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| There's no place like home. Even when you're unemployed and homeless. Edd's Travels are now on hold, but will be resumed with a vengeance some time in 2015. Thanks for reading! |
Saturday 8 November 2014
Sunderland, England
Wednesday 5 November 2014
Denver, Colorado (continued)
Marijuana. Cannabis, grass, hash, dope, draw, weed, green, Mary Jane, chronic, cheeba, da sheeeeet. Available freely to buy and own, courtesy of that august and reverend body of men and women, the voters of Colorado. Strictly speaking, you still can't smoke it in public; but as far as obstacles go, that's not exactly Beecher's Brook.
The ballot measure was signed into law by Governor John Hickenlooper, who is not just a politican but also the co-founder of the Wynkoop brewery (see Edd vs Food in last blog) and Denver's first brewpub. A strong contrast with the Lilliputians back home. What have Cameron or Clegg or Millipede ever done in the real world? As for the wider effects of legalisation, well, as far as I can tell Colorado is much the same as it was, except that the rake-off from the marijuana trade now gets paid in taxes rather than going to mass murdering Mexican psychopaths. Seems like a no-brainer to me.
You can buy the stuff in a number of different places, and in any form, from resin & grass to cakes & pre-rolled 'blunts'. (By the way did I mention that I went to a Hallowe'en fancy dress party? All I could find at short notice was a ghost-themed 'Despicable Me' T-shirt. There were numerous zombies and also one of the barmaids was there as Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, complete with nosebleed and syringe sticking out of her chest. One woman even came as 'Sharknado'. That costume's kind of hard to describe, but it worked.) It's not too expensive and of course the cakes are a bit easier to get away with consuming somewhere you technically shouldn't be consuming them. (Also I forgot to mention that I visited the Coors brewery, in a town called Golden just outside Denver; it's the biggest single-site brewery in the world and frankly it looks more like a nuclear power station than a brewery. They churn out all kinds of undrinkable effluent there, but they also make Blue Moon so all is forgiven.) Where was I? Oh yes, hash cakes. I'm easily distracted right now because there's a guy sitting near me who frankly I don't trust at all. His eyes are too close together. His green sneakers surely bespeak evil intent. You can't be too careful in Denver and anyway this chair's way too uncomfortable to sit still on. The sofa's a bit better. It's still noisy but I don't know where the noises are coming from and nobody else seems to be hearing them. My thumbs have gone weird. I think I need to eat some sugar or something. Actually I could eat just about anything right now. Apart from this last pot cake. It's marshmallow flavour and the guy at the shop said they were good microwaved but I'm concerned that if I microwave it then it'll expand into a big Michelin Man monster like from Ghostbusters and then it'll squish me and turn Sigourney Weaver into a dog. I would go and microwave some soup, but it's right over the other side of the room and I don't think I can actually stand up at this precise moment. But I need to get up because if I don't then they'll all come and get me. All of them. What if weed's been criminalised again? I could be deported or go to jail. No, that's not likely. I think I have diplomatic immunity. I love burritos. And this sofa is getting really comfortable now. It' s making me feel sleepy. Must be all that walking I did earlier. Things To Do In Denver When You're Edd, ha ha ha. Soup can wait. I'll be safe having a little sleep because there's no-one here except that pleasant chap with the green sneakers and he's a really good mate of mine. Haven't spoken to him yet but clearly he's alright. He looks like he has a happy soul. Denver's a nice place. Did I mention it's been called the Mile High City for years because of the altitude? Now they could still use that name even if the altitude changed or something and it went like down to sea level or something. Cos everybody would still be a mile high ha ha. Although if there was a volcano earthquake combo type thing and it went up to ten thousand feet then it would be the Two Mile High City and that wouldn't be as good. There's a guy in the bunk below me who listens to drum & bass music all day and all night. He says he used to weigh 400lbs but lost half of it just by dancing to drum & bass. Earphones in 24/7. His feet twitch in his sleep and he dances down the street when he's walking. Sort of like the American version of Dave the Rave. If you're not from Sunderland then you won't know who Dave the Rave is. You should come to Sunderland and check him out. Him and Ernie the Bag Man. Is my soup ready? Oops no I haven't opened the tin yet. There's a beeping noise but that's my alarm clock going off with some kind of reminder. Something about an airport and a taxi. Who takes a plane to the taxi rank? Weird. I don't care. I'm hungry and I want cheese.
The ballot measure was signed into law by Governor John Hickenlooper, who is not just a politican but also the co-founder of the Wynkoop brewery (see Edd vs Food in last blog) and Denver's first brewpub. A strong contrast with the Lilliputians back home. What have Cameron or Clegg or Millipede ever done in the real world? As for the wider effects of legalisation, well, as far as I can tell Colorado is much the same as it was, except that the rake-off from the marijuana trade now gets paid in taxes rather than going to mass murdering Mexican psychopaths. Seems like a no-brainer to me.
You can buy the stuff in a number of different places, and in any form, from resin & grass to cakes & pre-rolled 'blunts'. (By the way did I mention that I went to a Hallowe'en fancy dress party? All I could find at short notice was a ghost-themed 'Despicable Me' T-shirt. There were numerous zombies and also one of the barmaids was there as Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, complete with nosebleed and syringe sticking out of her chest. One woman even came as 'Sharknado'. That costume's kind of hard to describe, but it worked.) It's not too expensive and of course the cakes are a bit easier to get away with consuming somewhere you technically shouldn't be consuming them. (Also I forgot to mention that I visited the Coors brewery, in a town called Golden just outside Denver; it's the biggest single-site brewery in the world and frankly it looks more like a nuclear power station than a brewery. They churn out all kinds of undrinkable effluent there, but they also make Blue Moon so all is forgiven.) Where was I? Oh yes, hash cakes. I'm easily distracted right now because there's a guy sitting near me who frankly I don't trust at all. His eyes are too close together. His green sneakers surely bespeak evil intent. You can't be too careful in Denver and anyway this chair's way too uncomfortable to sit still on. The sofa's a bit better. It's still noisy but I don't know where the noises are coming from and nobody else seems to be hearing them. My thumbs have gone weird. I think I need to eat some sugar or something. Actually I could eat just about anything right now. Apart from this last pot cake. It's marshmallow flavour and the guy at the shop said they were good microwaved but I'm concerned that if I microwave it then it'll expand into a big Michelin Man monster like from Ghostbusters and then it'll squish me and turn Sigourney Weaver into a dog. I would go and microwave some soup, but it's right over the other side of the room and I don't think I can actually stand up at this precise moment. But I need to get up because if I don't then they'll all come and get me. All of them. What if weed's been criminalised again? I could be deported or go to jail. No, that's not likely. I think I have diplomatic immunity. I love burritos. And this sofa is getting really comfortable now. It' s making me feel sleepy. Must be all that walking I did earlier. Things To Do In Denver When You're Edd, ha ha ha. Soup can wait. I'll be safe having a little sleep because there's no-one here except that pleasant chap with the green sneakers and he's a really good mate of mine. Haven't spoken to him yet but clearly he's alright. He looks like he has a happy soul. Denver's a nice place. Did I mention it's been called the Mile High City for years because of the altitude? Now they could still use that name even if the altitude changed or something and it went like down to sea level or something. Cos everybody would still be a mile high ha ha. Although if there was a volcano earthquake combo type thing and it went up to ten thousand feet then it would be the Two Mile High City and that wouldn't be as good. There's a guy in the bunk below me who listens to drum & bass music all day and all night. He says he used to weigh 400lbs but lost half of it just by dancing to drum & bass. Earphones in 24/7. His feet twitch in his sleep and he dances down the street when he's walking. Sort of like the American version of Dave the Rave. If you're not from Sunderland then you won't know who Dave the Rave is. You should come to Sunderland and check him out. Him and Ernie the Bag Man. Is my soup ready? Oops no I haven't opened the tin yet. There's a beeping noise but that's my alarm clock going off with some kind of reminder. Something about an airport and a taxi. Who takes a plane to the taxi rank? Weird. I don't care. I'm hungry and I want cheese.
Monday 3 November 2014
Denver, Colorado
And so I'm back where it all began, two months ago, except that now I'm actually staying in downtown Denver rather than just driving or flying through. For the first time in about six weeks I'm feeling cool fresh breezes, and I'm loving it. The sun's still shining, though. This is the first time I've been in the USA for autumn, or 'fall' I should say, and at this time of year the low-lying sun and the leaves on the ground are every bit as picturesque, in their own way, as the height of summer.
Denver is a proper city but it's not too big and it's pretty nice; perhaps not destined for my top 5 US cities, but probably in the top 10. Unfortunately there are no real youth hostels, and so in order to stay downtown without spending a fortune on hotels, I've ended up in a bit of a flophouse. My dorm room smells like a dead tramp's underpants. At least there are some good second-hand bookshops a few blocks to the south on Broadway. And of course it's the craft beer capital of the USA.
Today's blog contains the slightly momentous event of only the second-ever 'selfie' photo to appear herein. (The first was me with Libby Kennedy off of Neighbours, in my blog from Erinsborough last April. I can still remember her tears on my shoulder when I left.) About fifteen seconds after I left my Sunderland studio flat for the last time, to catch the Metro to the airport - having posted the keys through the letterbox and thus become officially of no fixed address - I saw the Google Street View van trundling past, and you see the results below. That's me in my red Coca-Cola T-shirt; the backpack straps are visible on my shoulder.
Anyway, as the shadows lengthen and my thoughts turn to home, perhaps it's time for a few retrospective summaries of my trip:
CITIES
Savannah definitely takes first place, with Memphis, Houston, Nashville and Denver earning honourable mentions. I liked New Orleans, but not so much that I'd particularly want to go back.
STATES
The Good: Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennesse, Alabama, Georgia, Texas
The Bad and the Ugly: Florida
NATIONAL PARKS
All great, but Zion takes the laurel wreath of victory. Truly magical.
EDD VS FAST FOOD
Very disappointing on the whole, apart from Quiznos, who I'd like to see expand into the UK. Subway only do two sizes of sub, but Quiznos do three. Because when 6" isn't quite enough, and 12" is perhaps too much, 8" should be just about right.
Please note - in spite of all the above, don't think this is the last blog of my trip. I have one more thing to indulge in before I leave Colorado...
Denver is a proper city but it's not too big and it's pretty nice; perhaps not destined for my top 5 US cities, but probably in the top 10. Unfortunately there are no real youth hostels, and so in order to stay downtown without spending a fortune on hotels, I've ended up in a bit of a flophouse. My dorm room smells like a dead tramp's underpants. At least there are some good second-hand bookshops a few blocks to the south on Broadway. And of course it's the craft beer capital of the USA.
Today's blog contains the slightly momentous event of only the second-ever 'selfie' photo to appear herein. (The first was me with Libby Kennedy off of Neighbours, in my blog from Erinsborough last April. I can still remember her tears on my shoulder when I left.) About fifteen seconds after I left my Sunderland studio flat for the last time, to catch the Metro to the airport - having posted the keys through the letterbox and thus become officially of no fixed address - I saw the Google Street View van trundling past, and you see the results below. That's me in my red Coca-Cola T-shirt; the backpack straps are visible on my shoulder.
Anyway, as the shadows lengthen and my thoughts turn to home, perhaps it's time for a few retrospective summaries of my trip:
CITIES
Savannah definitely takes first place, with Memphis, Houston, Nashville and Denver earning honourable mentions. I liked New Orleans, but not so much that I'd particularly want to go back.
STATES
The Good: Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennesse, Alabama, Georgia, Texas
The Bad and the Ugly: Florida
NATIONAL PARKS
All great, but Zion takes the laurel wreath of victory. Truly magical.
EDD VS FAST FOOD
Very disappointing on the whole, apart from Quiznos, who I'd like to see expand into the UK. Subway only do two sizes of sub, but Quiznos do three. Because when 6" isn't quite enough, and 12" is perhaps too much, 8" should be just about right.
Please note - in spite of all the above, don't think this is the last blog of my trip. I have one more thing to indulge in before I leave Colorado...
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| City & County Building, seen from the balcony of the State Capitol building |
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| This is the Yard House, which advertises itself as having the world's largest selection of draft beers. I have no reason to doubt them. The taps go right down the other side of the bar as well. |
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| Two Lamborghinis and two Ferraris, all available for hire. Very nice...but if I was the owner of Mile High Drives, I think I'd park them in a garage. |
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| Edd vs Food #21 Denver fries (although they don't call it that here, it's just fries) at Jonesy's. A double order: half with bacon mac & cheese, half with buffalo wing sauce & blue cheese. Washed down with a pint of Wynkoop Patty's Chile Beer (it does actually taste like peppers). |
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| Edd vs Fast Food #6 Dairy Queen As the name suggests, they originally specialised in ice cream. They now also sell burgers & stuff too. Mediocre at best though. You can buy a better hot dog at any street stall, and the ice cream comes a distant second to a McFlurry. |
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| He's Leaving Home...bye, bye... Google Street View capturing the very beginning of this trip, August 31st 2014. My front door is just round the corner behind me. See the original here. |
Thursday 30 October 2014
Houston, Texas
Texas is miles better than Florida and I defy anyone who's visited both to tell me otherwise. I really enjoyed my time in Texas last year, when I visited El Paso, Alpine and Austin (I thought I'd also been to Dallas, but it turned out to be just a dream, ha ha) and so it was an easy decision to come back. Houston is the fourth-biggest city in the US, behind NY and LA and Chicago. It's not exactly a tourist hotspot but I prefer things that way.
It occurred to me recently that while travelling I devote all my time to leisure and pleasure, and that perhaps it was time to be a bit less selfish and do something good. Time to give something back to society...
So I volunteered as a sample pourer at the Big Brew Beer Festival, in the George R. Brown convention centre in downtown Houston. The festival is aptly named: it makes the Ashbrooke festival look like two tramps discussing a can of Special Brew. I manned the stall for Anchor, a fairly well-known San Francisco brewery, and was responsible for dishing out their California Lager, Anchor Porter, Liberty Ale and Anchor IPA brews, one liquid ounce at the time. This was my first time working behind a bar and I rather wish I'd tried it sooner. Girls coming up from all directions and vying for my attention. Who knew?
It occurred to me recently that while travelling I devote all my time to leisure and pleasure, and that perhaps it was time to be a bit less selfish and do something good. Time to give something back to society...
So I volunteered as a sample pourer at the Big Brew Beer Festival, in the George R. Brown convention centre in downtown Houston. The festival is aptly named: it makes the Ashbrooke festival look like two tramps discussing a can of Special Brew. I manned the stall for Anchor, a fairly well-known San Francisco brewery, and was responsible for dishing out their California Lager, Anchor Porter, Liberty Ale and Anchor IPA brews, one liquid ounce at the time. This was my first time working behind a bar and I rather wish I'd tried it sooner. Girls coming up from all directions and vying for my attention. Who knew?
My social hub here is the Hay Merchant, just a short walk from the hostel, where Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is $3 a pint during happy hour. There is also a thriving food scene in Houston: my particular favourite is a Greek diner called Niko Niko's. No meal that contains grilled chicken, feta cheese, tzatziki and filo pastry can ever be bad.
Good beer, good food, and - even though it's late October - the sun shines 30 degrees C in a clear blue sky. Houston, we have no problem.
Good beer, good food, and - even though it's late October - the sun shines 30 degrees C in a clear blue sky. Houston, we have no problem.
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| Downtown Houston at dawn, from the 60th floor deck of the JP Morgan Chase building. |
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| Corner of Congress and San Jacinto |
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| In the foreground on the right are the Esperson buildings (1927 & 1941) and in the background is the BG Group Place building (2011) |
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| My stall at the beer festival |
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| Happy chappy at Houston Zoo |
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| Moon rock at Houston Space Center |
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| Meerkats doing their best 'Next catalogue pose' at Houston Zoo |
Thursday 23 October 2014
Florida
Florida is the number one location in the USA for retirement homes. In other words, it's where Americans go to die. Perhaps that's because living here makes you a bit more open to the idea.
It's the 22nd US state I've visited. It's the 10th state in this particular trip*, and it contains the 10th national park of my trip, the Everglades. Colorado has forests and rivers; Utah has mountains and canyons; Florida has a swamp. It may be the world's most impressive and biodiverse swamp, but it's still a swamp. An ugly, fetid, featureless, stinking swamp that you have to pay $10 to get into. But the mosquitos dine for free. Like all humans, I undergo intense discomfiture at any threat to my hitherto unchallenged position at the top of the food chain. See photo below.
I drove my rental car north from Miami and visited Pensacola, Tallahassee, Kennedy Space Center and the Everglades, in that order. Along the way I had two one-night stays in Jacksonville. I couldn't stay in Tallahassee because it was college football weekend and all the hotels were totally booked out. (When I say 'football', I of course mean American football. There was no English football this weekend. On the fixture list it said that Sunderland were playing at Southampton, but I refuse to acknowledge that any game took place.)
None of these places really merit a blog by themselves, hence the state-wide scope of this one. Pensacola and Tallahassee were nice; Kennedy Space Center was great. I gave Disney and Universal a miss as they're not really places to visit by yourself. Florida as a whole? It's a place which I can definitely take or leave.
So I'm going to leave.
(*I've mentioned 8 of the 10 states in my blog: there's also Montana, which I entered very briefly while in Yellowstone, and Mississippi, which I crossed between New Orleans and Memphis.)
It's the 22nd US state I've visited. It's the 10th state in this particular trip*, and it contains the 10th national park of my trip, the Everglades. Colorado has forests and rivers; Utah has mountains and canyons; Florida has a swamp. It may be the world's most impressive and biodiverse swamp, but it's still a swamp. An ugly, fetid, featureless, stinking swamp that you have to pay $10 to get into. But the mosquitos dine for free. Like all humans, I undergo intense discomfiture at any threat to my hitherto unchallenged position at the top of the food chain. See photo below.
I drove my rental car north from Miami and visited Pensacola, Tallahassee, Kennedy Space Center and the Everglades, in that order. Along the way I had two one-night stays in Jacksonville. I couldn't stay in Tallahassee because it was college football weekend and all the hotels were totally booked out. (When I say 'football', I of course mean American football. There was no English football this weekend. On the fixture list it said that Sunderland were playing at Southampton, but I refuse to acknowledge that any game took place.)
None of these places really merit a blog by themselves, hence the state-wide scope of this one. Pensacola and Tallahassee were nice; Kennedy Space Center was great. I gave Disney and Universal a miss as they're not really places to visit by yourself. Florida as a whole? It's a place which I can definitely take or leave.
So I'm going to leave.
(*I've mentioned 8 of the 10 states in my blog: there's also Montana, which I entered very briefly while in Yellowstone, and Mississippi, which I crossed between New Orleans and Memphis.)
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| Pensacola Beach |
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| Pensacola at sunset |
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| The old Florida State Capitol building in Tallahassee. It's now a museum. (The new big ugly one is visible right behind it.) |
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| Saturn V rocket at Kennedy Space Center. It's still the most powerful machine ever used by mankind. |
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| Space Shuttle Atlantis |
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| Everglades National Park This is about as scenic as it gets. |
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| Edd vs Food #20 Good old fashioned meat & veg, but posh. At Pot Roast & Pinot in Pensacola. |
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| Edd vs Fast Food #5 Arby's Not as disgusting as it looks. Pretty close though. The chicken was half gristle, and the beef was of the kind you buy in a £1 packet from Iceland. They didn't even have wi-fi. |
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| Mosquitoes vs Food #1 Edd Fatty, quite sweet, with top-notes of ginger. Sometimes cheesy. Very filling when served on the bone. |
Sunday 19 October 2014
Miami, Florida
Miami began badly. The train from Savannah was meant to last 12 hours, 7am to 7pm, but it didn't show up until 9am and then there was an apparent suicide on the line ahead of us. Presumably the police weren't sure it was suicide, because they kept us waiting there for five hours. We finally rolled into the outskirts of Miami at 3am. There was no public transport available, and a taxi would have cost a fortune, and you can't check into a hostel at that time anyway; so all I could do was sit outside the train station and wait for the sun to come up.
At 8am a bus arrived and took me to South Beach. While waiting to check in, I watched Estonia v England on my netbook in the nearest McDonalds. Naturally one is obliged to make a token purchase when hijacking their wi-fi: mine was a McMuffin meal. And then a chilli chicken wrap. And then a McFlurry. (In the circumstances described above, I think I was entitled to a bit of comfort food. Also I'm slowly coming to terms with the fact that I actually like just about everything McDonalds sell, with the obvious exception of the burgers and the fries).
After a much-needed sleep I went out for an early evening walk to the beachfront. Impressions of Miami from the first five minutes: an obviously gay man pushing a baby stroller containing only a puppy; a hipster wearing earphones and texting while on a skateboard being pulled along by his dog; a brand-new Rolls-Royce convertible on the back of a tow-truck. I took a picture of the latter and was rehearsing a witty caption about the tow fees probably not being a problem, but then I realised it was being delivered, not towed.
It's very hot, and my speed-eating skills have come in useful because ice creams don't last two minutes under the sun here. I got up early to watch that sun rise over the east-facing South Beach on my second morning here (my first morning was lost in a fog of puke-stained hangover).
At first, Miami struck me as more refined and much cleaner than I'd expected. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting. Probably some kind of turbo-charged Whitley Bay; a Blackpool on steroids. But the good impression didn't last. Posing seems to be the order of the day here. People drive convertibles round and round the block just to see who notices them. And there's a young chap in my hostel, in town for a modelling shoot, who does not appear to possess a single item of upper-body clothing. Admittedly if I looked like that, which is to say, if I was carved from bronze-tinted marble, I'd probably take the same approach.
The main drinking area is Ocean Drive, which looks out over South Beach. Endless crowds of people who are neither rich nor beautiful, pretending to be both, and spending fortunes in the process. It's loud, crude, vulgar, seedy and false. There are better places to drink further inland, but not many.
For people who like hot humid weather and loud noise and nightclubbing, Miami is perfect. For me personally, it's the eighth circle of hell. I won't be leaving the way I arrived, because after that fiasco, me and Amtrak are having a trial separation: a 'conscious uncoupling', if you will. (Trains? Coupling? Geddit? Never mind.) I now have a gleaming white Nissan Altima 2.5S with a full tank of gas, at 50p a litre by the way, and I'm outta here.
At 8am a bus arrived and took me to South Beach. While waiting to check in, I watched Estonia v England on my netbook in the nearest McDonalds. Naturally one is obliged to make a token purchase when hijacking their wi-fi: mine was a McMuffin meal. And then a chilli chicken wrap. And then a McFlurry. (In the circumstances described above, I think I was entitled to a bit of comfort food. Also I'm slowly coming to terms with the fact that I actually like just about everything McDonalds sell, with the obvious exception of the burgers and the fries).
After a much-needed sleep I went out for an early evening walk to the beachfront. Impressions of Miami from the first five minutes: an obviously gay man pushing a baby stroller containing only a puppy; a hipster wearing earphones and texting while on a skateboard being pulled along by his dog; a brand-new Rolls-Royce convertible on the back of a tow-truck. I took a picture of the latter and was rehearsing a witty caption about the tow fees probably not being a problem, but then I realised it was being delivered, not towed.
It's very hot, and my speed-eating skills have come in useful because ice creams don't last two minutes under the sun here. I got up early to watch that sun rise over the east-facing South Beach on my second morning here (my first morning was lost in a fog of puke-stained hangover).
At first, Miami struck me as more refined and much cleaner than I'd expected. I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting. Probably some kind of turbo-charged Whitley Bay; a Blackpool on steroids. But the good impression didn't last. Posing seems to be the order of the day here. People drive convertibles round and round the block just to see who notices them. And there's a young chap in my hostel, in town for a modelling shoot, who does not appear to possess a single item of upper-body clothing. Admittedly if I looked like that, which is to say, if I was carved from bronze-tinted marble, I'd probably take the same approach.
The main drinking area is Ocean Drive, which looks out over South Beach. Endless crowds of people who are neither rich nor beautiful, pretending to be both, and spending fortunes in the process. It's loud, crude, vulgar, seedy and false. There are better places to drink further inland, but not many.
For people who like hot humid weather and loud noise and nightclubbing, Miami is perfect. For me personally, it's the eighth circle of hell. I won't be leaving the way I arrived, because after that fiasco, me and Amtrak are having a trial separation: a 'conscious uncoupling', if you will. (Trains? Coupling? Geddit? Never mind.) I now have a gleaming white Nissan Altima 2.5S with a full tank of gas, at 50p a litre by the way, and I'm outta here.
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| Downtown Miami |
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| The main beaches in Miami are on a small island which is called Miami Beach. Technically it's a separate city to Miami itself. |
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| The sun, newly risen over South Beach...behind some clouds. Stupid clouds. |
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| Edd vs Fast Food #5 Chick-Fil-A Miserably small serving of chicken nuggets. Doesn't even compare with KFC. How hard can it be to compare with KFC? Epic fried chicken fail. |
Friday 17 October 2014
Savannah, Georgia
Honorable mentions go to Leopold's Ice Cream and especially to the Crystal Beer Parlour, which scored the full five stars on all three counts of food, beer and service. The local brewery is called South Bound and their Scattered Sun is one of the best Belgian white beers I've ever had.
I also tried an all-you-can-eat soul food buffet, at a restaurant owned by the ever-so-slightly scary TV personality Paula Deen. What did I make of soul food? Well, I liked the fried chicken...I think I can take or leave the rest of it though. One for the 'been there done that' file. But Savannah on the whole is definitely one for the 'come back here one day with friends' file.
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| The Westin Hotel. Very plush. Obviously I didn't stay there. |
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| Savannah River ferries on the north shore |
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| Forsyth Fountain, Forsyth Park |
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| World Of Beer, 112 W Broughton St, Savannah. This is my new home. It's been nice knowing you all. |
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| Edd vs Fast Food #4 Jimmy John's A 'Totally Tuna' sub. Better than Subway, not as good as Quiznos. That's all I can say really. |
Tuesday 14 October 2014
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is bigger than I expected, with plenty of high-rises looming above the fairly plush Downtown area. I was here just one night, passing through, and the only event of note was a lovely big pile of Mexican food at Jalapeno Charlie's. Not photogenic enough to make it into Edd vs Food but very nice all the same.
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| Downtown Atlanta |
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| At dusk, a fairly pleasing coherence of architectural styles and colours. London could learn from this. |
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| Sunrise over Atlanta |
Sunday 12 October 2014
Nashville, Tennessee
On the Greyhound into Nashville there was an intense-looking young guy sitting in the front row, totally engrossed in a book. Eventually he stood, turned round and began addressing the whole bus. He told us that the God of Abraham was dead and had been replaced by the God of Life. Sadly for him, denying the God of Abraham means denying Jesus Christ, and that sort of thing doesn't go down well in Tennessee. He failed to win the crowd over and sat down again in resentful silence.
Although I do like a bit of Gram Parsons and Hank Williams and Emmylou Harris, I can't say I'm as excited about the Nashville scene as I was about Memphis or Muscle Shoals. But there's plenty more than just country music here. It seems almost everyone you meet is in town to play a gig or make a record, and of course names get dropped constantly. ('I'm working with such-and-such...he did the xylophone arrangements for a solo album by the drummer of the band who used to open for Ugly Kid Joe...') It's like LA: everybody wants to be on the scene.
Of course, name-dropping and competitive boasting is a fairly universal thing. Last year in Detroit I said hello to a chap in a hostel kitchen and within about fifteen seconds he had found occasion to mention that he'd once been nominated for an Oscar. I looked him up later and in fairness it was true.
Aside from the record industry, Nashville is also a popular holiday destination for Americans to get drunk and shake their tails to live music. Most of this happens on Broadway and it's a good night out. In the pub where I got the food pictured below, I came across 'layered beers', meaning two different beers mixed in one glass. Snakebite, ie lager and cider, is familiar; as is Black Velvet, ie Guinness and cider. However 'Black Garden' - Guinness and Hoegaarden - is definitely a new one on me. (It's also known as 'Black Hoe', but obviously I'm not about to start yelling that across the bar...)
Although I do like a bit of Gram Parsons and Hank Williams and Emmylou Harris, I can't say I'm as excited about the Nashville scene as I was about Memphis or Muscle Shoals. But there's plenty more than just country music here. It seems almost everyone you meet is in town to play a gig or make a record, and of course names get dropped constantly. ('I'm working with such-and-such...he did the xylophone arrangements for a solo album by the drummer of the band who used to open for Ugly Kid Joe...') It's like LA: everybody wants to be on the scene.
Of course, name-dropping and competitive boasting is a fairly universal thing. Last year in Detroit I said hello to a chap in a hostel kitchen and within about fifteen seconds he had found occasion to mention that he'd once been nominated for an Oscar. I looked him up later and in fairness it was true.
Aside from the record industry, Nashville is also a popular holiday destination for Americans to get drunk and shake their tails to live music. Most of this happens on Broadway and it's a good night out. In the pub where I got the food pictured below, I came across 'layered beers', meaning two different beers mixed in one glass. Snakebite, ie lager and cider, is familiar; as is Black Velvet, ie Guinness and cider. However 'Black Garden' - Guinness and Hoegaarden - is definitely a new one on me. (It's also known as 'Black Hoe', but obviously I'm not about to start yelling that across the bar...)
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| Broadway. If you like country music and/or beer, then this is the place for you. |
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| Guerrilla billboard behind the Hustler shop on Church Street. The shop itself is in fact fairly innocuous, like an Ann Summers, but the rest of the Hustler empire isn't. For example they have a 'Barely Legal' strip club in New Orleans, with special offers for Father's Day. Words fail me. Details of the campaign are here. |
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| LP Field, home of the Tennessee Titans (American football), with a game ongoing. The visiting team was the Cleveland Browns, who came back from 28-3 down to win 29-28. It was the biggest comeback victory by an away team in NFL history. |
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| I think this rollercoaster needs some work. |
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| The AT&T Building. It looks like Batman. |
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| Savannah's Candy Kitchen on Broadway, by far the most impressive sweet shop I've ever seen. |
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| Edd vs Food #19 A bit of comfort food at The Pub, an 'authentic' English-style boozer on 11th Avenue. Shepherd's pie with beef, lamb, peas, carrots and chive whipped potatoes...all topped with mozzarella. Since when did 'authentic' English shepherd's pies come with mozzarella? I'm not complaining though! |
Thursday 9 October 2014
Muscle Shoals, Alabama
Even if you think you've never heard of Muscle Shoals, you've definitely heard songs recorded there at FAME studios (eg 'Mustang Sally' by Wilson Pickett and 'Wild Horses' by the Rolling Stones), or elsewhere by their session band the Swampers (eg 'Respect' by Aretha Franklin). I heartily recommend that you spare half an evening to watch a recent film made about both. Also see the lyrics to the third verse of Sweet Home Alabama. That's all for today!
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| FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals. |
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| Edd vs Fast Food #3 Quiznos An Italian Classic six-inch sub on Italian bread, and a Tuna six-inch sub on wheat. It's like Subway, but a bit more expensive and much better all round, especially the bread. Subway still has its place. But any time you see both, this is definitely the one to go for. |
Monday 6 October 2014
Memphis, Tennessee
Music is a recurring theme in my blog. It's been pretty unavoidable really. Chicago is the home of the blues; Detroit is the home of Motown; New Orleans is the home of jazz. But Memphis is the home of rock'n'roll. Needless to say I have invested quite heavily in souvenir T-shirts.
Here I've visited Sun Studios, a room the size of a garage where Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison all recorded their first hit singles. Did you know that U2 recorded 'Rattle and Hum' there? Also the Stax Museum, formerly Stax Records. (If you've ever seen 'The Commitments', well, basically in that film when they're talking about 'soul' music they're essentially talking about Stax music). Then there's the Memphis Rock & Soul Museum, which has (just as an example) the guitar Elvis took with him to Germany while serving in the US Army. Finally there is Graceland, which I trust needs no introduction...
At Sun Studios the tour guide showed us how the equipment is set up as it was when Elvis recorded 'That's All Right Mama' there in 1954. He (the tour guide, not Elvis) asked for silence and played the original radio broadcast over the speakers. In my tour group there was a well-built man of about seventy, with graying but still-prominent sideburns, and as the music started he broke down silently into tears. Maybe he went there every weekend. Maybe he'd waited all his life to be there.
In amongst all of the above it's essential to include the National Civil Rights Museum, erected around the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated in 1968. Stax Records was tightly bound up with the civil rights movement in a way that Motown, admittedly, wasn't. (Berry Gordy Jr didn't want Motown to release 'What's Going On' at all.) It's worth adding that there were white people, not just record label staff but writers and studio musicians, involved at all levels in Stax.
Beale St, which is where everything used to happen in the heyday of the blues pre-rock'n'roll, is nowadays the focal point of social life, or at least tourist life. It's rather like a miniature version of Bourbon St in New Orleans. In truth it's pretty trashy, but I found a club called Rum Boogie with a good blues band and a good plate of red beans & rice.
Memphis as a city is surprisingly upmarket, or at least the downtown area is. Realistically, I think this probably indicates that the authorities have been more successful than in other cities at keeping the poverty confined to the suburbs. Maybe I'm just cynical. But I really like this place and I'm definitely coming back here one day. All of a sudden Machu Picchu and the grand temple at Angkor Wat seem that little bit less important. I've been in Elvis Presley's kitchen. I'm all shook up.
Here I've visited Sun Studios, a room the size of a garage where Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison all recorded their first hit singles. Did you know that U2 recorded 'Rattle and Hum' there? Also the Stax Museum, formerly Stax Records. (If you've ever seen 'The Commitments', well, basically in that film when they're talking about 'soul' music they're essentially talking about Stax music). Then there's the Memphis Rock & Soul Museum, which has (just as an example) the guitar Elvis took with him to Germany while serving in the US Army. Finally there is Graceland, which I trust needs no introduction...
At Sun Studios the tour guide showed us how the equipment is set up as it was when Elvis recorded 'That's All Right Mama' there in 1954. He (the tour guide, not Elvis) asked for silence and played the original radio broadcast over the speakers. In my tour group there was a well-built man of about seventy, with graying but still-prominent sideburns, and as the music started he broke down silently into tears. Maybe he went there every weekend. Maybe he'd waited all his life to be there.
In amongst all of the above it's essential to include the National Civil Rights Museum, erected around the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated in 1968. Stax Records was tightly bound up with the civil rights movement in a way that Motown, admittedly, wasn't. (Berry Gordy Jr didn't want Motown to release 'What's Going On' at all.) It's worth adding that there were white people, not just record label staff but writers and studio musicians, involved at all levels in Stax.
Beale St, which is where everything used to happen in the heyday of the blues pre-rock'n'roll, is nowadays the focal point of social life, or at least tourist life. It's rather like a miniature version of Bourbon St in New Orleans. In truth it's pretty trashy, but I found a club called Rum Boogie with a good blues band and a good plate of red beans & rice.
Memphis as a city is surprisingly upmarket, or at least the downtown area is. Realistically, I think this probably indicates that the authorities have been more successful than in other cities at keeping the poverty confined to the suburbs. Maybe I'm just cynical. But I really like this place and I'm definitely coming back here one day. All of a sudden Machu Picchu and the grand temple at Angkor Wat seem that little bit less important. I've been in Elvis Presley's kitchen. I'm all shook up.
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| Downtown Memphis, from the rooftop bar of the art deco Madison Hotel. |
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| Sun Studios. |
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| Stax |
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| Stax Studio A. This is where '(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay' and 'In The Midnight Hour' were recorded, among many others. |
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| A rotating exhibit of the 1972 Cadillac El Dorado, in peacock blue, driven by Issac Hayes. Fur-lined interior, external gold trimmings, plus TV and refrigerator in the back. Not many cars had TVs and fridges in 1972. This ride is pimped, y'all. |
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| Graceland from the outside |
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| Graceland from the inside. The 1970s were a brown decade. |
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| Graceland - the kitchen. Surprisingly modest. |
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