Restaurant Review: Queen City Q, Matthews, NC

Ate at Queen City Q's new Matthews location for dinner, along with me was George "Mad Ogre" Hill. Got there at 5, before the dinner crowd arrived. We both ordered combo platters: mine was pulled pork, brisket, and ribs; George had pulled pork, brisket and sausage.

The pulled pork was a bit dry, but had a good flavor, and with six different sauces offered, it didn't stay dry. They had Lexington-style dip, Eastern NC-style sauce, South Carolina mustard-style sauce, a rib sauce, and a proprietary tomato-based sauce. All were good, particularly the Lexington dip and the Eastern NC-style sauce, which was appropriately hot and vinegary. (we tested the sauces out on the hush puppies, which were round and golf-ball sized, properly fried, just a little bland.)

The brisket was a bit tough and looked like steak slices, since it was cut incorrectly across the grain. It was okay rather than good.

The ribs were served properly dry (no sauce), had plenty of flavor, and were properly cooked so that they didn't fall off the bone, but didn't have to be gnawed off, either.

George said that the sausage closely resembled Carolina Pride hot sausage that is found in area groceries.

Side items were mac-n-cheese and bbq beans (George) and sweet potato fries and "corn maque choux" (me). George pronounced the mac-n-cheese ordinary, and the beans probably from a can. Sweet potato fries were rather blah, I only ate a few of them, and the corn maque choux was similar to creamed corn, with the corn itself probably from a can, but overall rather tasty.

Service was rather indifferent, could have been more attentive, as drinks weren't readily refilled and George had to ask for his credit card back as we waited to leave.

Rating: I'll give Queen City Q a 3 on my 5-scale of restaurants: 3 out of 5: average; reasonably good food, moderate effort by staff/management.

The place was hopping as we left, most tables and the bar were occupied. High noise level due to reflective ceilings and a single large room. Good ventilation, so no smell of smoke or BBQ - - a minus, in my opinion, at least for a BBQ restaurant. A few TV's were placed in the corners, but sound turned down too low to hear.

Pics:

Random Complaint

I sure wish that grocery stores would sell cornbread in the bakery like any other bread. Our local places won't even sell corn muffins on a regular basis.

Treasure Blog: 1715 Treasure Fleet Coins

Story.

The 1715 Spanish treasure fleet that wrecked off the Florida coast during a hurricane is probably the most famous of all US shipwreck treasures, with the possible exception of the Atocha hoard.

Pic of the new finds:

Those are what pirates called doubloons. By contrast, a piece of eight was a similar coin made of silver instead of gold.

I have a coin from the 1715 fleet myself, it is a silver 1-real coin:

I purchased it back in 1979 for $75, as I recall.

Labor For the Border Fence

You want amnesty for all of the millions of illegal aliens in the US? Fine, put your labor where your mouth is and volunteer for the Fence Corps, a project to build a secure fence system along the southern US border. Illegal aliens that register as laborers for one year of Fence Corps will be given amnesty upon successful completion of their year's contract. Once the fence is built there will still be volunteers needed for maintenance and guard duty.

While you're at it, amend the Constitution so that there is no longer automatic birthright citizenship except for parents of native US citizens. In other words, no one whose parents are illegal aliens are to be granted automatic US citizenship simply by the fact of being born in the US. No anchor babies, to put it bluntly.

Guess What Day It Is?

National Hot Dog Day.

I'll be putting the hot in hot dog with my very own special andouille sausage dogs:

Meanwhile, In My Home State of Florida...

...leprosy is on the rise due to people messing with armadillos, which carry the disease.

It's not enough that we have to deal with Florida Man, but Florida Leper Man? That's too much.

Leperdillo.

Not the Hapless Victims They Seemed At First

They violated regulations to carry their own firearms, risking court-martial for wanting to be able to defend their lives. It appears that they might have gone down fighting, at least a couple of them.

A Navy officer and a Marine fired their sidearms hoping to kill or subdue the gunman who murdered five service members last week in Chattanooga, Tennessee, according to multiple military officials familiar with internal reporting on the tragedy.

It remains unclear whether either hit Muhammad Abdulazeez, who was shot and killed Thursday after he gunned down four Marines and a sailor at the Navy Operational Support Center in Chattanooga. It's also unclear why they were armed, as it is against Defense Department policy for anyone other than military police or law enforcement to carry weapons on federal property.

A report was distributed among senior Navy leaders during the shooting's aftermath saying Lt. Cmdr. Timothy White, the support center's commanding officer, used his personal firearm to engage Abdulazeez, Navy Times has confirmed with four separate sources. A Navy official also confirmed Monday's Washington Post report indicating one of the slain Marines may have been carrying a 9mm Glock and possibly returned fire on the gunman.

Good for them for not being willing victims and dying like heroes. Click the link to read the rest.

How To Arm Military Recruiters

When I was in the Navy and serving on ships, the in-port quarterdeck was where all access to the ship occurred. When a visitor crossed the brow (gangplank, civilians call it), (s)he was confronted with at least one armed sailor whose job was to prevent intruders from gaining access to the ship. This sailor openly wore a pistol on a web belt, and during the hours he was on duty the gun remained belted around his waist. Remarkably, no accidental discharges occurred (/sarc). It would be quite easy to designate an NCO at each military recruiting office to be officially armed, prepared to deal with situations such as the shootings in Chattanooga. Such an NCO would hand the gun off to another NCO when going to lunch, and take it back upon return. At the end of the working day the gun could be locked in an on-premises safe, or taken home by the NCO in charge of it.

Problem solved.

Yet Another Menace

"Are American Bullfrogs Taking Over the West?"

Bullfrogs are hopping across the West and compromising the health of local ecosystems as they go, The Spokesman-Review reports. Experts worry that the frogs—with an abundance of food and few natural predators in the region—may have lasting negative effects on species that inhabit the same ponds and marshes, potentially driving some to extinction.

In Idaho, in particular, in the 1940s, the Department of Fish and Game (DFG) released bullfrogs into area waters for residents to catch and eat. Unfortunately, frog gigging didn’t catch on, and the bullfrog population has flourished in the past 70 years, feasting on an array of aquatic creatures.

Earlier this month, in an attempt to combat the invaders, biologists and wildlife managers spent a day catching and killing bullfrogs near the Canadian border; however, workers managed to kill only 20 of the 116 bullfrogs that they spotted.

“They’re hard to catch,” says Michael Lucid, a DFG biologist. “If you get close to them, they’ll go ‘EEEP!’ and all you’ll hear is a splash in the water.”

Click the link to read the rest. It reads like a parody, doesn't it?

Headline of the Day

"Trump: I’ve Never Asked God For Forgiveness For Anything."

Given Trump's ego, I'm sure he feels that God is required to ask The Donald's forgiveness, I expect.

Will Military Personnel Defy Gun Control Orders That Endanger Their Lives?

Since the attack at the Chattanooga recruiting station by a fucking muslim I have been pondering if, or when, military personnel will become so disgusted with being targeted while disarmed that they begin defying their orders and carrying guns unlawfully. The penalty for doing so is a court-martial and loss of career, so there is a natural disinclination to make an example of oneself. But what if these attacks continue, will potential danger to life outweigh career considerations?

It could work out a couple of different ways, I think: one is by passive defiance, i.e., service members begin carrying concealed secretly, hoping both not to be caught and not to be put in a position of having to use the gun for defense of self and comrades, but accepting the consequences if they occur.

The other approach is active defiance, i.e., openly carrying sidearms and forcing military authorities to respond via arrest and court-martial. For this tactic to be effective it would have to wide-spread, which would bring charges of collusion and possibly even mutiny, but it has the advantage of forcing the military and civilian authorities to address the issue sooner.

What say you, readers?

Acquisition

This:

Sorry about the crappy pic. It's a Ruger SR9 full-sized 9mm semiauto pistol with a stainless steel slide. Between the polymer frame and the stainless slide the gun isn't going to be subject to much corrosion in the NC heat and humidity, a good thing. It's less fat and blocky than a Glock, and has a thumb safety, which Glocks don't, so the chances of accidental discharges are reduced.

I purchased this pistol specifically for acquiring my CCW license, I wanted a pistol to take to the qualifying shooting class instead of a revolver, and this one has modern 3-dot sights that will make it easier on my aging eyes than the sights on my S&W revolvers. Better recoil control too, I'm thinking.

Shipwreck Blog: NC Coast, US Revolution Era

Story.

Headline of the Day

Alabama Man Is Sick Of Hearing About Caitlyn Jenner, Shoots TV."

The more peevish and less crazy cousin of Florida Man, I guess. :-)

He's From North Florida, But He Ain't No Redneck

"Tom Petty regrets promoting Confederate flag."

Proudly waving his freak flag, instead.

C'mon, Tom. You don't have to live like a retardee.

Bletting Your Medlars

Adding to my vocabulary, courtesy of my current book.

For those of you who don't wish to look up the words yourself, a medlar is an Old World fruit that isn't fit to eat until it is overripe. Thus, to blet your medlars is to allow them to stay on the tree until they are nearly over-ripe, at which point you can eat them. In the US, eaters of persimmons can tell you the importance of bletting.

Volcano Blog: Colima, Mexico

Known as the "volcano of fire."

Brown Truck o' Tragedy

"UPS Truck Hits Horse and Buggy in Central Pennsylvania, Killing Mother and Her 8-Year-Old Boy."

Treasure Blog: Thomas Cromwell's Ring

Discovered by a treasure hunter with a metal detector on the grounds of Launde Abbey, UK.

Valued at £30,000:

NASCAR To Fans: Knock It Off With the Confederate Flags, Rednecks

Florida rednecks to NASCAR: fuck you.

My people. :)

A Story of Pure Horror

Remember the boy who was found chained in the yard of a Monroe, NC home with a dead chicken tied around his neck?

The details of the boy's story are utterly horrific.

Jesus wept.

Good News and Bad News

The good news is that Google's photo software no longer tags photos of African-Americans as "gorillas."

The bad news is that it now tags photos of gorillas as "niggas."

Insane Wingsuit Stunt

via Daily Caller:

Pass Hate Crime Legislation, What Do You Get?

Fake hate crimes, that's what.

Fake gay hate crime.

Fake black hate crime.

Police probably got suspicious over the last one because the purported KKK racists used the inflammatory word "blackmen" instead of the usual "nigger."