Taking Care of Business ... Memphis Style

We had a great weekend in Memphis in our extremely mini-version of Feasting on Asphalt that morphed into an homage to Elvis, although I'm not sure those two things aren't related. Our friend Bo came along as another fan of both Alton Brown and Elvis - he was also a terrific road trip guide, and came prepared with all things electronic so Rolland didn't have to worry about anything he may have left at home. We were clearly covered in the way of things that plugged in. In fact, the quote on the road was that it was like riding in the "firefly" - again, you guys have to watch it. I'm not going to keep babying you with the link, well, just this once. Go here.

Saturday we got into Graceland bright and early. The pic is of Bo and Rolland (he's in purple in case you wondered), in the hallway heading for the jungle room after having left my favorite room and the other pic, the TV room. The TV room could hold up today with a few tiny changes (and I covet that monkey!). The jungle room, however, was more than a little disappointing. It had very little in the way of a jungle and didn't live up to all they hype I had built up in my mind. After much more touring and shopping at Graceland we headed for lunch at Jim Neely's Interstate BBQ. More to come on that on tomorrow's blog - yes, it requires it's own entry.

After lunch, we hit the road heading for Sun Studio as a nice compliment to the earlier Graceland visit. Let me just say, if you ever get a chance to visit, you should. I thought the tour and the studio were awesome and really give you a sense of the history of the town as the birthplace of some of the most amazing music in the world. It really was wonderful.

A quick stop at the hotel and then we headed to Beale Street, apparently, the area has undergone some major revitalization and it showed. The neon signs on the restaurants, bars and clubs were whimsical and lovely. One of my favorites, of course included the crown. There were tons of places to satisfy the craving for "big ass beer" - what's up with that by the way? And there was some terrific music. We had an amazing dinner at a fantastic restaurant where we were drawn in by a lovely man in a truly one of a kind blue suit, alas, no blue suede shoes, but it did seem to fit the theme pretty closely anyway. You can see the waffle I still envy that Bo ordered, along with his chicken. I stuck with the chicken fried chicken while Rolland had the fried chicken and greens. All of it, was very tasty! We were not led astray by the blue suit. This was a fitting end to our feasting tour of Memphis.

I encourage everyone to take to the road and their own adventure - ours paid of in spades. I have some great memories, and ate some terrific food, plus I got to see Graceland before the monstrosity of a visitor center goes up! So hit the road people - there's tasty goodness out there.