The Original Moe's Barbecue

I am far from a restaurant critic. I will eat from any place and usually be happy but this is a rare occasion where I was extremely dissatisfied.

Terry and I were out doing Uber runs today and didn't have a chance to do lunch until late so by the time we were at the point of passing out, we decided to eat. Neither of us wanted "Fast Food" or anything ready made from the grocery store. I try to prepare lunches before I leave the house but today I didn't have any bread to make sandwiches so I figures we'd wing it.
I has seen a barbecue place on the corner of 14th & State Street a few times in passing and figured Terry and I could try it out...we love us some BBQ!!!!
Parking is in the back and an entrance in the rear by way of a great little patio was definitely a good thing.

We walked in and were asked if we'd ever been and the guy at the counter said he'd "explain how it works" and then pointed out the menu on the board. We weren't really looking for expensive "dinner prices" and were told the prices were the lunch prices. Before we ordered, the guy told us how expensive the price of meat is at the moment...Seriously? You're telling 2 guys that work at restaurants how expensive meat is? We both grocery shop also, we are fully aware of meat prices. $11 for a sandwich, two sides and a drink sounded a bit pricey but we were hungry and it would've been super awkward to walk out so we ordered and they brought it out to the table.

Terry ordered Pulled Pork Sandwich, Cole Slaw & Baked Beans

Adrian ordered Sliced Turkey Sandwich, Banana Puddin' & Mac N Cheese

The sandwiches were quite skimpy, probably about 2 ounces of meat on each. The sides were in 4 ounce containers but filled only 3 quarters of the way to the top. For a place to charge that much, you'd think they would offer larger portions of the sides, especially when those are usually the cheapest part of the entire meal.

We both enjoyed the flavor of the sandwiches but disappointed in the size. Terry mentioned the cole slaw was "interesting" it looked very celery seedy and he mentioned a little spicy and vinegary. My mac N cheese was good, it was obviously baked, the banana pudding on the other hand was definitely NOT pudding. I'm a sweets freak and I know my puddings, this seemed to be a concoction of Cool Whip, pureed bananas (or banana baby food) and 2 Nilla Wafers on top. The pudding was good but I'd call it mousse before I considered it pudding.

The atmosphere? It wasn't screaming of sterile and it wasn't exactly unfriendly. The only word that comes to mind is UNWELCOMING. The service seemed to be along the lines of Burger King during the time they did table service. I was finished with my food within 7 minutes, Terry took a little longer because he was listening to the conversation the employees were having regarding something political that didn't interest me.

As we walked out, we were never thanked...In fact we weren't thanked at all while in the building...As we walked down the steps leading to the parking lot I told Terry, I am still hungry and I feel ripped off. Our check was a little under $24, the amount of food we got on each plate most likely came up to no more than $4 a plate. I'm a great judge of food cost, been in the restaurant biz too long. If given the opportunity to return to this establishment for a second round, I'd polity decline with "Hell NO, I could fill up for less than $5 at McD's."

Whole Wheat Banana Bread Recipe

There's only one thing I love more than music and that's eating. Though I'm technically on a diet, I am trying to make better choices when I eat...I do have my weaknesses though, baked goods being that weakness...Carbs are certainly not my friend but I have a love/hate relationship with them. I also love to share recipes I've found or been given that I love...If someone tells me to never share the recipe, I respect that, otherwise I will pass on the love. This is one of those recipes that I wasn't told I couldn't share so here's a little loaf of love from me to you. This is healthier than traditional Banana Bread but keep in mind that it's NOT gluten free and certainly has it's share of calories.

2 c Whole Wheat Flour
1/2 c butter
1/2 c light or dark brown sugar
1/4 c honey
1 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 large eggs
3 medium bananas mashed
*optional 1/2 cup walnuts

Preheat oven to 350F degrees

Blend all ingredients together in a large bowl until smooth. Spoon the batter into a lightly greased load pan. Let rest at room temperature for approx. 10 minutes. Bake bread for 50 minutes until brown and then cover with aluminum foil for additional 10 minutes. Test with toothpick, which should come out clean. Cool for 10 minute before removing from pan and then cool it completely on a baking rack.

There Goes the Neighborhood...DEMOLISHED

Up until the time my dad moved us to Florida, we moved around a lot. Sometimes our move would be across town or just two doors down from our last residence but we always seemed to remain in Mobile County. The places we lived that I remember the most vividly, was a place near the fairgrounds, my grandmother's house, a little yellow house on Easter Lane as well as a house two doors up the block also on Easter Lane. My favorite of all the houses that my dad rented was a ranch style house on slightly over a half an acre of land which we knew as our second rental house on Easter Lane. We were actually renting from one of my sister's best friends's parents who had recently moved out of the area and offered us a much better deal than our land lord gave us in Easter Lane rental home #1.

Holiday Subdivision

Our neighborhood was a mix of older people and average sized families with a few kids. Many kids in the neighborhood were around my sister's age and only two were around my age. Angie, maybe two or so years younger than myself, was a horrid little girl. She was a mix of tomboy, spoiled brat and undisciplined pageant kid. She was occasionally fun to play with but almost always in a bad kid way. I was terrified of her for the most part, she spat, cussed, talked back to her parents and enjoyed torturing me through various forms. She taught me how girls can pee standing up while wearing a frilly dress. She horrified me by telling me how she would hide in her parent's closet to watch them "get it on" which scarred me for life. Angie was like the real life version of the Toy Story character named Sid. Sid's, I mean Angie's toy collection consisted of headless dolls, action figures, and pretty much anything that comes to mind when you think of a demented child. My visits with Angie usually ended with me getting my ass beat when I got home, usually due to something she had done but I got blamed for. My parents were the type that thought everyone else's kids were more behaved than their own.

A character inspired by Angie.

The first, and last time, that Angie came with church with me the Sunday school teacher, Ms. Karen, drove me home, showed my parents the bad words that were written on my Sunday school lesson paper. What no one believed was the little girl in the frilly dress from two doors down was the one that wrote those words. I could barely spell three letter words, four letter words were not in my vocabulary at that point. It took many months before Ms. Karen, realized that I was not the one that wrote the bad words though my parents never really believed that I was innocent. The other little girl that I played from the neighborhood, Monica, was the daughter of my Sunday school teacher. Monica was a well behaved "proper" little girl and I preferred to play with her over Angie. Monica's toy collection consisted of Barbies and Strawberry Shortcake dolls which I spent hours playing with.

My favorite Christmas and holidays happened in that neighborhood. What would one expect from a subdivision called Holiday which consisted of of two streets that began with Easter Lane which formed a circle and merged into Christmas Drive? Many families competed against each other for the most creative Christmas displays, I think it's where my dad began to get ideas in regards to outdoor light displays. A family across the street, the Jones', covered all of their bushes with garbage bags and turned the sprinklers on one night and transformed their front yard of their ugly green, gray and white house into an icy Winter Wonderland, this was when it began to get cold in October up into March or April.

My sister Becki and I during Christmas 1980 at the Yellow House.

Not the Jones' house but this was what they did.

We moved away from this neighborhood when I was 7 years old. The last time I saw this neighborhood, I was 16. My sister, brother in law at the time and myself drove through and were shocked at the condition of the houses 12 years later. Recently I got curious to see what our old neighborhood looks like now, 22 years after the last time I saw it. Being that it's about 330 miles from my house in the Atlanta area, I decided to take a trip using Google Earth and Street View. I was SHOCKED at what I saw...to say the very least. Unsure of the actual addresses we lived at, I just pulled up Easter Lane and Christmas Drive in Mobile, Alabama and found absolutely nothing. It's all gone. Everything from the homes to the church at the end of the street were gone. The subdivision entrance is now fenced off and gated with signs that read Authorized Personnel Only and Gate 101. The only remaining evidence of this neighborhood besides the entrance is the view of the streets from above which shows the streets are disintegrating and eroding away. The two yards in the neighborhood which had in ground swimming pools show no sign they ever existed, they have either been filled in or covered. I really don't think the houses were old enough to condemn and demolish so the reasoning behind the demolition of the neighborhood is a mystery to me. The only thing I can think of is the fact that behind our subdivision was land owned by the Mobile Regional Airport and they possibly took over the land in hopes of expanding though I'm not exactly sure why, there are only four and a half airlines that fly a total of twenty two flights out of the airport each day.

The Present Day Easter Lane Entrance To Holiday Subdivision.

Aerial View of the Easter Lane Entrance of Holiday Subdivision.

Aerial View of present day DEMOLISHED Holiday Subdivision.

Adrian sing's Timebomb

My cover of Kylie Minogue's Timebomb

My cover of Harper Valley PTA

My cover of Jeannie C. Riley's Harper Valley PTA.

Adrian singing Back To The Wall

My cover of Back To The Wall originally by the Divinyls.

Pencil vs. Pen

Being a weirdo freak...or OCD...I've found that writing in pen leaves too many mistakes and somehow, scribbles and crossouts are hard for me to deal with thanks to the OCD. I never cared for pens, even when I was a kid. My parents seemed to have an endless supply of pens with logos and business names ranging from their own business B&D Home Care and Landscaping to AmSouth. Essentially, pens that just happened to be around, ended up in our house, banks, hotels, stores, restaurants, insurance agencies and pretty much anywhere that hands you a pen. I guess technically, they weren't stolen since they werte promo items. It really seemed like there were more pens in the house than my Tupperware bin of crayons. I think the only pencil in the house, besides the few my sister took to school, was a rectangular shaped pencil in my dad's tool box, which he sharpened using a box cutter.

Ever seen people do crossword puzzles in pen? The thought baffles my mind. When I was in school, I hated the classes where teachers would force us to use either black or blue ink, I really hated it with a passion. Something in my mind makes me make more mistakes when using pens, probably because of the anxiety of knowing you can't erase it and it just makes me loose a little control over my perfectionist emotion. I know I'm crazy, writing in pen to me seems like a high pressure thing, when we signed our mortgage, I made more mistakes than you could imagine...in some office, someone is wondering why they gave someone like me a house when I can't even sign in the right place.

My house is overrun by pencils now, I have 2 electric pencil sharpeners and about 3 gross of pencils from Oriental Trading...Can't pass up good deals on stuff I'll eventually wear down ya know? Mechanical pencils used to be my thing but they seem to be more trouble than what they are worth...you never know when you're at your last bit of lead...Could be the crazy in me talking though.

Remember the super cool toy called Spirograph? Essentially, gears that came with a few colored pens, usually primary colors that barely work and no other pens will fit into. They did make really cool, colorful designs but due to the fact that pens were involved, I wasn't interested...Plus my sister would have killed me if I used it since it was hers...What was hers was hers and what was mine, I wasn't really interested in anyway.

Seriously I can't believe I'm sitting here typing about pencils and pens, obviously I'm bored and have nothing better to do at the moment. I actually sat down to type about something else and ended up getting sidetracked and forgot my other subject. I guess it could be worse, I could be talking about bad kids again. So what's your choice? Pencils or Pens? ;-)

My cover of Kylie Minogue's 2 Hearts

Me singing 2 Hearts originally by Kylie Minogue. ;-)

Bottled Iced Coffee Knock Off Recipe (CORRECTED)

When it comes to drinking coffee, Terry and I are complete opposites. I like mine hot, black and sometimes with a little Splenda or Equal...He loves his super sweet, cold, flavored, in lots of sugar and milk. When we go to Starbucks, he orders a Frappuccino and I prefer to order their most regular blend with a few ice cubes to drop the temp to not scalding.

Many years ago, Terry discovered the bottles of Starbucks branded bottled Frappuccino coffee drinks in the grocery store and began to buy them. I personally thought it was a rip off, considering you get four for $7-$8 and a 270 cup container of ground Folgers coffee is about the same price...But like I said, we are opposites and I like what I like and he likes what he likes. Recently, I discovered through a blog featuring reviews of products from Aldi, that Aldi had their own versions of bottled coffee drinks similar to Starbucks and only for $1.29 each. $5.16 at Aldi, the reviews seemed to have been more favorable than the Starbucks 4-pack so we tried them...He liked them. I still felt that it was a rip off though, coffee is such a cheap commodity that I don't feel a cup should cost $1.30 especially when you can make a cup of black coffee at home for around 3 cents...but that's just my opinion.

A few weeks ago, he told me before he was gonna log onto the uber app to start working for the day, he wanted coffee but had no more bottles. He was about to head down to Aldi but I told him I could make something even better...He thought I was full of shit but on my first try, I aced the challenge...He actually said that my coffee drink gave him more energy than the bottled stuff and it tasted better. The fact that I knew what the actual ingredients to mine compared to the mystery of the bottled stuff was a plus...The cost of my coffee drink compared to the Aldi version? I can safely say it was substantial...The cost of my recipe, if I did my math right, is about 30 cents...For me, it's off limits because it's NOT a zero or even low calorie drink. You're looking at about 270 calories for this entire recipe.

1 cup ice cubs
1 cup brewed coffee
2/3 cup 2% milk
1 tbsp sugar
2 tsp Torani flavored Syrup (I used 1 tsp Vanilla Bean and 1 tsp Caramel and he LOVED it)

Blend all ingredients in a blender...This should be a watery consistency and not really like a milkshake. If you're looking for the consistency of an actual Starbucks in-store Frap...add a lot more ice and make sure you're coffee is super strong and is already chilled before you add it to the blender.

My Crush Crushed By Puke

We've all had to go to school while we were sick at one time or another. Well, at least those of us that actually went to school. My mom's motto was "If you don't throw up, shit yourself or aren't laid up in a hospital bed, they you will be at school." My could usually tell when we were too sick to go to school and force us to stay home. There are, however, dumbass parents out there that insist their sick kids go to school.

From the time I started kindergarten until the end of the second grade, my bus ride to school was a thirty mile trek up and down hills which can be nausea inducing for a completely healthy child. Throughout my kindergarten year, there was a 5th grader that rode my bus that was everything I wanted to be...Not wearing clothes from the TG&Y, athletic (yeah I know he was only a fifth grader) and really good looking...Not sure if he really was but I thought so at the time and it was my first boy crush and I tried to sit near where I knew he might sit everytime he got on the bus. This particular day, by luck, he didn't sit near me because fifteen or so miles into our way to school we hear a gag, heave and a prompt splash. Within a few seconds, every kid on the bus was scrambling to get the windows down...A move of despiration thanks to the fact that it was in the middle of January and freezing cold but fourty four kids preferred shivering to the fumes of permiating vomit in a long tube with no circulation for the duration of fifteen more miles.

It didn't take me long to realize the source of our collective discomfort was "my man" and in one fell splash my crush was crushed. He was crying and not as tough and manly as I thought...plus he just puked. We have fifteen more miles to go up and down hills and this kid must have been super dehydrated because it seemed every bit of fluid in him must have been on the floor of the bus. Gravity kicked in...the floor of the bus became a vomity wave pool of milky, juicy, watery, cereally, disgusting funk. From the front of the bus to the back and back to the front on a twisting hilly road at thirty five miles an hour in the freezing cold and well...No one's feet touched that floor.

Grooves in the aisle of a school bus floor.

Debussing was tricky. Our driver, Mrs. Horton, wouldn't let us budding gymnists climb out the windows or flip over the seats so we were stuck. The kids in the front half of the bus stradled the edges of the seats and exit through the front door where a puddle of vomit awaited them on the stairs. We lucky bitches in the back followed suit but we had a back exit door that we could jump from with no puddle of puke. Mrs. Horton tried to clean the bus as best as she could but it still reeked of vomit for a week.

From that moment on, I vowed that would never EVER be me. Over the course of my school years, there were many kids that gave the janitors workouts with mops and the peppermint scented kitty litter shit they throw on puke...NEVER ME...I can't say that I've not been spotted puking in public though...When I did, I did it in style....Once in a plant at Burkhardts and again in front of the governors mansion in Atlanta.

Emetrol Anyone?