Location: Nashville, Tennessee, USA

When trying to find a breakfast place this morning Katisse asked if I had any preferences, to which I responded ‘I need something healthy! Something green!’ Remember my sad arteries from yesterday?

I only mention this because Kat somehow found us the greasiest place in town, which not only did not have healthy food, I think they likely have never served a salad in the history of their existence. We had a good laugh and then I promptly revoked her restaurant picking privileges for the day!

It’s Kat’s birthday in a couple of days (partly the reason for our trip!) so I bought us a custom chocolate making class, thinking it would be a real boujee way to spend an afternoon. As with a lot of things I didn’t really anticipate the American-ness of it all and it turned out we were not making chocolate per se, but instead crushing candies and fillings into a quarter pound chocolate puck. A quarter pound!!! The finished product is bigger than my fist! We giggled the whole time, which in the end is what matters. Now we both have massive chocolate pucks filled with candy to contend with (demolish) at some point.

It turns out we made the right call yesterday by waiting to go to a Broadway bar, because the bar my friend Kristin recommended was having their 64th birthday today! Happy birthday Tootsies! A pastel purple 4 story building covered in painted orchids happily greeted us near the top of the street. We smooshed our way through the first floor up to the second, where we managed to snag two bar seats right near the band as some other ladies were leaving. Nice!

We ordered a couple of insanely priced drinks and sang loudly along to the songs we knew, and swayed in our seats to the ones we didn’t. The band, JB and the Highriders, took any and all requests from the rowdy crowd and belted out everything from Shania Twain, to Garth Brooks, to Morgan Wallen and Chris Stapleton. After my second beer (just enough liquid courage) I gave up my seat in favour of the increasingly full dance floor. After a few good songs and some highly embarrassing dancing on my part, we decided to call it a day.

I’m laughing a little now because it was 4 PM. Usually you go to the bar after dinner, but party time seems to be all the time in Nashville! That bar was packed all the way to the 4th floor roof for the entire day!

We consulted our taxi driver-approved list of local restaurants and ended up at Butchertown Hall, a new American wood fire grill place with a taco happy hour we couldn’t turn down. Brisket and steak tacos?! Yep!

I’d love to say the tacos were delicious, but the dinner started off with me eating my words…

Our dinners were both topped with a grilled spicy pepper and we each took a little nibble. Katisse turned red and looked like she was going to break out in a sweat, meanwhile I wasn’t even sure there was any spice at all. I’m making fun of Katisse, hardy-har-har, until she goes ‘you try it!’ and I’m like ‘it’s the same pepper but ok ok!’

Big chomp.

It was not the same pepper.

I don’t think I tasted any of my dinner at all after that and was coughing and breathing heavily and drank like 5 glasses of water. Did I black out?

I’ll take Kat’s word for it that the taco’s were delicious.

We meandered home to relax and watch a scary movie, me still breathing heavily and coughing most of the way. Am I getting acid reflux? Why does my tummy hurt? God this is embarrassing. I love spicy food. What the heeeck was that pepper!?

Sav