To 10 Years!

On Saturday, Paul and I celebrated our 10-year anniversary! It's hard to believe a decade has gone by since I met this dude, but I guess that's a sign that we're really getting older. When you're old, time seems to fly by. Here's a baseball game selfie from a few weeks ago.

A few months ago, we discussed maybe taking a fun trip for our ten-year anniversary. But then, I found out Everclear, Soul Asylum, Spacehog, and Eve 6 were playing a show in Southaven, Mississippi (just 15 minutes from Memphis) on their Summerland Tour on our big day. We're huge '90s alternative rock fans (again, this makes me realize we're old), and I actually got to interview Everclear's Art Alexakis for the newspaper I write for, The Memphis Flyer (you can read that interview here). So we decided to celebrate our decade together at the Everclear show.

There was a 30% chance of rain Saturday night, and it was an outdoor show. We packed our panchos and prepared for a rain-or-shine show. When we arrived at the amphitheater, it began to sprinkle. I put on my pancho, and Paul slung on his rain jacket. And then seconds later, a monsoon hit. It was sideways rain, the unforgiving kind that manages to soak through rain gear. And the winds were blowing over vendor tents and beer stands. Everyone took cover under any vendor tent they could find. And we waited. And waited. And waited.

An hour went by, and the rain wasn't letting up. A policeman showed us the radar map on his phone (ours were tucked into the only dry spots we could find in my purse), and more storms were on their way. My clothes were soaked. Paul's shoes and socks were oozing with water. My canvas purse (and everything in it!) had a pool of water at the bottom, and my wallet was floating! Seriously. It was bad. The organizers hadn't yet called off the show, but we assumed they would. And if they weren't going to, we knew it'd be hours before the bands would be able to play. Dejected, we walked in the rain back to our car. We missed the show. Here we are totally soaked (look at my sad hair!) and frustrated, incorporated.

Afterward, we met up with our friends Misti and Doug, who were also supposed to go to the concert, at Local Gastropub for beers. We finished out the night at Newby's, the bar where we met 10 years ago. Sadly, we checked the amphitheater's Facebook page at 9:30, and they said Soul Asylum had just taken the stage. We missed it! But it was hours after the show was supposed to start, and had we stayed, we would have been miserable and cold in our wet clothes.

Fast forward to today. Since we skipped out on a fancy dinner in favor of a concert that never happened, we decided to have a make-up dinner tonight. We went to our favorite vegan-friendly Italian joint, Ciao Bella Italian Grill.

We started with Bread and Olive Oil. They have the best soft bread and garlicky oil!

I had a House Salad with Italian Dressing.

And the Oricchiette Pasta with Garbanzo Beans, Tomatoes, and Mint with White Wine Sauce. This typically also comes with feta, but they were happy to leave that off. So good! I love little ears pasta, and the white wine sauce was light and fresh.

For dessert, I picked us up a takeout slice of Stephanie's Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookie Cake from Imagine Vegan Cafe. Four layers of cookie with buttercream! OMG, this was so good! We shared it at the house after dinner (okay, truthfully, Paul ate one bite cause he's not really a dessert guy ... I shamelessly devoured the rest).

After we shared I ate dessert, we stopped by The Cove, our favorite nautical-themed bar on Broad Avenue, for a drink. I had my usual, The Vampire (tequila, tomato juice, sriracha, lime, hot chilies).

Even though we didn't get to see Soul Asylum and Everclear, it was still a lovely celebration! We're hoping to catch the Summerland Tour in Chicago — only an 8-hour drive — this August maybe if funds allow.