I Need You, More Than Anyone Darlin, You Know that I have From the Start, So Build Me Up, Buttercup, Don't Break My Butt

I lied about the possibility of an increasing frequency to the whole posting on the blog thing.  I could say that I have been busy, and this is true. I have been cutting cards, assembling my own cards, and generally debate-camping my way to fame and fortune. I recognize that this isn’t the DDI, but I am pretty impressed with the increase in quality that has occurred in most of these kids. We’ve put out some good files and had a hella lot of practice debates, drills, etc. There is no doubt in my mind that a couple of these teams will be elite squads if they decide to stick with it, cuz they are all smart and most of them are wickedly determined. On the final day of the institute, I am somewhat unsure about only the decision to have a tournament with wins and losses, since after two weeks (a long time for a group mostly composed of sophomores and first years), hearing that you lost a debate on an argument you worked to develop for a week seems to be somewhat devastating. I don’t really understand that mentality, but I can imagine that it would not be the best way to spend a Friday in the summer.

Katie and I celebrated our second wedding anniversary this previous Monday. We stayed that night at the Minneapolis Hilton, at least a small step up from 312 Sorin Hall. More important than that, we had dinner at fucking Manny’s. I know that there are those who do not consider Manny’s the best steakhouse/restaurant/place in Minnesota/the world. This is in no way to diss those people or the Silver Butter knife Steak. In my mind, however, there isn’t really anything you can do to get better than this joint. I recognize that in many ways the place is exactly geared to the things I value. The décor is classy but not fussy, dark woods, clean lines, aprons and jackets on the waiters. The place is comfortable, always busy but rarely so jacked that you feel hot or out of place. The menu cart is so awesome, the fact that each of the servers get to do their own bit is brilliant, and that doesn’t even get to the generally impressive hugeness. I have never gotten to enjoy either the double-porter or the $125 Australian lobster tail, but someday they will make the ultimate surf and turf.

I didn’t even mention that we were dining virtually free on a gift from Kari and Karly, which got us each a couple glasses of wine, a very very rare porterhouse for me, a nearly charred (but still delicious) baseball steak for Katie, an order of the world’s best hashed browns, and some legitimately enormous asparagus. If there were downsides to eating at Manny’s (and I’m not so much saying there are) there would be two that are possible: 1) The rest of the world just seems like someone turned the volume down. Food pretty much seems like gruel for the next week, cuz how do you match that up. 2) Its hard to eat dessert. I pretty much eat steak, potatoes, and vegetables until I no longer feel physically capable of doing so. Its usually shortly after that point that your snappy looking wait-person comes around to offer you the enormous brownie sundae, the ricockulously large slab of cheesecake, etc. etc. This is a tough position, because while you are hella certain that you should not follow up a steak as large as what you just ate with a brownie as large as what you see on the next table, you are also hella certain that the brownie on the next table is ex-fucking-actly what you need to follow up the steak with. So you can either overeat a second time in the course of one meal or refuse one of the best desserts you are likely to see for a while. We got out of this dilemma with a delightful surprise, that being Manny’s providing us with complimentary dessert for our anniversary. I guess I had mentioned that it was, in fact, our anniversary when I made the reservation, but it really did surprise me when they did so. I had never had this particular dessert before, but it pwnd Manny’s style: it was a brownie, topped with a thick layer of chocolate mousse, topped with a thick layer of whipped cream, which was then dumped upon by a classic gravy boat full of hot fudge. The crazy thing was that, enormous as it was, it was still small by Manny’s standards. We managed to put the whole thing down, though I like to think I was responsible for about 90% of that. Brownie French silk pie: ain’t nothing wrong with that.

Manny’s and the Minnesota State Fair are pretty much my two favorite places and this meal pretty much put any hierarchy (which would have previously had the fair strongly in the lead) in question. More importantly, of course, was that I got to spend a wonderful 24 hours with Katie. She got me an incredible tapestry like woven thing which features both a bunch of really cool colors and textures, as well as kitty cats. Considering we have like 25 times as much wall space in our new place as we do now, having some things to hang there would be hawt. We got to watch some TV that wasn’t just recorded World Cup games (not that there is anything wrong with that) and enjoy some wedding cake redux, courtesy of Wuollet’s.

We celebrated our wedding anniversary with Hippo the next day, cuz she wanted to say congratulations and all, but we didn’t get to hang out long. She sent me an email yesterday, meowing about how she missed us. She is really ready to go back to New York, but likes having the stairs to race up and down—little does she know….

Peace,

MB-K