Kansas City Adventure

This year we decided we wanted to take a trip by train. We looked at the routes and picked a destination that A) did not require an overnight trip and B) would not have come to mind otherwise. We chose Kansas City, Missouri. I am glad that we did.

The Area:
We stayed close to an area called Country Club Plaza. It is an area of shops and restaurants kind of like Michigan Ave. or Rodeo Drive: Coach, Tiffany's, clothing stores, Bang and Olufsen, an Apple Store, Williams Sonoma, and so on. The buildings are older and the whole place is modeled on Seville, Spain. I think it makes it more charming and unusual.




It was within walking distance of our hotel so we found ourselves walking around there quite often. There is a lot to see and explore. We had coffee at a local place a few times. We found a shop that sells really good gelato...so good that we went there three times. My favorite flavors were banana and caramel apple, but the wild berry was good too. I did some window shopping and some real shopping. We did some people watching too. There were quite a few street musicians and that was generally fun. We didn't see any jazz acts, but got a taste of it in various shops and restaurants.

Our hotel was close to two art museums. We walked around both of them one day. The Kemper museum wasn't awesome, but I did enjoy one exhibit: a sort of Choose Your Adventure installation that was witty. The larger museum had a good selection. I saw a couple of Impressionist paintings I hadn't seen before. I learned that I really enjoy the photo-realists.

The hotel was also close to the bus stops. That was handy because it made it relatively easy to get to the zoo. That trip was a bit rocky at first--the entrance off the highway is not set up for pedestrians. The zoo itself is a great experience and was one of the highlights of the trip. My favorite part was the kangaroo surprise. We were walking along and suddenly there were a lot of signs that directed us to stay on the path. We turned a corner and noticed a kangaroo sitting on the path. That led us to see that there were kangaroos all over the place, just hanging out. We got pretty close to a couple of them.




It was pretty awesome. I am glad that we were early enough to get to experience it before there were mobs of people around. Getting there early also helped us to make it through the day--it was pretty damned hot. And the A/C in our hotel room was not quite up to par.

The Food:

There were a couple of places I wanted to be sure to visit. Most of them were successful. I did not like the food at O'Dowd's Little Dublin pub, but the unfiltered wheat beer from a local brewery was fine. We had some very good Chinese food at Bo Ling's. We probably should have participated in the Dim Sum, but I had my heart set on the Sichuan Green Beans (my favorite!) and at first all I could see were a lot of carts of fried dumplings. Later we saw some cool looking veggie dishes and salads...ah well, maybe we'll get back some time.

We had a wonderful lunch at Brio, a Tuscan Grille. I had a Mixed Berry Lemonade (fresh lemons and berries) and ravioli stuffed with mushrooms and sweet gorgonzola with butternut squash and a browned butter sauce. It was so good that I am on a quest to replicate it. That evening we had our anniversary dinner at a classic steak house: The Plaza III. It was a success. We had Kansas City strip steaks, mushrooms, and potatoes. Hard to beat a day like that.

And we had barbecue. It wouldn't be right to go to Kansas City without having some barbecue. We skipped the down home style and went for a well regarded (though consciously more upscale) place: Fiorella's Jack Stack Barbecue. Adam got some beef soup (with burnt ends--brisket pieces, I think) and a prime rib sandwich. I got a ridiculously huge rib sample plate:




There were three kinds of ribs and all three were very good. The beef ribs were my least favorite, but I think that might be because when I think ribs I think pork. The pork ribs were definitely the best. The lamb ribs were really unusual, but in a good way. They are ultimately a bit too fatty for me and the lamb taste is strong (though not muttony). I don't know that I would order them again, but I am glad I tried them once. I must say that the fries were some of the best I've had. I only had a few of them because I wanted to try the other sides. The cole slaw was perfect---though I do admit to liking it sweeter than some do. The baked beans were in barbecue sauce so they were sweet too. I had heard about their cheesy corn bake so I ordered an additional side...but I must say that it was pretty gross. I was expecting something like a corn souffle, but this really was just corn in a cheese sauce. The waiter was awesome and took it off our bill after he found out we didn't like it. Otherwise, the meal was really tasty. My mouth wishes I could have finished more than a quarter or third of the meal, but the rest of me is happy with the relative restraint.

The Train:

Overall, I would say that I enjoyed our train travel. The key is to not be on a schedule because delays seem to be a regular occurrence. Luckily, our delays didn't really hurt. The train leaving Lafayette was late, but our layover in Chicago was a long one. We still had time to grab a pizza at Giordano's (spinach, mushroom, onion, and cheese=delicious) and some dessert before our connection.




The leg to Kansas City was my favorite. The staff was warm and helpful. The seats were comfortable with lots of legroom for Adam and a little footstool I could use. There are electrical outlets all over. The ride is mostly smooth. I could just kick back and take in the sights or read the Kindle (which was perfect, by the way). The landscape is pretty typical midwest (corn, cows, fields), but the Mississippi River was impressive as always. The barge traffic did delay us a bit...we almost missed the last bus of the night at the station in KC.

Our trip back to Chicago was good, but the vibe was definitely more harried. The route goes from Los Angeles to Chicago so these folks had probably been on for a couple of days. Still, there was a bit of the bum rush feel to it. This leg did make good time.

The worst, as always, is the return trip from Chicago to Lafayette. The Hoosier State service is, in a word, ass. The lack of leg room and a beverage/snack car would not be a big deal if the train ever kept on schedule. It does not. My experience with this trip has always been that you leave the station, go for a little bit and then get delayed by freight traffic. No one announces anything, unless you happen to get a conductor who walks by). You just sit and suck it up. I had always traveled in the winter so I had not yet experienced the next layer of joy which is that you get to bake during the wait. This time we had a 45 minute delay, traveled forward for maybe 3 minutes, and then had to sit for another session. But we eventually made it back to Lafayette.

I was glad to get home to the air conditioning, but we had a very good time on our vacation. I am glad to say that despite the Hoosier State run I enjoyed my experience with Amtrak. We may just do this kind of thing again next year...but this time we may try out the sleeper car. Maybe my territorial issues won't be triggered so often.

Though I won't bet on it.

My New Toy

This past Sunday marked the turning point for me. I could no longer resist the urge to buy a Kindle. For those of you who don't know, the Amazon Kindle is an electronic book reading device. It claims that it can hold about 200 titles (more if you buy a memory card). It will also play MP3s and audiobooks. My Kindle arrived yesterday. I could hardly contain myself all day; I was pretty much giddy with anticipation. I must say that so far my expectations have been met and I am really happy with my purchase. It isn't cheap, but for someone who reads as much as I do it is worth it. I am really looking forward to traveling lighter. I may actually get away from carrying the ridiculously huge bags.

The device is smaller than I thought it would be. I think I was envisioning something that was a bit thicker and maybe closer to a traditional hardback (or the oversize paperback) in size. I was happy to discover that I was mistaken. It is actually fairly thin on its own and is roughly the size of a paperback. I have taken a picture of the Kindle, in its cover, beside a "normal" size paperback book.




I did not realize that the Kindle is intended to be used inside the cover. Most of the video I've seen of the product seems to feature the Kindle outside the cover. You sort of wedge it inside the cover, hooking it in with a tab that fits into an indentation in the Kindle and anchoring it with the corners of the cover. You are then supposed to bend the front cover back to read. I must say that the cover could use some work. It did not fit securely at first. Adam did a little tweaking and it seems to fit now, but I am not confident that the cover will last. The bending back of the cover seems wrong given that it seems to crack like a hardback--going against early training in book handling. Despite that twinge, I admit that it is more comfortable to hold and read inside the cover. I used the Kindle for awhile without it and even with my relatively small hands, I experienced some discomfort. I will say that it is a good thing that some different covers are on the market now.

The screen is not backlit; it is made to look like ink and paper. I prefer it this way. I would rather be able to read it in direct light than in the dark. I really like the look of the Kindle screen. It is crisp, you can change the font sizes easily, and it is easy on my eyes. It can handle pictures fairly well too (though it certainly isn't photograph quality). Here is a picture of the Kindle in its cover, in sleep mode).



Navigating is pretty easy. There are buttons on both sides of the screen: next page, previous page, and back (will take you back to an original screen when you have followed a footnote or a link elsewhere). I haven't had much trouble with accidentally hitting the wrong button. The menus and means of selecting are straightforward. I appreciate that.

There were a few things I was worried about, but it looks like they won't be an issue. I was worried about how the pages would change. There is a flash, but it doesn't really bother me. It doesn't last long and I suspect I'll soon be able to tune it out. I can still get lost in the story. I can also write and highlight in the books. There is a highlight, clipping, and annotation feature. I can also look up words in the dictionary or in Wikipedia. I can delete books from the Kindle and if I purchased them on Amazon they are saved there so I can reload them when I want to (they also save the Annotations). The content management looks pretty good, though it would be nice to be able to do things like group a series together chronologically. I think that non-genre readers often overlook the importance of this kind of capability.

The thing that really sets this apart for me is that it is connected to Amazon.com. I can search the Kindle store on the Kindle and I can purchase books on it. They are downloaded and ready to go in about a minute. My favorite part so far has been the Sample feature. I can ask for a sample and it is sent to the Kindle. I've looked at a few titles so far and looks as if the usual amount is at least the first two chapters; it is certainly a big enough chunk to get a good idea about whether or not you're interested. There is no obligation to buy.

There are some magazine and newspaper subscriptions available, but I haven't been tempted yet. If I can buy a single issue I would do that just so I could see what it would be like. You can subscribe to blogs too, but I can't see paying for what I can browse for free on my laptop. I guess there aren't any sites out there that I feel that I must be able to get to. I do like the idea that I can do a bit of limited web browsing from the Kindle (for free). I say limited because Adam went to this site and while it did display thesacredcheese, when we tried to go to one of their listed sites it claimed it had run out of memory and that we needed to restart the device. Uncool. I will stick to my books, thank you.

So far I have sampled a few books, bought a couple (each for a little over six dollars, though most current titles are $9.99), and I went to manybooks.net and got an unabridged version of Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo for free. That was easy enough, once Adam walked me through it.

I'll be giving it a good long test when we take the train to Kansas City for our vacation. It will be so comforting to have a number of books with me and it will be great to not have to take up valuable room in the suitcase for them.

I could go on and on, but I've got some reading to do.

4th of July

We took advantage of the nice weather on Independence Day to try another barbecue experiment.  This time I felt compelled to take care of my craving for ribs.  I bought a couple slabs of St. Louis style ribs, gave them a rub (paprika, chile, salt, pepper, a little sugar) and fired up the grill.  I put the ribs in my rib rack, sprinkled some wood chips on the coals and let them cook.  Occasionally, I gave them a basting with some mop (apple juice, apple cider vinegar, a bit of barbecue sauce, and so on).  It took about four hours to cook the ribs.  I finished them flat on the grill to crisp them up a bit.  Here is a picture of them at that stage.



 I served them with some corn on the cob and baby Yukon Gold potatoes that I boiled in a brine. Add some melted butter and barbecue sauce on the side and we had our meal. The ribs were messy (as is usually the case) but turned out well. They weren't fall off the bone tender, but they did come off the bone pretty easily. I think that Adam appreciated it that they weren't particularly sweet (I must admit that I like my sauce a bit sweeter). The smoke flavor was definitely present, but basically complemented the spice and sauce without overwhelming it. All in all, I would count it as a success.

The grill has brought me outside more than usual. The deck has seen more activity this summer than I think it has seen since we've moved in. It has made me more aware of the lack of attention we have paid to the plants surrounding the deck (okay, the house as a whole). I am just not much of a gardener. We have overgrown plants that were there when we moved in, a few plants that we have added, and some interlopers. It turns out that some visitors are more welcome than others. I have recently discovered that some raspberry bushes have moved in. They are pretty and delicious...a real bonus.



Before trying them I did a little of internet research and the consensus seemed to be that these aggregate berries are safe to eat. In addition to making me feel better about eating berries of unknown origin, I got to read a story about the problem of safeguarding your berry patch from hungry critters. Apparently, robins will form "gangs" to assault a berry patch. I just love the idea of robins forming gangs.

But they better stay away from my raspberries.