Saturday, April 03, 2004

We went to Much last night for dinner. Calling it tacky seems to me to be missing the point -- a place with fake Moorish decor, a waterfall, and fire-twirling dancers is not operating by standards that make "tacky" an operative concept. It was fun. It was over the top. The waitresses were cute. Service was good, although the hostess had a chilly you're-lucky-to-be-here vibe instead of the let's-party attitude the place demands. The only problem was that the food was seriously not good enough. My veal was flabby and flavorless. Lisa's tuna was OK, but just OK. Ditto for our friends' meals -- edible, but more like Applebee's than Undercurrent. The appetizers could have come from the frozen food section of the supermarket, and they were just plopped on a plate with zero effort at presentation. If Much wants to be more than Chuck-E-Cheese for grown-ups and prom dates, if it wants to be taken seriously as a high-end restaurant, they need to up the quality of the menu. Or just lower the bar and have fun food at less-steep prices. As it is, I'd take my kids there for their birthdays, and I'd hang out at the bar, but that's about it. 12:10:41 PM    comment []

More than half of the $50 million raised by John Kerry in the last quarter came in over the Internet. Some numbers from the campaign:  $72,000,000 – total receipts for the Kerry Campaign through 3/31/04. $50,000,000 – total raised in the first quarter of 2004. $38,000,000 – total raised in March 2004. $36,000,000 – total raised from the 355,000 grassroots contributions this quarter. $26,700,000 – amount JohnKerry.com raised this quarter. $2,600,000 – amount JohnKerry.com raised in one day, March 4, 2004. 355,000 – contributions to Kerry Campaign in just 10 weeks. 245,000 – individual online contributions during quarter. 200,000 – individual online contributions during March 2004. 150,000 – number of direct mail donors to the Kerry Campaign. $109.00 – Kerry Campaign average online contribution. $50.00 – Kerry Campaign average contributions from the mail. 11:42:48 AM    comment []