So I thought I might tell you about September.
1. MIDWEST
I went to the Midwest & performed in Columbia at the Rag Tag Theater,
afterwhich traveling to a friend's house where I learned (in the midst of a game) that if she had to pick her last meal, it would be Fiddle Faddle. Do you know that that is? Kind of like the poor man's cracker jacks.
I also went to Chicago and Iowa City, where I did not perform but did table with my stuff at Casiotone for the Painfully Alone / Otouto / Key Losers shows.
Otouto is one of my new favorite bands, who've traveled here from Australia and are currently touring the US with Casiotone (on his very last tour ever).
Someone said they sound "like Dirty Projectors covering the Blow".
Onward.
1.5. KANSAS CITY REVIEWS
CHINA TOMS felt wrong for the first time in the 13 years since I started eating there. The dining room was empty and hot, sort of muggy and the soy sauce container appeared not to have been cleaned since I dined there in high school. Bummer.
GENGHIS KHAN is always right.
BROADWAY CAFE even better than before. If only it were closer to our hotel...
LA QUINTA INN in Lenexa, Kansas, featuring a very very friendly front deskman who recently immigrated to Kansas from Zimbabwe, and whom I would befriend if only I lived there. He was so much nicer than the people at...
SUPER 8 MOTEL in Lenexa, Kansas, which featured a muggy room of bad smells and a la-z-boy chair speckled in who knows what sort of invisible debris (see photo). The bed had a couch pillow masquerading as a sleeping pillow, which I exchanged for an unleavened cotton-clad matzoh to lay my head upon.
HY VEE GROCERY STORE in Lenexa, Kansas had an amazing salad bar with delicious fresh fruits, no lie. The salad bar also had some classic midwestern fare (like Oreo pudding and glazed strawberries) which I decoded for a very curious and mystified Jeb.
THE GROCERY STORE IN COLUMBIA MISSOURI was a land unlike we've ever seen. Where "garlic" is a specialty item kept safely in the back room, "canned pumpkin" is an unstocked delicacy (leaving one to make sweet potato waffles in lieu of), and broccoli is charged at $3.50 a head, no matter if you have a head or not.
WINSTEADS on the Plaza in Kansas City held up to the test of time, serving a small gravy boat of french fries and a frosty chocolate coke. The waitress had amazing false eyelashes, and I only lamented the lack of table-side juke boxes.
FUD is a new vegan restaurant in Kansas City, where I had trouble wrapping my head around the idea of no table menus, only a chalkboard and a thorough verbal description from the waitress/owner of the restaurant.
I dined on vegan nachos with "jack fish" (phish?) (made of jack fruit), Wild Rice meat, cashew cheese (very nacho cheese like, no lumps), and a generous helping of guacamole. BUT LO! As I finished the first layer of nachos, the owner came out and instructed me that I needed more cheese. In a stupor I agreed and she whisked my plate away, only to return it with the 2nd tier of chips replenished! More cheese & guacamole! Had I died and gone to a vegan heaven ? Perhaps. But I needed a nap after eating what was possible 3 pounds of jack fish.
