Not yet anyway. It's only my blog that has been dead. Almost 3 months since my last entry. Do I feel bad about it? Sort of. There is no point in having a blog if you aren't going to post in it. I was just starting to develop a readership too. Nevertheless, I am not going to blog just for the sake of having words on a page. I read too many blogs that are simply boring as hell: No - I don't want to see pictures of everything that you have made for dinner for the last 2 weeks. It's no small coincidence that my last blog entry occurred before the onset of winter. You see, I don't handle the infamous Seattle Gloom very well. Not only does it sap all semblance of color from my complexion, but it also saps all semblance of initiative from my soul. I manage to get to work everyday, and I hit all my doctor appointments, but after that? Couch time, spending quality time with good films and bad reality shows. I know I'm not alone when it comes to an inability to cope with Seattle Gloom - I wonder how others handle it? Anyway, the sun has shone for 3 days straight now; hence the fire and the energy to write.

    I have no one particular subject I want to address today, but there have been four things on my mind:

1) The neighborhood Moroccan restaurant. The one that I trashed last summer has closed. Karma strikes again. The furniture store next to it has expanded into its space. I don't know whether the business failed or the furniture store took over the space from a desire to expand - I'm guessing the former. Restaurant closures in Seattle are not rare, but I believe this helps illustrate that if you put out an inferior product, you will be faced with an inferior revenue stream. Far too many great restaurants in Seattle for a weak-ass, mandarin orange-lovin' establishment to survive.

2) Yelp. Yeah, here I go again about Yelp. One of my clients gave me a generous gift certificate to a fairly new and classy Italian restaurant for my holiday bonus. This place, Barolo, had received mixed reviews, and I was a little bit wary about what David and I might see and eat when we went a few weeks ago. After making our reservation, I Googled Barolo to read all the reviews. Other than the reviews from the local papers, my Google search also brought up hits for several Yelp reviews. I was pretty sure what I might find in the Yelp reviews, but I looked anyway. I looked and I found some of the most insipid writing about restaurants I have ever seen. Like the professionals, Yelpers also had mixed reviews for Barolo. And some of the reasons Yelpers gave for their bad reviews? "My waiter looked at me wrong." "My waitress asked me if I wanted wine when I already had a cocktail." I am paraphrasing these - maybe I have blocked the actual offending words from my mind. Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with reviews that I disagree with - I just want reviews to be reasonable, cogent, and well-written. Apparently Yelp needs to instutute an intelligence requirement for posters. Not all Yelp posters are unreasonable, uninformed and flat-out stupid, but enough of them are that I can't ever go to the site expecting to find anything resembling a helpful review.
    And how was Barolo? Great. Up there with Il Terrazo Carmine as my favorite Italian places in the city. Not just the best osso buco I have ever had, but also the biggest. Normally David and I split a dessert. After my osso buco, I didn't have room to even split something. I did manage room for a fine late-harvest white that our waitress recommended though.
    In my first blog I lumped together Chowhound with Yelp. I apologize for that, Chowhound. While Yelp posters seem to consist mostly of 20-somethings who have recently come into enough money to start dining out on their own, Chowhound posters seem to be true "foodies." When I visit Chowhound I find reviews that are better-intentioned and by far better-informed. True, there are still some problems with Chowhound: if you read enough postings in the message board for a particular city, you will notice that the same 6-8 restaurants are always championed. Maybe Chowhound posters are a small group who have influenced each others' tastes, I'm not sure. Still, I can be reasonably sure that I can find thoughtful and articulate writing when I log on there. And I recently logged on to their message board for.....

3) New Orleans. I'm going to New Orleans next month. I am so "jazzed" to be hitting the Crescent City. I've never been, and it will also be the first time I've taken an almost purely food vacation. David will be attending a conference there  - since his hotel room will be paid for, and since I also possess a free round trip plane ticket anywhere within the U.s., well, it was a no-brainer where I would be taking my vacation this year. My birthday is just a few days before our trip, so in a sense it is a birthday gift to myself as well. I am a little overcome with the possibilities of what I might do when I'm there. Lots of free time while David is at his conference - where will I go? I don't want to fall into the trap of spending the whole week in the French Quarter, but since we are staying on Canal Street, I think many of our dinners will be eaten there. And where to go for my birthday dinner? Commander's Palace is the most famous NOLA restaurant , but I don't think that will be my choice. Bayona? Galatoire's? Herbsaint? Any New Orleans residents or visitors reading this blog, you are more than welcome to give me a recommendation. There are other spots I know I will be hitting for sure - Central Grocery for muffaletta, Dooky Chase for gumbo, Acme for oysters. Maybe if we have time we will take a bus tour out to bayou for some Cajun cuisine. I've read the Chowhound message board and my Frommer's guide - I think I am now on information overload. I will try to post my impressions of NOLA after we get back. Soon after we get back, not three months later.

4) Freerice.com. My sister turned me on to this site. It is an online vocabulary game, and when you answer questions correctly, grains of rice are donated to help feed the world's poor. Not only do you improve your vocabulary, but you also help accomplish a social good. Plus, by increasing your vocabulary you can write in your blog about the caryatid-shaped vegetable napoleon you recently constructed, or the pruritus effects of Australian reds. Well, maybe that's not such a good idea - a blog should be readable, not pretentious. Finally when you reach Level 48, and get within one question of Level 49, you can call your sister to piss her off. Not that I'm bragging or anything. Blogs should be readable, unpretentious, and braggadocio-free. (See if you can spot my recent vocabulary words.)

My next blog will be forthcoming in less than 3 months. Thanks for staying with me.