Rant- Traffic Lights

This week I realized how bad the timing is on the lights in Riverside. Every morning I drive down about a 5 mile stretch of Arlington Avenue and either I make a couple of the lights when they're green or I hit every light when it's red. It makes a drive that should be fairly short last a really long time. It's really frustrating, too. I don't expect to be able to drive all the way down a street and not have to stop at any red lights, but having to stop at EVERY red light is completely ridiculous! Whoever is in charge of timing the lights in Riverside doesn't do a very good job...

TGI Fridays - Flair Bartending

I love the TGI Fridays at the Galleria. The bartenders are fun and it has a friendly atmosphere. I went there last night to watch the football game with some friends. I didn't know that they were having a flair bartending competition afterwards. All the bartenders there did a routine, and it was amazing to watch. There was a DJ announcing the bartenders and they each made about 3 drinks for the judges. In all the times I've gone to Fridays I've never seen the flair competitions. I am definitely going to go to the next one! They make drinks by doing all types of tricks with the bottles and the mixing glasses. It's like advanced juggling with glass bottles and is incredibly entertaining to watch. Once I find out when the next one is I will post it.

El Torito Sunday Brunch

This morning I went to El Torito for their Sunday Brunch, and I think I have found my new favorite place to spend a Sunday morning! It is a breakfast buffet with all-you-can-drink champagne from 9am-2pm. We ended up going around 11am and staying until 1pm. There were a couple football games on, so we got to hang out and watch them as well. I don't know how I've missed out on this for so long!

Arts Walk, Lake Alice

Last night some friends and I went to the Downtown Arts Walk. This is an event that is put on by the Riverside Cultural Consortium and is held the first Thursday of every month from 6-9pm. There are about 12 art galleries and museums downtown that participate. They have special exhibits and attractions, and all of them are free. There are many people who cannot afford studios in the art galleries, so they set up their artwork on the sidewalks for people to see and possibly buy as they walk between the galleries.

I haven't seen downtown this busy since they used to do the market night on Wednesday nights. It's a very interesting crowd. One of the artists that we looked at was giving away a percentage of her profits to the Riverside Animal Shelter. I thought that was a great idea because not only was she at the Arts Walk helping to bring people out to Downtown Riverside, but she was also helping one of the other groups in the community.

After the Arts Walk we went to Lake Alice. I really like this bar because they have so much going on there. They have pool tables, a shuffle board table, arcade games, bar games, and some big screen tv's. On Thursday nights they have karaoke, too. We watched the game for a little while and listened to a couple people sing before we left for the night. Lake Alice is a good place to just hang out and meet people or bring a big group of friends for the night.