one more new restaurant

Last night we finally got over to SOMA Creekside in "downtown" Bradenton... and had a really nice meal.  We brought a fabulous champagne from Waris-Larmandier and a 1990 Pernand Vergelesses. We ordered all kinds of things to try to see if this was a place we would return to when we returned and decided YES...

yes the Cuvee Sensation was sensational! It's been sitting in the cellar since the millennium and is still so young!

and this Delarche burgundy was delicious!

here are the various menus -

an excellent tuna ceviche!

above- tater tots- not amazing but good enough- and below -fried green tomatoes which were very good-

a blurry seabass which tasted wonderful-

a worthy calamari with peanuts- and a sweet chili sauce!

we tried the last four of the five desserts - the winners were the blood orange mojito popsicle and the caramel brownie- with the strawberry cheesecake coming in close behind...

Tina offered us excellent service along with good suggestions- and we would definitely return again...

at the movies

this morning I headed off for my most full day of movies ever- at the Sarasota Film Festival and the films ran the gamut from funny to touching to weird and excellent to abysmal....

so let's get right into it-

the first ones I saw were a group of shorts- and here are my thumbnail sketches on these- 

weirdest- Melvin (milk man in meltdown)

weird- Grange to Garage (the "carlings" were cute!- LOL)

amusing- Mulignans (a 5 minute rant against gentrification that hits the target)

funny- 5 ways 2 die (you just don't know until you know) 

funniest- Down in Flames IF YOU EVER GET A CHANCE TO SEE THIS ONE DO NOT PASS IT UP!!! (literally laughed the whole way through and so did the rest of the audience)

intellectually interesting with two excellent performances- Sure Thing 

Another winner in this- I am just a tad too young to have really seen Tab Hunter in his prime but my oh my what a prime it was- that guy was stunningly beautiful- the essence of a beautiful youth - I completely understand the heart broken teens... one of those guys you wish was playing on your team- but alas - no... he was much more interesting than I ever knew, Olympic level figure skater and horseman... he sings - he acts - and his partner of thirty years has given us a wonderful portrait of an intensely private man who has found peace in his life.  but oh my god- that smile was swoon inducing!

my next film was the amazingly terrific Homme Less- an exploration of the life of a NYC fashion photographer and actor and former model who lived as a man with no home for more than five years... he slept on the roof top of a building where a friend of his (who did not know this) lived. He had keys to the building from an earlier stint as an apartment sitter and just kept coming back.  He looked more than 100% presentable- all the time -  despite shaving in the men's room at a pubic park and showering at the "Y" etc... an incredible story of fortitude on his part. Worth seeing, as it will make you re-think who might pass you on the street and yet be homeless - it would never cross your mind...

and finally - Phil joined me for this HOT MESS of a film- despite two very good performances from Pacino and Holly Hunter - this film was completely bizarre and I kept wondering how soon it could all be over. The cat was cute....so so so two hours I will never ever get back in my life- SKIP it -really - Don't bother - go have a beer or two instead...

so there is day one of my week of the SFF... and up tomorrow are the following three for both of us-

back with more reviews tomorrow night!

makes no sense

So last night we went to our final (for this season) production at the FSU Conservatory for Actors. They were performing Chekhov's Cherry Orchard. And this morning I found myself marveling at the similarities between the play and the soda that Phil is so inordinately fond of...

at first glance you may not notice it- LOL

and it isn't because they both have "cherry" (corrupted in the case of cheerwine) in their names- it is because neither one of them makes sense!

Cheerwine (been around since 1917! but who has ever heard of it? the legend! LOL) is a cherry drink without any identification of it being cherry - just being cheery!  here is some info on it from wikipedia-

When the Maysville Syrup Company of Maysville, Kentucky went bankrupt in 1917, L.D. Peeler and other invested businessmen moved the company to North Carolina and renamed it the Carolina Beverage Corporation. That same year, Peeler purchased a recipe for a cherry flavored soda from a Saint Louis flavor salesman, which eventually became Cheerwine. Though it had been around since 1917, Cheerwine first became a registered trademark in 1926.  Cheerwine has a mildly sweet flavor with strong cherry notes, most notably black cherry; is burgundy-colored, and has an unusually high degree of carbonation compared to other soft drinks. The product was named for its color and taste; the company website states that "it made sense to name a burgundy-red, bubbly, cherry concoction—Cheerwine." Despite its name, Cheerwine is not really a wine and contains no alcohol. 

OK so I get maybe the wine color misled you into thinking it made sense to call it "xxxwine" but is the cheer a misspelling of cherry? This makes no sense to me...

Which leads me back to the play- it also made no sense to me... here is the synopsis- 

here is my thumbnail synopsis of the play- "everyone gets what they deserve"- rarely will you see a stage filled with such a group of morons as this one. Clearly inbreeding rendered them "incapable of saving their estate" it rendered them INCAPABLE of even making a decision! These losers couldn't have held on to that orchard and house if they had money- one of them gives away everything she has to a less than scrupulous lover (who not surprisingly keeps sending her telegrams entreating her to return to him in Paris) another spends his time repeatedly saying the phrase "yellow ball in the side pocket".... the whole thing reminded me that I had not yet mentioned the meal we had on Saturday night (LOL- just wait for it...)

an excellent pizza place in Cortez right next to the best ice cream in town (Tyler's Homemade)

the above pizza is called Adam's Favorite but it my favorite as well!

but back to the stupid people who couldn't bother to make a move to save their own estate- - - Society is breaking down, the servants are dancing in the ball room with the local bureaucrats... people wander in and out of scenes making statements that don't make any sense...

after having listened to the drivel coming out of the characters mouth's last night I read literary criticism of the play and see there are many levels and of course even during the play I was aware of the issues of the time period with the end of the aristocracy in Russia... but even with all this context I found their inability to make a decision and to take action seriously annoying............

 

so out with the old year and in with the new- here is the upcoming 15-16 season for FSU/Asolo

and they are also starting to release the 15-16 season of the Asolo Rep -

so we will see what next year brings- and since I am heading next week (for the first time) to the Florida Studio Theater - that season will be added into the choices we have--- as well as some more music at Phil's favorite venue- Fogartyville! Stay tuned... as we are off to the SFF (film festival) tomorrow for our day one of entertainment!....

a multitude at the multiplex

And away we go-

this weekend begins the ten day experience of a multitude of films for viewing at the Sarasota Film Festival.  We poured over the catalogue- mind boggling choices of literally HUNDREDS of films and we double checked them against the schedules for conflicts and narrowed down to the two dozen tickets we wanted to procure - and so here is some info on what we decided upon... keep in mind that some things must be jettisoned simply because the schedule looks like this every single day of the festival

here are the things I have chosen for this Day One (for me) one day's schedule-

 so this also happens to be my busiest day- as it is the only one I have four films scheduled-

here is my sequence- 4-3-2-1-1-1-3-3 with that  week followed by ONE MORE play before I head north... so lots in store- not to mention the work of getting the condo closed up for the summer...

come on back during the process to get reviews and updates along the way... I promise not to go into the details of the HVAC guy's visit or the quarterly call from the exterminator LOL!