Excited about opera

The Q and I are now subscribers to The Lyric Opera of Chicago. I just ordered tickets to five shows, where will hopefully be sitting in the first balcony. The shows we'll be seeing are:

La bohème by Puccini (Wikipedia)
Die Frau ohne Schatten (The Woman Without a Shadow)by Richard Strauss (Wikipedia)
Doctor Atomic by Adams/Sellars (Wikipedia)
Falstaff by Verdi (Wikipedia)
Eugene Onegin by Tchaikovsky (Wikipedia)

All shows will be on Monday nights, so I'll have to work with my boss to make sure that I get some travel-free days in there. Our first show will be in October.

ribs for dinner

Tonight for dinner I made some Memphis-style baby back pork ribs. Got the ribs at our local meat purveyor (Jerry's Quality Meats on Dempster in Skokie). Rubbed, grilled dry (save for the occasional basting with a mop sauce), cooked slowly with hickory smoke. I put a couple of potatoes on with the ribs, and they came out smoky and delicious, too. Grilled up some asparagus to round out the meal. Served the ribs with Hecky's Spicy BBQ Sauce on the side. And boy howdy was it spicy (so was the rub!).

All in all, a very successful dinner. Here's the recipe (from Steve Raichlen, so davew0071 will be happy).