atlanta bleg
sorry for the dearth on my part for the past few days - they've been doozies. sunday my dad and i flew into chicago at 7am, spent the entire day packing, and fell asleep at like 8pm. monday we packed up the truck (with the assistance of the lovely kevin) then drove six hours and spent the night at a quality inn in richfield, OH. (our thoughts, summed up the morning after - catherine: "quality inn maybe isn't the best name for that place." dad: "yeah. the quality part should be in air quotes.") the next morning we arose at 5am, drove drove drove, and got to my parents' house at 1pm, where we promptly unloaded the truck and collapsed in a heap.
anyway, tommy and i head down to fine, fine atlanta on friday at 6am, and i need your help! can you recommend me the following:
-things to listen to in the car (podcasts, new albums, books on tape)
-fun games to play in the car besides tommy's and my standard one of "roadkill!"
-a nice restaurant in atlanta to eat at on saturday night. not, like, SUPER NICE AND FANCY, but something cute and good.
-a yum barbeque place in atlanta to eat lunch at
-a bar that doesn't make me want to shoot myself in the head
do i even have any atlanta readers out there? i know i had a few chicago readers when i started out in that town that were quite helpful...but in any case, everyone can help out with the car activity listening stuff!
Comments
These are really nice restaurants:
http://www.buckheadrestaurants.com/index2.html
A nice restaurant in Atlanta: I agree with the previous commenter that the Buckhead Life restaurants are good (especially the Atlanta Fish Market). Some other options include Cafe Tu Tu Tango, South City Kitchen, and Two Urban Licks (which is THE place to go right now).
A yum barbeque place: I really like Fat Matt's Rib Shack, but I like it more for dinner (in fact, I'm not 100% sure if they're open for lunch) since there's usually live blues. Another option is Slope's, but it might be too far off the beaten path.
As for the bars, I'd probably need more information. But, here's what I used to like when I lived there: Cafe Intermezzo (HUGE drink menu, GREAT desserts, cool scene), Neighbors, and the Vortex (excellent beer list).
Have fun--I'm jealous!
Buckhead is terrible. Think of Georgetown waterfront mixed in with a shake of southern stupidity.
i don't eat it, but Fat Matt's is the place to go for BBQ. as for a nice restaurant, i'm sure jeanie can point you somewhere handy.
Something to Play:
Zip, Bang, Bury-em-all.
Dogs are worth 1 point.
Horses are worth 2 points.
Cemeteries (Bury-em-alls) clear the scores.
To claim a dog, point, say Zip.
To claim a horse, point, say Bang.
To claim a Bury-em-all, point at the headstones and say Bury-em-all.
This is your WTF moment of the day.
When driving through the South, I like to try to make a rule that I can only stop and eat at restaurants with giant plastic animals on their roofs, or at least as part of their signs. Keep an eye out for hogs, skunks, turtles, roosters, etc. These are always the best non-chain lunch places, for some reason.
I'd recommend Sarah Vowell's Assasination Vacation on tape.
Also, I'm not sure how well it works with a couple, but we had an awfully good time playing Married, Buried, One-Night Stand at the beach. Tommy can teach you to play. Not really a road-trip specific game, but silly fun.
I second Sarah Vowell.
As for games, how about letter bingo? One person starts and has to find an A on something they see -- license plate, sign, car model label, etc. Then the other person has to find B. Continue alternating, and rub it in when one person is taking a long time (think Q).
Sommer's classier than the people I knew who liked that game. They always called it Hump, Dump, or Marry. (I'm assuming it's the same one.)
For BBQ, stop in North Cack on the way down. For audio, get Tommy to bittorrent the Mitch Hedberg albums. I know listening to standup in the car is what we all did between stealing signs and TPing houses, but trust me, they'll make two hours fly by.
On a recent road trip we made up a game where you name items from a movie and have to guess the movie. For example:
Catherine: Cheese Pizza, Tarantula, Shovel, Bed Wetter
Tommy: Home Alone!
It made the 3 hours of traffic in Balitmore slightly more bearable. Another version is to describe a character's traits and name the character/movie.
Happy Driving!
Becks: "classier" is one interpretation. "More amenable to homicide" is another.
(perhaps I should stop now)
Q in Atlanta. Pfft.
(drive safely!)
Buckhead lists a place called the Texas Rib Ranch. I'm only saying.
i second cafe intermezzo. mind you the last time I was there was 1994.
also I had sampled quite a bit of the L5P's main cash crop.
ahh. those were the days.
As far as bars stick to the Highlands and Little Five. Some of the places in Midtown are alright. Neighbors, Dark Horse, Hand in Hand, etc. Buckhead is the only place worse than the Georgetown waterfront that I can imagine.
Skip BBQ and head to the Vortex, Fellini's Pizza, Willy's, the Flying Bisquit.
I'm getting to Atlanta sometime in August, so hopefully by then this list will be more filled out! And we will know where to have a drink (or nine) in the name of deciding what to think of the place ;-)
I was just at Fat Matt's a few weeks back and it lives up to the hype. In fact, you can see my fat ass walking to Fat Matt's right here.
The flying biscuit has great breakfast food but expect to wait in line on the weekends. The Vortex has great nacho-tots (tater-tots instead of tortilla chips, just do it) plus it's located in the little Five Points.
if hot dogs are your thing, try the dogzilla at manuels tavern.
and i second the stand up comedy idea. it has shortened many many journeys. if not that, then cruise by imdb and refresh your memories about who has starred in what in preparation for hours of "six degrees of kevin bacon," another excellent time killer.
Vortex and Fellini's are great--excellent burgers and pizza, respectively.
Dark Horse is great, but it's not called Dark Horse anymore--I believe the name is "10 High" (or "Ten High," not sure if they spell it out).
Last time I was there it was still called Dark Horse and the music venue that was in the basement was called 10 High...but I haven't been done since October so it could have changed.
For barbecue, go to Dusty's (1815 Briarcliff Road NE) or Daddy D'z (264 Memorial Drive, http://www.daddydz.com/).
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