You see, we have one thing Columbus does not that is pretty irrefutable….hills. Not only are they great for running and biking, but they provide some pretty stellar views.

Someone call Duke and get that transformer out of there

Come July 4th those hills can give you a wide angled scene of dozens of fireworks shows, the likes of which I’ve only experienced on the top of a 34 story building in Chicago.

It will also give you a view of the fire that started across town (remember kids, booze and fireworks don’t mix well [actually they do, except that one time...])

If you live tucked into a hillside with a view of the basin, you are required to have a telescope. I looked into the one sitting on the top floor of our hosts’ house to find it aimed perfectly down Main St.

This is the point where I need a better camera, or at least a tripod. But I think you’ll get the idea.

As cool as fireworks are, it’s not really a party until someone brings out the sparklers.

A little puppy love also added to a great time.

Guard dog that knows what's really valuable...beer

To our hosts that evening, thank you very much, I know I had a blast, and everyone else sure looked like they were having fun as well! In fact I’m pretty sure the right phrase was on display in your house….

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It’s nighttime, around 9:30, and I’m still up at Race St, work boots and all. My jeans are starting to have permanent sweat stains on them because it’s getting hot. I’m sitting on a chair that looks like it came from an elementary school (it probably did) watching some guys play chess in my garage. I finish my tallboy that I picked up next door and say my goodbyes to the crowd that has become an unexpected group of friends.

I drive home–all of seven blocks–relishing the A/C that’s pouring from my vents. As I do many nights, I pull in the apartment garage and sit in my car while I wait for the song that’s playing to end (have I mentioned how much I love music?).

I’m tired. The project is wearing on me. It’s tough to measure progress a day at a time.

I get out of my car and head upstairs. Normally I would shower and fall over on the couch, done for the day. For some reason though I change into shorts, grab my camera and leave my apartment. I need some thinking/outside time.

I walk down Court St towards the Greyhound station and the bridge that spans I-71–one of my favorites for many reasons. It’s an easy way to get from downtown to Mt. Adams. There is a wild juxtaposition between life at the bottom of the bridge and life at the top. It’s also relatively steep, which makes it a good running spot.

My mind wanders as I approached the steps that lead up to the bridge. A burst of light followed closely by that unmistakable fireworks BOOM snaps my head back to reality.

I grab my camera from my pocket and start shooting. At first I think it’s just someone firing off a few shells from their house, but the bursts keep coming.

I realize this is more than an amateur event, so I start climbing higher on the bridge.

I reach the top and the fireworks are exploding at what appears to be a little over head height.

It was all pretty cool as it’s not often I see exploding balls of light at eye level.

The Finale

The shows over, and my mood has done a 180. Not that I was even in a bad mood per se, just frustrated. But now I’m just happy and grinning–my worries about Race St are fading away like the smoke trail left from the show.

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I don’t know why I do the things I do, but everything happens for a reason.

I don’t know why I sat around for half an hour drinking a beer at Race St. I don’t know why I left my apartment when I did, or why I walked over to that bridge instead of down to the river. The list of actions I’ve taken for which I have little to no explanation is endless. But somehow it all makes sense when I stumble across a random fireworks show in the middle of the city.

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As I walk home, I start running through pictures in my head of what Race St looked like when I bought it a couple of months ago (a la yesterday’s post). Progress is much easier to measure in months, and that thought calms me down enough to hit the sack and prepare for another day of work.

Night 1

My first stop is always at Andy's for Shish Tawook

Fish and Chips: ok, but not good enough to remember where it was from

I feel bad for people that can't tolerate gluten because this cookie was pretty weak.

So the winner of night 1, hands down, was Andy’s Mediterranean

Night 2

Ribs from The Inn

Mac n' Cheese from Bella Luna was pretty good, but the Buffalo Mac was awesome

Beer for desert...always a winner

I love The Inn, but damn that Buffalo Mac n’ Cheese was good. Dare I say it was Mackin’ Cheese….so it wins night 2.

Night 3

Vicious Voodoo Chicken

I also got the Shrimp Scampi from somewhere…wasn’t that good and I forgot to take a picture.

That leaves the awesome and perfectly spicy Voodoo Chicken from J. Gumbo’s as the night 3 winner.

Overall the Voodoo chicken was the best thing I ate all weekend. Tthat chicken and sauce had so much flavor and spice I ended up going back for another bowl. Located downtown on Walnut between 4th and 5th, I’ll be heading to J. Gumbo’s for lunch often……especially on the other side of summer when I need something to heat me up.

Once again we met in front of Park+Vine at 12:30 on a bright Saturday afternoon. This year Reser had some shirts (rolled as bike tires) sitting on the check in table, and I had a little fun waiting for everyone to check in and pump up.

The OTR/Gateway Summer Celebration was taking place right up the block, and had I not been working on Race St I would have run the 5k and partied a bit before our food trek. Instead I caught a glimpse of the action as ~50 of us pulled away from P+V.

We cruised up Vine St through the heart of OTR (and past the park that will be my new backyard) on our way to Take The Cake in Northside. I’ve heard so many great things about TtC that I was a bit embarrassed I had never been there before.

My garage is on the other side of the park

The cruise to Northside was a good 5 miler, enough to work up a sweat, only to have it cooled by TtC’s awesome Gazpacho. Which then heated you back up with its spicy kick!

I may have purchased a brownie as well...

Not an official stop, but right next door was Cluxton Alley Coffee roasters. I’m not a coffee guy, but I poked my head in with a few other people to check it out.

Back on our rides we pedaled the longest single length of our journey, a 10 mile and at times not-so-flat (hey it’s Cincy) route over to Pleasant Ridge to Loving Cafe. The only repeat so far in the B+D series, they changed up from the veggie rolls and peanuts sauce we got last time (which was awesome) and went with fresh fruit and a salad, accompanied by two phenomenal homemade dressings.

With only six miles left to cover two stops, we took a short cruise over to Lucky John Slow Food where we filed through a buffet of pasta and vegan pizza awesomeness.

Seeking shade

After a nice boost of energy from all those carbs most people cruised (and some of us hauled ass) through Eden Park into Mt. Adams to The Rookwood. They served up some awesome chocolate on chocolate dessert and some “Yellow Bicycles” which were something, something, St. Germain and Proseco.

Each Bike+Dine has been a different experience for me, so I can’t say any one was better than the other. They have all been a blast though, and I can’t wait for the fall 2010 ride.

Turning+Sneezing....now that's talent

A little help from the popo in walnut hills

Cheers!

I was out riding without music, which leaves my head a little clearer to think about stuff (namely, how the hell am I going to rebuild the interior of a house!!!). It was a good time for reflection…which I then started taking literally.

I cruised up into OTR from downtown, figuring the sun was right to get some shots of the detail on my new place.

Right up the street is Rookwood Pottery, who was hosting the first tapping of Christian Moerlein IPA.

At the end of Race St lies a pretty cool church, with an iconic hand pointed towards the sky.

I then rode back down to the riverfront to meet up with the Thursday Night Slow Ride, a member of which informed me they would be at The Banks in 5 minutes. I beat them there, and snapped some photos of Roebling Bridge during the painting.

This was right below the stairway from the bridge down to the street.

The Banks.

I found the group, and we actually rode through the painting tarps on the suspension bridge. It’s not the first time I’ve ridden across the bridge during construction.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky-jtmdzBxI

We then cruised from Covington to Newport, and then back to Fountain Square. Oh yeah, and we found the Girls Gone Wild bus down by the Levee.

I know it’s a shitty picture, but it’s true. Life. Happens. Here. At least my life.

Thing is, even with work being the primary objective of this particular trip, when 3 gentlemen who went to university together reunite, especially under such spectacular weather conditions, they must immediately celebrate with glorious amounts of food and alcoholic libations. Upon my friends arrival we immediately made our way to La Mexicana, and I was able to creep them out a little bit by parking in back and walking in through the cash only mexican grocery store.

Dinner was as great as it always is and I determined once and for all that the green salsa in the bottle (as opposed to the one that comes out with the first basket of chips) is my favorite. A little red for some extra kick is ok, but not always necessary.

After a feast that included barbacoa and chicken tacos as well a big order of flautas we hopped back across the river to my place to drop the car off and walk to Arnold’s. There in lies a bit of the problem–by dropping the car off, we took the limit on the intake of alcohol and pushed it into different territory (let’s forget about that time at the Jacob’s house….thanks for the ride). For three guys who enjoy the company of one John Jameson, that can be somewhat detrimental to accomplishing a full days work (keeping in mind the weekend before I worked 7:30 am to 6 pm).

Two thirds of our party started with Cumberland Pale Ales while the crazy SOB in our group said fuck it and went Jameson and ginger. “Oh yeah, and a three shots of Jameson,” accidentally flowed from my lips–we were off. Bowl of peanuts in hand we moved to the patio, 3 stooges out drinking and generally being goofballs. A step away from their normal Friday night genre, Arnold’s was featuring a pretty funky little jazz band on the patio. I’m pretty sure they had a deal with Rhonda to play music that convinced people they need more booze, because even our one friend who didn’t normally like straight shots of Jame was DEMANDING them!

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Soooooo we made it to Findlay market by noon on Saturday. Have I mentioned how nice it is to have a garage directly across from the market? The place was slammed and we just parked at my spot and walked over. We grabbed a quick breakfast at Ms. Helen’s Grill (best $3 breakfast sandwich around) and then walked back across the street to start working. Greasy food and powerade gave us energy, while at the same time our natural male desire to break things using big tools took over, and we started tearing apart drywall and plaster.

In a solid five hours we managed to expose the entire wall of brick in what will be an upstairs office/den. I had already removed the commercial-style drop ceiling, and while we were chipping away at the plaster we were also pulling down parts of the old furred out plaster ceiling, exposing copious amounts of coal dust from the rafters above. The good news was that the joists themselves look great, and so far there are no signs of water leaking; lets hope the same holds true in the back of the building as well.

We accomplished well more than I could have in a whole weekend by myself, and for that I am very thankful. I’m lucky to have good friends who will come down and help out (even in potentially hazardous conditions). Of course I treated them to breakfast and plenty of those drinks the night before, but they would have come and helped me out regardless (hell we played 3-way Rock, Paper, Scissors for the tab at La Mexicana).  I’m sure the chance to break stuff with the 10 lb sledge didn’t hurt either.

The awesome G&M wrecking crew

One of my friends commented that out of almost any one of our acquaintances in college, he never would have picked me to be living in Cincinnati. I’ve been thinking about what has made me stay here these past three years, and why I’m committing myself to this area for the foreseeable future with the purchase of a building–of my first home. At the end of the day a lot of it comes down to the local friends that I keep in contact with-it has made this a very comfortable area to be in (and I’m really speaking about here to Columbus, where half of my friends reside). Not only have I met awesome new people, but I’ve been able to sustain long term friendships with close college friends. Add to that a job I really enjoy in a city where the cost of living is low–it’s pretty hard to complain. With the progress I have witnessed in the last three years I think Cincinnati is going nowhere but up. That extends beyond downtown and OTR (which I do love) to places like Northside, another community that does a great job of being, well, a community. I’m excited to be part of a location people are so passionate about and its renaissance.

This year I made progress. I’ll have to save the full glory for next year (Baby Steps) because-like last year-I got caught up in Friday’s beautiful weather and went for a run. But I kept it short, and while I missed the Bockfest parade, I certainly got my fill of Bock beer.

Arnold’s, on the other hand got their fill of people.

What I imagine (or at least hope) Laura, Pam, and the other Bartender who's name I don't know were thinking

Drunk Monk*

*Please note this was around 8pm, and the Monk may or may not have been drunk, but entering that establishment I imagine he was there soon.

Moving on to Mr. Pitifuls.

We passed Jack Potts on the way, the existence of which I was completely unaware of. For someone that lives a block away, I really don’t get up Main St. much it seems. That’s all bound to change when Neon’s opens this summer. But I digress…

It was actually less crowded than Arnold's I swear

Cheers to mini decorative drinks

I took some people new to the city out and about, and we all had a great time. There were a few people that drove downtown to meet us, and as the end of the night approached, I couldn’t help but think about those poor souls having to either sleep on a couch or temper their drinking to pilot a vehicle home. Chalk it up as another win for life in Cincinnati’s center city.

I’ll just keep tooting the downtown horn here. I have friends coming in from different parts of the country, and they can all converge down here and party before the show. Then we walk (or shell out like $2 a person for a cab) down to US Bank. Naturally when the show is over we’ll stop by one (or more) of the fine beverage establishments between the arena and my apartment.

Viva downtown! (I feel like that should be The Cincinnatista‘s tagline)

The Green Dog is in Neyer’s new development at Columbia Pkwy and Delta Ave. The chef (whose name I regretfully forget) came and spoke to us about being a sustainable business, and how that theory was used in everything from construction of their space on through to the foods they prepare. Much (all?) of their ingredients are locally sourced. The food was phenomenal, and I can’t wait to drag my boss there for lunch.

Turkey BLT and Hummus/Red Pepper Sliders at Green Dog Cafe

We got back on our bikes and traveled across town to the Five Star Foodies commissary. It’s located near the corner of central pkwy and ludlow, but you can find their food at Bigg’s as well as a number of local eateries such as the Coffee Emporium. We tried a seitan slider and some delicious Thai soup. They also quenched our thirst with some very flavorful hibiscus juice.

We were running a bit behind schedule (damn you flat tires!) so we took the quick route over to Northside for a stop at The Hideway. If you are looking for a great black bean burger then this is your place. It went really well with the tomato bisque soup. I’ve always enjoyed their creamer potatoes as well, though I recommend brushing off some of the salt they are coated in.

After filling our bellies with food we traveled back to OTR to begin the libation portion of the afternoon. We stopped at Grammer’s where I was able to drink one of my favorite beers of all time, The Maharaja from Avery Brewing Co.

Thanks to everyone who braved the (slightly) cold temps to enjoy a great day of bikes, bites, and beer!

Thumbs up for a great ride!

Checkin' out Campy Washington

Hangin' at the Hideaway

The Queen City Bike+Dine is coming up again on Saturday, October 10th. Like last time, the trip will feature some tasty local food and a smooth cruise around town. Granted we will be lacking the beautiful midsummer day we had for the last QCD, but it will be a nice fall ride instead.

Meet at Park+Vine a little before noon to get squared away. Cost is roughly $30 if I remember from last time. A few pictures of the food are up on the slideshow to the right. I’m still getting used to this whole flickr thing and how to get the photos to look decent when being pulled on this stream.

I didn’t think much of it until the week of the race, when I combined some running and biking workouts to make sure I would be ready for Sunday’s event. Thursday was the race walkthrough to show us where the transition area would be, and exactly where we would be swimming. Even though I watched my sister prepare and participate in her triathlon, I was still nervous about this being my first, and I was glad to hear the course walkthrough.

Stretching while looking out over the upcoming swim course

For me, the event was about two things. One, it was a testament to my efforts to get in shape, which has paid off enough for me to at least attempt this sort of event. And two, it was a great way for me to help to support an event centered on Cincy’s Urban Core, and a way for me to embrace the downtown lifestyle. For example, Saturday, the day before the race when we picked up our race numbers etc., most people got in their cars and drove down to Sawyer Point to check in. Instead, I hopped on my bike and cruised down to the park in 10 minutes. Likewise, I was probably one of, if not the only person to ride their bike to and from the actual event. After the race I took a shower and walked up to Tucker’s for a post race feast (“Ghetto” Huevos are the best, try ‘em). It was a great day, and one that made me proud to be a downtown resident.

And I beat my goal of doing the whole thing in 1:20. So I’m doing something right.

What I saw walking back from breakfast

I’m a little late on this, since it took a little while longer than I thought to get the blog up, but the Queen City Bike + Dine was a blast. I found out about this event walking back from breakfast one morning, when I noticed 10 bikers sitting outside of Park+Vine. I found out about the 25 mile journey from the shop, thru Norwood, Pleasant Ridge, down to and along Eastern Ave, and ultimately over to Covington, sampling vegan fare all the way. Check out the post on Queen City Bike for more info, but the event was great, and more (and maybe meatier) types of these events need to happen around town.

Cruising thru Piatt Park

I found four great new restaurants to check out, and met a ton of people along the way. I stood out a bit, as the one mountain biker amongst about 50 road or hybrid bikers, but they were accepting and I tried to keep my antics to a minimum. Sometimes it’s hard when you can jump over curbs and no one else can though.

This is just another example of how living downtown turned a saturday of no plans into a great day that got me outside, meeting new people, and learning about new, independently owned businesses. Take that ‘burbs.

Fried Green Tomatoes at Otto's in Covington

This brings me to my winner of that particular trip, the fried green tomatoes at Otto’s in Covington. They were fried perfectly, and had a great sauce that went with it. It was a great end to a great ride (helped of course by an ice cold beer).