VA Day 4 -Pizza, Poe, and Plenty of Art Around Richmond
I started today by getting coffee and a cinnamon muffin in Fredericksburg at the Agora Downtown Cafe. It was a cozy little coffee shop, so much so that I actually thought it was somebody's house at first. The coffee was good, but the muffin really hit the spot. Cinnamon crumbles are one of the true highlights of the fall season.
Properly fueled up, I drove down to Richmond for a day in the capital. At my cousin's suggestion, I went to Piccola Italy Pizza and Subs for some lunch. It's right on Virginia Commonwealth University's campus, and is one of the go to late night spots for students. After having been there, I can see why. I made the delicious mistake of ordering two slices because they were so cheap that I had no way of expecting how gigantic they would be. I ordered a plain cheese, and and a fried fried eggplant parm. The standard cheese was an incredible no frills slice, but the eggplant parm was on another level. I like eggplant, but if it's over cooked even a little it turns to mush. This one was perfectly crispy and well doused with basil and parmesan. It was amazing. There was also an ad for Garlic knots, so I was enticed, but couldn't finish them all after the pizza which is a great problem to have.
With my belly sagging, I went to the Edgar Allan Poe Museum. While Poe wasn't born in Richmond, he spent the majority of his childhood there and would return often throughout his life. The museum also happens to be the oldest still standing building in Richmond so that would be pretty cool on its own even if the museum wasn't really well done.
There weren't photographs allowed inside the museum which was too bad, as they collected a lot of Poe's original manuscripts, furniture, and clothing. There was also a very cool special exhibit on the legacy of his stories dealing with monomania, or a crazed fixation on a single thing. He was one of the first writers to be really interested in the new field of psychology and started a trend of moving horror from the external and supernatural to the internal and frightfully real.
Some Fun Facts about Poe that I learned: He was really interested in science as well as literature, and wrote an essay about his theories of the universe, the majority of which have proven to be true. He was an incredible athlete growing up and still holds the fastest time for swimming the length of a nearby river. He married his 13 year old cousin. He only got $15 for The Raven. He died mysteriously in Baltimore. Nobody knows why he was there, what he actually died of or why he just kept shouting shouting, "Reynolds!".
It was really interesting stuff, and the museum had some cute little touches to lean into the macabre, including having two black cats on the premises, putting a coffin next to the bathrooms, and filling a crawl space with a plastic skeleton but not drawing any attention to it so that it would just be a fun little easter egg for curious visitors who aren't always great at keeping their hands to themselves (i.e. me). Definitley worth a visit.
After the museum, I went to Sefton Coffee Company, and had one of the best coffees I have had so far. They made an iced honey breve with local honey, espresso, and milk and it was so smooth and well balanced. As far as sweeteners go, it doesn't get much better than a nice local honey. And it's supposedly good for your immune system!
Sweetened and caffeinated, I went to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. It's free except for the special exhibits and very expansive. One of the most impressive permanent collections is a gallery of works from the Faberge Company. I had heard of their eggs before, but they made a variety of different kinds of jewelry and as head jeweler to the Russian tsar, there were very few expenses spared and the works were able to get truly ornate.
After the faberge wing, I looked at their ancient arts from around the world. Something that really struck me was a special exhibit of contemporary art by Native American Artists put into conversation with more traditional works. I loved this gallery because it was such a beautiful mashup of tribal art traditions and various movements in Western Art, showcasing that Native American culture continued to produce relevant and vibrant contributions to the arts world at every point in time not just antiquity. It was pretty amazing.
The next thing that struck me was a collection of British Sporting Art. Most of the pictures of hunters and dogs didn't really do anything for me but then I saw a series of paintings about a day in the life this one dandy gentleman sucking at hunting and horseback riding and it had cracking me up.
The modern/contemporary wing had some of the best late 20th and 21st century paintings I'd seen in a long time. For example, can you believe that this isn't a photograph:
Unfortunately, I didn't get the artist's name for this one.
The whole collection was quite strong but some others that really stood out to me were a painting by Paul Caulfield, that reimagined a Magritte painting in a pop art style; a work by Barry McGee that featured dozens of unique cartoon portraits of alcoholics painted onto flasks; a painting called Two Harbors by an Dean Byington, that features a staggering amount of fine detail in the tradition of famous Dutch draftsman; and unsurprisingly a Hopper, that seems to fit an entire novel's worth of mood and detail in a single haunting image.
I also almost missed a room just kind of tucked to the side of the lobby that had a Picasso, a Dali, and a small collection of German Expressionists.
After the museum. I stopped for one last coffee at Sugar and Twine. It wasn't my favorite, but it certainly wasn't bad and outside the store a homeless man gave me advice about taxes so that was a plus.
After that, it was time for the open mic. It was hosted at a place called Penny Lane Pub, which strove to recreate the kind of pub experience you find in the UK and Ireland. It was a very cool bar. Id you asked they'd put Ribena, black currant juice in any pint you like so I got a Magners with Ribena. This made me really happy because you almost never see that juice in the states, and I use to have it with my breakfast nearly everyday when I was doing an internship in the UK, so it's got a special place in my heart. The mic started a little later than the posted time, so I also tried a scotch ale which was also really good.
Overall the mic was not very well attended by either comics or bar patrons. The host said that it's usually a much better turnout, but there was a scheduling mishap so he figured people probably didn't know it was happening tonight.
The host James Munoz was very funny and did an extended bit about how ridiculous it is that Blake Shelton won the sexiest man alive. He also just seemed like a really nice dude.
I actually went first, so I didn't get much of a chance to read the room and just went for it. Because there weren't a lot of people there, James let me do about 10 minutes so I decided to try out some new stuff sandwiched between stuff I was more confident in. I think it all went okay, but if you there's only four people in the room it's hard to tell how well you're doing even if you make all four of them laugh.
All the other guys except me were pretty new so it's not super fair to judge them too harshly for doing new stuff in front of almost no people. There was definitely potential in all of them, but it was naturally still a work in progress. One guy though was just a drunk bar patron who felt compelled to go up there, and just say a bunch of old jokes and memes he half remembered. He seemed like a nice enough guy, but he should probably keep his day job.
Fortunately for the night of comedy, the two women who closed the show were definitely the best of the night. The first woman, Marika Turner, told a really funny story about being a bridesmaid and the only person of color at a predominantly white wedding, and another story about hooking up with a semi-famous comedian.
The second female comic, Kat, was probably the most experienced besides James and it definitely showed. She had easily my favorite joke of the night when she did an impression of the Kool Aid Man showing up at Jonestown, "OHHHHhhhh my god"
Favorite Random Sightings: Cockeye Cox's; Bladder Experts; Ladies and Gentleman's Club
Regional Observation: Just about all the cafes serve booze as well, which is kind of fun.
Albums Listened To: Inflammable Material by Stiff Little Fingers (it is one of the great injustices that U2 somehow became the face of Irish rock and roll during the 80s, as these guys were better musicians, in my opinion, and much more biting social commentators, not an opinion. They just weren't as pretty); Inna Lovers Quarrel by the Frightnrs; Inside In/Inside Out by the Kooks
People's Favorite Jokes:
A pirate walks into a bar, and the bartender says, "Is that a steering wheel in your pants?" "Aye," the pirate says, "It's driving me nuts."
*this one's pretty bad* What's the difference between an onion and my ex-girlfriend? I cry when I cut onions
Song of the Day:
I love this song on its own, but the doo wop break is really incredible when you're listening to the full album because you don't see it coming at all after five straight thrashing punk songs
