- With schools closed today and snow everywhere and much of the town on lockdown (not really—but the police are urging people to stay off the roads), I'm wondering how that will affect the Bend WebCon 2 going on downtown today (from 11-3). I won't be there either way, but a number of other bloggers will be.

- Super Burrito may be opening as soon as mid-February. They're waiting on permits to finish up some interior work. The location is the former Makahna's space, right next door to Alpenglow on the corner of Greenwood and Bond.

Tipster Stanislaw Funk today let drop that the Bulletin will soon be doing something new: offering free "E-Edition" access to subscribers of their dead-tree edition.

If true, it's a step in the right direction—when we had our Bulletin subscription I often wished I could also have online access to those "extras" I had already paid for—but it's not enough. They need to do away with paid access for the online stuff entirely, make it free for everyone. I don't know of anyone who pays for online news, and the Bulletin would benefit hugely from opening up the "extras" and the archives to everybody.

This is sort of a mini-press release but it was a reasonable email pitch so I figured, why not. I don't know what a Blu-Ray player goes for, but this doesn't seem like a bad deal. Maybe someone who follows up on it could report back?

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A couple of things I thought I'd mention for this weekend—well, Saturday, anyway.

First the Library is having their Winter Book Sale on Saturday. As usual, that runs from 10 to 4 and is located at the Library Administration Building at 507 NW Wall, in the basement. Best deals on used books in town when they do this... children's books are sold by the inch (stacked).

Also, it's the Family Free Day at the High Desert Museum all day on Saturday. Might be a bit cold to wander around the outdoor exhibits, but the indoor ones are pretty good, too.

The other day when I blogged about finding Deschutes Brewery's The Abyss around town, I didn't foresee the beer showing up on eBay. At least, not so soon.

Seriously. Go to eBay and type in "abyss deschutes" in the search box. I did that just now, and there's one with six bids up to $26; one with four bids up to $21.50; and two marked as "Buy it now" for $49 each.

I half-joked when I bought a case for myself that I'd wait a couple of months and sell the bottles for $20 each (twice what I paid for them). I guess some people couldn't wait...

(You can blame Kina for first bringing this to my attention.)

We had lunch at the new Decoy Bar and Grill yesterday (read The Source's review here), and I was impressed. I won't go as in-depth as The Source did, but I will agree with their assessment that they have one of the best burgers in town (if not the best).

The space isn't as big as I envisioned it, but it's not small, either. It's very comfortable, lots of exposed brick and wood giving it the "Northwest atmosphere" they were aiming for. There are booths and table/booth combos along the walls, but most of the seating are the tall bar tables and bar stools you can see in the picture on their home page.

The food was excellent. My Decoy Burger was thick, juicy, served up with blue cheese on thick sourdough bread instead of a traditional bun. The patty is made fresh from ground chuck and seasonings, nothing frozen going on there. There were even sweet pickles on the side... something I've not seen anywhere else in town (and I love sweet pickles).

The kids ate every bit of their food and loved it. They have a "token" children's menu, with three items: chicken nuggets, pasta and meatballs, and grilled cheese. They're kid friendly, but are definitely catering to the more adult clientèle.

The tomato Florentine soup my wife had was very good, too. And the fries that came with my burger and the kids grilled cheese are hand-cut and oven roasted, quite tasty.

They are apparently known for their sours, but we just went "basic", beer and wine. Their wine list looked impressive, but the beer selection isn't as large; about 5 or so on draught and another bunch in the bottle. Beer was $4.50 for glass.

It's a bit expensive; not as expensive as Typhoon but comparable to (or slightly more than) the Village Grill. And while I liked the Village Grill, the Decoy was, yes, better for the price.

I'll be back, and next time I'll try a sour or something.

The Decoy Bar and Grill
1051 Bond Street, Suite 100
Bend, OR 97701
(541) 318-4833

Here's something cool that we just discovered: the City of Bend website hosts audio MP3 recordings of all City Council meetings, going back to 2005. That's rather progressive and tech-savvy.

No video yet, though. Which is a shame, since the meetings are recorded for COTV on channel 11. They wouldn't even have to host the videos themselves; just put them on YouTube.

What with all the new restaurants opening up around here lately (seriously, downtown seems like it's infested with 'em), I didn't notice that the Decoy Bar and Grill had opened; it's the new restaurant on the corner of Bond and Greenwood. It was this article in the Source today that caught my attention... the place actually sounds pretty good, especially the food.

The menu is a nice mix of the expected and unexpected, retaining a few offerings of the well-worn “pub food” genre. There are crispy wings, but there is also pastrami and yellowfin tuna on crostini (a strange but very tasty pairing). There is a burger. (One of the best I’ve had in town.) But there’s also a corned beef Reuben that is so gargantuan that making a colossal mess is deliciously inevitable.

The entrées range from chicken served with plum sauce and couscous, to crab cakes served with remoulade, to a grilled thick-cut pork chop. There is definitely a Southern streak in some of the dishes like the white bean soup with bacon and wilted kale, and the jerk chicken tender sandwich. I sampled the baked grits and shrimp, a relatively simple dish that seems to stump anyone above the Mason Dixon line. Not so at the Decoy, the grits were creamy, the shrimp grilled and spiced to perfection and the caramelized onions and bell peppers added nice body to the dish.

Their website needs work, though. The menus aren't online yet, and that's the main thing for a restaurant website to have (in my opinion). The other interesting thing is the website says the Decoy is closed Sundays, while the Source article says they're open seven days a week. Call first if it's a Sunday.

If/when we get a chance to try it, I'll post my own review.

McMenamins Old St. Francis School is holding a Scotch tasting on Thursday, January 24th. It starts at 7pm and costs $40 (reservations required).

This spirited liquor goes notably well with cold, rainy weather. Come in to warm up with this selection of scotches paired with a Scottish-themed menu of hearty appetizers.

*** SCOTCHES ***
GLENKINCHIE
DALWHINNIE
CRAGGANMORE
TALISKER
LAGAVULIN
OBAN

***SMALL BITES MENU***
Lobster bisque cappuccino
Mini lamb burgers with honey-harissa sauce
Housesmoked salmon cake with watercress crème fraiche
Leek & oyster tart
Venison carpaccio with chocolate espresso sauce
Ginger brioche bread pudding with butterscotch sauce

I have to say, if you're into Scotch, you should check this out. I went to one of their Scotch and cigar tastings a year and a half ago and even though it was held outside (where it got cold), it was a lot of fun and a really good deal. I imagine this one will be held indoors in one of the banquet rooms.

That would be Deschutes Brewery's much-coveted Imperial Stout, which was just officially released today. I have a write-up on my beer blog of their release party.

But the real hint here is where to find it. I've been calling around to the various stores in town who will carry it, and the earliest anyone can tell me they'll be getting this beer is "maybe Wednesday." Even at the Brewery itself (on Simpson Avenue), Wednesday at the soonest. So if you're dying for this beer, you'll have to wait until (maybe) it shows up at the store. And it doesn't sell out.

...Unless you go to the Pub itself downtown. They were selling bottles tonight (they're $10 each), and if they haven't run out, you can still buy them there. Score! I took no chances: I bought a case.

Saw this on TV; AdFed is putting on Bend WebCon 2 on January 31st. Last year's version slipped under the radar because it was focused on Search Marketing (SEO), but this one caught my eye because they're expanding to include email, blogs, RSS, podcasting, "and much more."

Anyway, the 31st is a Thursday, and the Con runs from 11 to 3 at the Tower Theatre downtown... not exactly optimum timing for me since I'm working at that time, but it'd be interesting to attend. Plus it costs $60 ($40 if you're an AdFed member).

Here's their description:

This conference is for marketing professionals, web developers, advertising specialists, web content providers, small business owners, writers and designers. The competitive business world is moving so fast it is important to stay up to date on the latest trends and learn from industry leaders. The expert panelists and keynote presenters are here for you.

The speakers they have lined up Tim Kendall, Product Manager at Facebook, Derrick Wheeler, Senior SEO Architect at Microsoft, and Kent Lewis, President of Anvil Media.

It would be interesting to know the number of bloggers attending...

The High Desert Museum is having its Free Family Saturday on January 26th. (It showed up in the Bulletin but I can't find it on their website.)

In addition to the free admission, they're also offering two short "behind the scenes" tours at 10:30 and 2 for $10 (normally these tours are more in-depth and cost $25).

If you've never been to the High Desert Museum, I highly recommend it. I particularly like the homestead reconstructions, but all of it is really good.

We stopped in at Ben & Jerry's (in the Old Mill) this evening for some ice cream, and on their specials board is perhaps the most unusual flavor I've seen: "Beer and Donuts" ice cream.

No kidding! Apparently it's some sort of Simpsons-inspired flavor.

And naturally, I had to try it. There's not much beer flavor (if any)... it mostly tastes like Krispy Kreme donuts. Since it's a special, it won't last long, so get down there soon if you want to try it.

Wow, there's spam blogs, and then there's just... wrong blogs.

When the Round About Bend "blog" first appeared on my radar, it almost looked like a spam blog... you know, the kind of blog that just posts canned (and often lifted from other sites without telling) content to get the search engine traffic, and plasters ads all over the page for the easy money. I'd actually exchanged an email with a person there because they were weirdly and incorrectly linking to Hack Bend for something else entirely... still are, sort of. But, they fixed the one I pointed out and generally I thought, no harm, no foul—it's another source of potentially interesting data about Bend, so I subscribed to it in my newsreader.

Today, though, there are two items which really bring "spam blog" right to the forefront: Bend's Hans Restaurant has award winning lunches and desserts and Typhoon in Bend celebrates first anniversary.

When you're wrong, you're wrong. I mean, we all know Hans has been closed for awhile now, right? And we know that Typhoon hasn't been open for even remotely a year, right? A mere two minutes of online research would have revealed both these facts.

I probably shouldn't even link and encourage it... but I find it so backwardly funny that I can't help it.

It was about six months ago when I blogged about the plans for a brewpub in Sisters (part of the FivePine development). Well, yesterday the Nugget reports that they've broken ground:

Three Creeks Brewing Company (TCBC) broke ground on its new brew pub facility on Monday, January 7.

Kallberg Construction will build the structure on the FivePine campus, just west of Sisters Movie House, with an opening slated for the summer of 2008.

[T]he 6,000-square-foot facility will provide a full restaurant, a 10-barrel brewing system, a large bar area with large screen plasma TVs, two pool tables and a large patio.

The theme is to be rustic, Old West livery stable.

Nice! Something else to look forward to come summer. Still curious about details, though, but I think I'll try to contact Wade Underwood and see what's what. I do note that they've already registered the domain (though there's no site yet, just a landing page).

(I need to follow the Nugget more regularly; I found this via John Foyston, who's in Portland.)

I realized on Friday that this was a post I needed to write, not because I'm (currently) running into any conflicts of interest—that I know of—but to head off any future potential ones and establish a line. Also, to put down in writing the "policy" I'm following.

Read on...

The Source is trying something new: they've created a Flickr group called "Light Meter" for use as a community photo album:

Welcome to Light Meter, the Source Weekly's interactive photo feature. Here's how to participate:

1. Join Flickr, if you haven't already.
2. Join the Light Meter Flickr Group.
3. Add photos to the group by clicking "Send to Group" on the page of the photo you'd like to add.
4. Done! Your picture will be added to the Light Meter group. We are going to publish our favorites in the Source Weekly.

I think the publish the favorites part is key. Not sure how they're going to handle copyright issues though—I assume they'll ask permission first—and I don't know (but wouldn't expect) financial reimbursement. But still, that's cool.

Been sitting on this link for awhile—okay, I actually forgot about it—but Jen posted several places in town to get coffee and free wifi awhile back. She's come up with seven items for her list, which is two or three more than I would have.

I'd also add McMenamins Old St. Francis School; they have free wifi on their property and you can certainly get coffee (among other things!) there. (They even roast their own.)

Any others?

Especially when everyone else is doing it for me, and I'm going to point to them!

The Bulletin: Readers' choice top stories of 2007

The Bulletin: Most clicked articles online

Bend Restaurants: Best of 2007

That's what I see for now... more pop up, I'll point to 'em.

Happy New Year, everybody!