Providence's East Side

Personally, I'm not a fine dining guy. It's not that I don't like good food, because I do. Maybe I would be if I were sitting in a corner office somewhere, raking in six figures instead of driving a truck for a living then I wouldn't mind dropping a huge wad of cash down onto a restaurant's table. When a big bill hits the table my mind immediately goes to just how many hours I had to work to pay for that and how it totally wasn't worth it. So while Federal Hill gets all the credit as the best neighborhood in the state of Rhode Island to go for a bite, I'd prefer to pass up Atwells Ave and head to Providence's east side.

A recent episode of Best Thing I Ever Ate on the Food Network had us wondering if there were a place where we could get a good bowl of noodles in the area. After a quick search on Yelp it seemed as if Noodles102 on Ives St was the place to go. I'm no expert on noodles. In fact, I made only one or two half-assed attempts at using the chopsticks before digging in with a fork. I am, however, an expert on delicious lunches and that's exactly what we found here. My only regret was that we didn't realize that the place was BYOB. The next time we go, and there will certainly be a next time, we plan on taking advantage of that.

While we were still on the east side we hit a couple of stores to get the makings for a night at home. Our first stop was Bottles, in the Eastside Marketplace plaza on Pitman St. The five second rule is upped to the fifteen second rule in a place that clean. It certainly isn't your typical dirty neighborhood liquor store. The shelves are stocked with quality products, organized in a way that actually makes sense. If you're looking for an IPA, all the IPAs are in one cooler. All the Belgians are on one shelf. The Sam Summer isn't packed with the rest of the Sam Adams beer. No, the Sam Summer is packed along side other varieties of summer beers. It makes it very easy to find what you're looking for and avoid what you don't want. They also have the most comprehensive section of local Rhode Island beers that I've found. They have Grey Sail, Narragansett, Bucket, Fool Proof, and Revival making Ravenous is the only RI brewery they don't stock. I even went home with a growler of Bucket Pail Ale. As far as I know, Bottles is the only liquor store in the state to carry that. The girlfriend bought a couple nice bottles of wine, one of which would be opened later on with dinner.

Our next, and final, stop on our east side tour was Farmstead. Still full from our lunch we didn't sit down to eat, but we did peruse their selection of fine cheeses. I had heard of this place before and was expecting it to be bigger, but what space they do have is crammed with things that I want to buy and try. We wound up with a soft goat cheese, a smoked gouda, and some local sopressata from Daniele Inc of Burrillville fame. I didn't think that cheese, wine, and sopressata would count as dinner, but I thought wrong. It turned out to be a delicious dinner served at a place with impeccable service, al fresco dining, and a relaxing atmosphere; our place.

It was a successful trip filled with delicious food. It was my first time hitting all three of those places, but it won't be the last.

Celebrating a Great Year by the Boston Bruins

I know that a sports fan like myself is supposed to be devastated when their team is eliminated from the playoffs. Fans spend the entire season investing time, energy, and emotion into their team. When the season comes crashing to a halt, it's supposed to hurt and it usually does. With that said, I'm really not feeling all that upset over the Bruins losing to the Blackhawks in the Stanley Cup finals. Yeah, the way that they lost, blowing a one goal lead with 90 seconds left to go in the game, was a punch in the gut. Overall though, it was a great year and the B's lost to a fantastic team.

It could be the fact that the Bruins won a couple of years ago. The epic run of championship titles flowing through New England in recent years has changed the mindset of the local fans. There's no sense of panic or desperation. Winning makes everything a little better and a recent title kind of tides you over for a little while. Sure, a legitimate dynasty is always great to live through, but a title here and there is enough to keep the spirits high. There are 30 teams going for the same goal and only one of them can be the best at the end of the year. That team can't, and won't, always be the Bruins.

It could be the fact that there's no shame in losing to the Blackhawks. In their first 24 games of the season Chicago had exactly zero losses in regulation. It was the best start in NHL history. They went on to win the President's Trophy with the best record in the NHL. Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane gave them one of the most exciting duo of young forwards in the game. Corey Crawford took a huge step forward and provided stellar goaltending all year. They were a team with plenty of obvious streaks but without many glaring weaknesses. The Boston Bruins were a good team in 2013. The Chicago Blackhawks were simply better than them. The Chicago Blackhawks were better than everyone. There's no shame in losing to a great team.

It could be the fact that the Bruins had a great season. They may have had a bit of a lull in the second half of the season and that caused them to lose the division, but when the playoffs rolled around they were a lot of fun to watch. Krejci, Lucic, and Horton finally stepped up to be a legitimate number 1 line. Tuukka showed the world that he's a top of the line goalie who doesn't wilt in the playoffs and can carry a team. Bergeron and Campbell suffered tremendous injury, but kept on going. Krug provided some unexpected excitement, Boychuk provided some unexpected goals, and Chara provided a completely expected and entirely perfect playoff beard. Looking for an entertaining hockey season followed by an even better two month long playoff run? The Bruins gave us that this year.

Obviously I wanted to see the Stanley Cup towering 7+ feet above the ice in the arms of Zdeno Chara. I wanted to attend another victory parada, would've liked to sing "We Are the Champions" with a bar full of Bostonians, and wished for another Bruins Stanley Cup flag. But it's tough to be upset with the way the NHL season ended. Next October can't come soon enough, but until then it's time to enjoy the summer and the baseball season.