A Blessing from The Congregation

I have had the pleasure of visiting the Congregation Ale House Chapters in Pasadena a few times in the last couple months, and I think it’s time I share my experience with everyone. Let’s do it!

The Congregation is a medium-sized ‘church-themed’ gastropub at the corner of Raymond and Del Mar Boulevard in Pasadena, California. A step above fast-casual, is how I would describe this place. Much like fast food establishment, you order at the counter and they bring your food to your seat. If you order a drink, however, they will serve it to you right away! No tip required, but I’m sure they would appreciate some money in their “offering box.”

Patron Beware! While the ordering style is the same as a fast food restaurant, the seating availability is not. I would suggest having a friend scout a claim on arrival, while the rest of your party waits in line. This way you don’t get caught with a beer in your hand, food on the way, and nowhere to sit. Now, let’s get to my favorite part. The food and drink!

I’m a big fan sausage (insert insult here), and this place has plenty of it! If it’s your first time and you can’t decide on what to get, you can’t go wrong with the Duck and Bacon. This delightful sausage is served on freshly baked flatbread and topped with grilled onions, sweet peppers and mustard. It’s both simple and delicious. They also have Sweet Potato Fries, which are pretty good too!

If sausage isn’t your bag, do not fear. There are plenty of other choices that will satisfy your hunger at the Congregation. If you’re like me, you enjoy a good salad just as much as you enjoy a good sausage. If you are down with the greens, try the Grilled Chicken Salad. I know what you’re thinking; it’s a chicken salad, how good could it be? The key to this grilled chicken salad is the artichoke hearts and roasted Roma tomatoes. These delicious ingredients on a bed of arugula and mixed field greens, topped with balsamic vinaigrette make for a scrumptious light meal. Did I mention it is only $7? Also, this dish does come with blue cheese, so if you aren’t a fan, don’t forget to hold it!

The menu doesn’t stop there! They have plenty more sausages and salads to choose from, as well as burgers, sandwiches, sides and desserts, all of which you can check out at congregationalehouse.com before your visit.

Of course it wouldn’t be a gastropub without a great beer selection! In addition to the popular beers like Chimay and Stone, they have a huge selection of ale on tap that I have never heard of! What is also interesting about the Congregation is that their taplist is different at each location, which I think is pretty damn cool. I played it safe the first time around and ordered the Stone IPA, but my next visit had me wanting something new, so I tried the Clown Shoes Clementine. It’s flavor is as cool as its name. The crisp, lighter texture of this beer makes it very refreshing and its flavor will have you going back for more.

Parking can be a hassle if you decide to arrive any time after 7pm, but with the Del Mar Metro Station just across the street you can ride in on the Gold Line without worrying about it. If public transportation is a little inconvenient you can still get away with parking your car at the station for $2.

Well, what’s the Bottom line, James? The Congregation is pretty awesome. With most of the menu prices ranging from $7-$12, several televisions, good service and great people, you can’t beat it. It can get pretty loud, so I would definitely count this place out for a first date. Other than that, if you are looking for a spot to watch the game, grab a bite and get a drink, you don’t have to look any further than the Congregation Ale House Chapters.

Hey, Congregation Ale House! Fantastic!

I got your guilty pleasure right here!

Pleasure. Something that makes you feel good or puts someone in a state of euphoria. Lots of things give us pleasure. To name a few; food, playing music and CrossFit all “rev my engine.”

What makes a pleasure guilty, you ask? I suppose a pleasure is guilty when the pleasure in question isn’t necessarily accepted by the rest of society in the eyes of an individual. Well, someone who uses the phrase “guilty pleasure” is usually excited by something that is stupid anyway, so they use it as a way for covering up their horrible taste in life. For example, someone may Tweet, “Listening to Avril Lavigne #guiltypleasure.”

If you have to feel guilty about listening to music, you have a problem. If it’s really that bad, and Avril Lavigne is that bad, don’t feel guilty you have bad taste in music. I would blame your parents, or your friends. Although, chances are it’s not your parents fault, since most of them were listening to cool music like Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, but you got all angst-y and wanted to rebel, so you started listening to Ace of Base and the Spice Girls. I suppose it’s safe to say it was your fault.

Friend: “Hey, listen to this new group called the Spice Girls!”

You: “No, Thank You.”

Saved.

Some would consider my liking of mid-to-late ’90s alternative rock bands such as Third Eye Blind, Counting Crows and Eve 6 as a “guilty pleasure”. Yes, their chord progressions are predictable and their lyrics cliché. Well, I have news for you; there is no guilt here. I like ‘em. Suck on it.

If we like to use “guilty pleasure” as an actual concept, we have serious image issues. If you like to Dub Step and at the same time wear lingerie and pretend you are Dr. Frank-N-Furter, don’t feel guilty you’re a few fries short of happy meal. In many cases it’s not your fault your damaged goods. This you can blame on your parents.

So, cool it with the guilty pleasures. We have to embrace out crappy taste in things. For those of you who are into country music and mint-chocolate cookies, you know… I hope you reconsider. Hey, We can do better.

Cafe 140 South

Let’s be honest, the only thing better than a nice steak dinner is a good sandwich, and the only thing better than a good sandwich is a good salad, and the only thing better than a good sandwich, well, let’s leave that to the imagination. Add to any of those a good wine or beer and magic can happen. Although, I wouldn’t recommend beer with the sandwich; you’re just asking for a nap.

My point is this: if you haven’t been to Cafe 140 South and you live in Pasadena, you need to do so. Part of the Smith Brothers Restaurant Family, 140 offers quality food and service at a not-so-elevated price. However awesome it would be to review every dish on this menu, it just isn’t practical. However, I have visited 140 3 times in the last month and haven’t been disappointed.

Pictured here is 140′s Grilled Ahi Tuna and Tiger Shrimp Salad. Colorful, isn’t it?

Now, salads can be a tricky situation. When we visit a regular restaurant a lot of the time salads are saturated with a thick sauce that many like to call dressing. You can call it whatever you’d like; ranch, caesar, bleu cheese, but it’s all just one step away from being mayonaise, and covering your salad in it just isn’t right. However, cover a bed of mixed greens with a light balsamic vinaigrette and you’re speaking my language. Anyone can do that. Let’s get back to what makes this salad so… fantastic.

Let’s start with the ahi tuna. When the pretty waitress came back around after she served me my lunch, she asked me how I was liking my choice. I looked at her as serious as I could and told her it was delicious, but the tuna was a little undercooked. She immediately went into waitress mode and began to explain what seared means. I quickly told her I was joking and she laughed quite loudly.

Searing is my favorite when it comes to ahi tuna. It gives the fish that sashimi texture with a little bit of the grilled flavor. If you haven’t had seared tuna yet, I highly recommend it. Let’s not forget the shrimp. While tasty, they were nothing over the top, which is just right for this dish. A lot of people think you need to cover seafood in seasonings and sauces, but really less is more, that is, when you know what you’re doing.

What was very interesting with this particular salad was that it came with asparagus. Long story short, I’ve never had asparagus with a salad before. It was delightful. Again, nothing special. I assumed they simply steamed and chilled it before adding it to the salad. Along with a little bit of lemon, onions and tomatoes, this salad was complete. My restaurant experience was great, and I will expect it to be great in the future.

Hey Cafe 140 South… FANTASTIC!

One more thought

“James, what did you learn here?” my Thesis professor asked me when I walked into his office to discuss the last class of my undergraduate career.

It’s a simple enough question. You would assume after four and a half years of going to class, studying, getting good grades, kissing up to faculty members, and not to mention spending thousands of dollars,  I would have learned quite a lot. I gave him a dumbfounded look; a look I wasn’t used to giving as an answer to my professors.

“I learned to manage my time,” I said, unsure of what he wanted to hear, “I learned to utilize my resources.”

He shook his head  in agreement like professors do when they are listening politely to someone talk. I want to believe that all people do when they are listening to someone speak is thinking about what they are going to say in response to what the other person just said. I continued my spiel for a few more minutes, giving him the in and outs of my college experience. Not so much the lessons learned when drinking and talking to young ladies (something I still don’t understand too well), but the important things like C. Wright Mills’ interlocking directorate of power and Weber’s Protestant Ethic.

“Visit your professors as much as possible,” was the last thing I said.

“Visit your professors?” It was almost like he didn’t know what I was talking about.

“Well, the more you visit your professors, the more likely they are to remember you.”

“Oh, I see; and the more likely they are to give you a break when you screw up?” He seemed amused.

“More or less,” I said grinning. I didn’t want to give away my secret to the man who would perhaps decide whether I graduate or not, but I knew him well enough that I trusted his sense of humor.

“So, you kiss ass?”

I laughed, “If you wanna call it that. I prefer to think of it as excessively praising.”

“So, let me get this straight. You learned to manage your time and utilize your resources?“

“It sounds bad when you say it that way, but yeah, I guess that’s the gist of it.” I was afraid I had offended him with my sarcasm.

“You’re going to do just fine, James,” he said with a look of encouragement. I suppose it made me feel a bit less anxious to graduate and begin my life as whateveryouwanttocallit. I’m not so sure about my future. People like to have it all figured out; not me. Whatever I decide to do I will always work hard, that’s  a given.

The conversation continued for a few more minutes as we discussed the next couple months and my impending graduation. Looking back on the last four and half years I can say my college experience was less than conventional. Having consumed  much less alcohol and made less bad decisions concerning the opposite sex than the average college student, it was pretty good. No matter how intact my liver is, how clean my blood may be, or how much money I have in my pocket, I can say with the utmost confidence, “I made the right decisions.”

Hey, College…Fantastic!

I worked hard. I should win!

It was March 6, 2011, if I’m not mistaken. If I am, it doesn’t really matter, because what happened that evening around 6 o’clock would make even Ingrid Newkirk want to kill a room full of kittens.

I had been writing a paper for a class I’m taking at ULV. It was around noon when I started. There I was, sitting in the back room of my mother’s home. The room itself is very cluttered, which isn’t very conducive to studying. Sitting in an IKEA white bubble chair at an IKEA cherry red desk-thing I began to formulate the structure of the paper.

The paper was decently written; eight pages on white-collar crime didn’t seem to take very long. When I looked at the clock, however, and saw that it was nearly 6, I wasn’t too happy (it must have been that nap I took). Nevertheless, I was relieved that my paper was almost done. One more paragraph and then… no.

I swear I saved it. I hit Ctrl+Z, thinking I might have selected the text and hit ‘enter’ on accident (I do that a lot). But alas, it was gone. All of it. Well, everything but the introductory paragraph. I couldn’t believe it. Infuriated, I complated throwing my computer against the wall, but then realized that I had no money to buy a new one. All that work, all that time… wasted. You would think the moral of this story would be to hit damn Ctrl+S occasionally throughout the writing of a paper, but it’s not.

If you spend a particularly long time working on something, you should benefit from your hard work. It should be mandatory. God in heaven should hit ‘save’ for your dumb ass. It shouldn’t just work for papers or writing assignments either; it should work for everything. Have you been working on the same level of that video game for four hours and can’t pass it? Screw it, you win. Have you been hunting that rat in your apartment for a while, but you can’t seem to find it? It’s dead in the dumpster outside. Have you been trying to land a date with the girl next door, but it’s just not working out? Check your bed.

It can work with relationships too. Say you’ve dating someone for like, say… six months. That’s the cut-off time in the relationship where everything is going to work out (because that’s the longest any of my relationships have ever lasted). Say you go to dinner and she says, “We need to talk.” Of course, that’s code for, “I’m way too good for you.” She continues, “this is not working out.” In my world, you can be like, “no, it’s working out. It’s been six months, so we’re staying together until I feel ‘it’s not working out’.”

I know, I know. “Whaa, whaa, whaa! Call the whaambulance. Get him a whaamburger and some french cries.” The thing is, I know I’m not the only one. We’ll all benefit from it. Write your Congressman! We need a bill for this. Hey, life… you can do better.

To Whom It May Concern

Like an annoying rash or hiccups, everything must go away at some point. That is why I will be leaving you, Facebook. I can only imagine how upset you must be. All the times we shared; the poking, growing virtual who-knows-what on Farmville, carrying on useless conversations on our Walls even though it would probably be a lot more efficient to pick up a damn phone, posting all my favorite movies, music and interests on my profile, and then having you automatically “Like” everything on my behalf. If I really wanted someone to speak for me, I’d get a girlfriend. I thought this relationship was going to be platonic, then you turned it into something more; how could you?

Let’s not forget having people answer questions about us and then not being able to access those answers because you need Facebook credits for that and those cost money, so you try convincing yourself that the answers aren’t important, but you know you’re insecure, so you sign up for a free trial Netflix membership to get 2300 credits, then you get your credits and 8 months later realize you’ve been charged $9.95 a month for something you didn’t even know you signed up for, but you decide that the $79.60 you were charged was worth unlocking answers to some of the questions, and finding out that so-and-so didn’t think you were gay, were a good friend and thought you were a good kisser, and getting a little bit scared when you find out the same person answered most of the questions, and even more scared when you realize it was a guy.

You know as well as I do, Facebook, the we could go on for days, but I’d rather not, because I don’t want to get too nostalgic and start tearing up. Despite my parting, you should not fret, because you can still find me on twitter (@theobviousjames) and heyfantastic.com. There’s an old saying that “Good wine needs no bush”; I just wanted to let you know, I have no idea what that means. Hey, Facebook… not-so-fantastic.

Dr. Cornel West Inspires the University of La Verne

From Plato’s “Apology”:

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

– Socrates

This is the quote Dr. Cornel West used to open his speech on February 11, 2011 at the University of La Verne. Walking into the newly refurbished Morgan Auditorium before the event began, I knew he was going to speak about Black History, but other than that I really didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know too much about him, only that he is a professor of Religion and Philosophy at Princeton University. However, after hearing him spout off lines of Plato and Socrates like he wrote them himself, I knew that I was going to enjoy this experience.

“Life is all about growing and changing,” he said, “what kind of human will you choose to be between the womb and the tomb.” I never really thought about it that way. Sure, I grow physically and change in certain ways, but I always assumed that this just comes with getting older and accumulating knew experiences and developing as a human being. I was hoping he would elaborate on this subject, and he did… for about an hour and a half.

He used education and schooling as an example, in order to make his words more clear to the audience. I was wondering why he used the terms education and schooling as if they had two different meanings. Schooling, he said, “is learning skills for the workplace and education is learning how to die.” I’m not a wordsmith like Dr. West, but a philosophy I’ve developed during my high school and college career, is that you go to school to learn how to follow. By that I mean follow directions, follow schedules and follow whatever else there is to follow. These are the skills Dr. West is talking about when he talks about schooling. As much as we don’t like it, there are lessons to be learned. I assumed he meant this is the boring, monotonous part of learning that keeps a lot of people out of school.

What Dr. West meant when he said, “learning how to die,” is that an education helps us understand how to think critically by ourselves, come up with our own opinion and make our own decisions. This is easier said that done, of course. He goes on to talk about courage, and how it plays a major role in getting a true education.

In today’s society, Dr. West explains, we are very interested in spectacle, or the image that we portray. This spectacle is a big part of American culture, and hinders people from standing up and having courage. “Spectacle has no sense of history, no pride,” he says. People will do whatever they have to in order to attain the image that society has deemed as important, that status, that spectacle. In the process of doing so, they lose their ability to think critically, and with that, they lose their individual identity as well. In a society based on materialism, it is easy to follow blindly; after all, everyone else is doing it, and so nobody is really going to chastise you for doing it too. We live day to day in the presence of other people’s opinions, and we rarely think for ourselves. Courage is what allows growth and change in a human being, without it we cannot live up to our potential, and essentially die improperly.

“Courage is fighting for something bigger than yourself,” West said, when he started talking about Black History. He used the Civil Rights Movement in the United States as an example in order to explain further what courage is. The Civil Rights movement involved groups of people coming together and analyzing the situation they were in and changing that situation. His speech was trickled with examples of powerful figures during the Civil Rights Movement, explaining that these individuals had courage.

The last lesson I received from Dr. West had to do with racism. He explained that racism happens because of a Revolution of Priorities. We make finding differences in people important, and racism occurs when we view differences in such a way that cause tension between people. Just because we are different does not mean that we should treat someone differently. We try to avoid this problem trying not to notice peoples’ differences, for example, skin color, by telling ourselves, “I don’t see color when I look at someone, I just see another human being.” That would be okay to do if that were possible, but unless we’re literally blind, that can’t happen. Saying, “I didn’t even notice your skin color,” to someone will most likely offend them, even though you didn’t mean to. “What do you mean you didn’t notice my skin color?” Differences are a good thing, but in order to live cohesively we cannot talk about those differences in a way that downplays the individual, because when we do that, we downplay society in the process.

What I didn’t expect out of an Ivy League professor was a sense of humor. A lot of Ivy League professors have the reputation of being very intelligent, but extremely dry and boring. Dr. West was anything but dry and boring. His humor made hearing him speak so enjoyable. He spoke seriously and assertively, but not so much that he created tension in the room. He spoke with such enthusiasm and fervor it made me wish I were black, so I could completely understand where he was coming from, so I too could feel the way he feels. I was very lucky to hear him speak that day. There were hundreds of people in line, waiting to hear him, a lot of which did not get a seat. I got a seat, and I’m very glad I did. Hey, Cornel West… FANTASTIC!

You can follow Dr. West on Twitter: @CornelWest