me think they were staying there. One of the kids left a circle covered in all different bits of food all around her plate. When the waitress came to clear some plates, she made some comment about the kids "having fun with the sundae bar" and the mom responds, "Oh, she's our messy eater. She always has been, ever since she was a baby." Well, no shit lady, she was a BABY. She's probably twelve now, so maybe there's a point where you make her grow up and eat like a person instead of an animal. Obnoxious.

After the food we headed out for a walk on the beach. I have just now realized that Mom has stolen all my seashells. It was a little chilly to be in the water much, but ankle deep wasn't too bad. Spent a couple hours sitting in the sun, just to get enough color to prove to myself I'd been to the beach.

Friday - Woke up early to hit Black Friday with Mom & Uncle George. This was Uncle George's first black friday experience. I don't think he was quite prepared for the scope of the madness. Got to Best Buy more than an hour after it opened and there was still a 50 yard line out the door. (Occupancy limits?) So we decided that Best Buy would have to wait. After a trip to Office Depot for Uncle George's new Flat Screen Monitor, we hit Target, then back to Best Buy. The line went all the way around the store--but I got everything I'd set out to buy. Target was the biggest bust. They had an Atari throwback machine that I really wanted to take a look at (my Atari joysticks have been misplaced, and I couldn't hook it up to my current tv anyway), but they seem to not be allowed to use any of the licensed arcade games, so no Pac-Mac, Frogger, Space Invaders, and therefore, no point in buying it.

That night we headed downtown for the official lighting ceremony for the downtown lights. They had an "Elf Parade." A bunch of little kids with pointy ears, followed by a 12-person high school marching band, which made a loop around the square. The junior high jazz band played some carols and that was about it. It was all very Stars Hollow.

Saturday - Travel day. Headed back through Houston this time, with a three-hour layover. We basically sat and read while we waited, had some dinner. Our table overlooked the passenger pickup area, so we could watch the security yell at all the people stopping in the no-stopping lane. We landed in Houston around 3, and our plane wasn't scheduled to leave until nearly 6. Saw on the departures board that there was another flight to St. Louis leaving at 4:10. In the end we decided not to see if we could switch, since our luggage would still be on the later flight, and we'd have to make a return trip to the airport to pick it up. So we just patiently waited until our flight, which left from this out of the way corner of the terminal that was on a lower level, and they made you take a bus to your plane.

We got into St. Louis on time, and went to collect our bags. While we were waiting, I thought I heard my name on the PA system. Don't know if you've been to Lambert recently, but you can't hear the PA over the roar of the baggage carousels. When it seemed that there were no more bags coming for our flight (there were two flights unloading on the same carousel, but we didn't see anybody who looked familiar still waiting on bags), I kept watch while mom went to see if the luggage office had actually paged us. They had. They'd gone ahead and put our bags on the 4:10 flight. Suck. The TSA searched both my bags. It's just so creepy to see that note on top of your stuff, although I'd fully expected it, with us traveling apart from our bags, and the fact that my bag had a bunch of DVDs & stuff in it. I'd expect they'd want to investigate further.

There are NO special features on Gilmore Girls Season 6. What a disappointment. But Field of Dreams has a featurette--if you could call it that--that's only about 10 minutes shorter than the movie itself!