Category: Culture

How To Deal With Self Service Beer At Me-N-Ed’s Pizza

The Fresnan 6 Comments

self-service-taps How To Deal With Self Service Beer At Me-N-Ed's Pizza

In case you haven’t noticed, the Bullard and West Me-N-Ed’s Pizza has been remodeled and added something Fresno has never seen: Self Service Beer Taps.

Run for the bluffs, post T-Ball pizza meetup, this may be too crazy for the kids!

SELF SERVING BREAKDOWN

Here is how it works. You order your food like always, but you tell them you are drinking like an adult. They ID you and start a tab. Then give you a magic wristband to wear.

You pick out a glass, search for the right beer (with pizza, I recommend an IPA, pale or Tioga’s Ed’s Red, but that’s just me), place your wristband against a certain spot on the tap, the tap gets ‘green lit’ and you can start pouring.

Wow. “Exciting” footage [sarc].

In addition to the beer taps, the place got cleaned up and is sporting a lot of wood.

remodled-me-n-eds How To Deal With Self Service Beer At Me-N-Ed's Pizza

Gone are the video games that the location had. So you might encounter a pissed off child at first. But give them a taste of your beer and it might shut them up.

(Disclaimer: thefresnan.com does not endorse childhood drinking in any way but just needed a mildly humorous line to place in the blog post).

HOW DRUNK CAN I GET?

You can get up to 32 ounces (two pints) but you can ask for more if they can see that you can take on additional juice. It electroniclly tracks how many ounces you’ve poured yourself – Big Brother is monitoring how much you drink, man!

There are 29 taps plus a cider or two and a couple of handles with something called “wine”. I don’t know what that is but I hear it contains alcohol so I guess it’s cool.

A REVIEW

This kind of system feels like a trendy thing, but I’m sure more will be popping up. And this one isn’t going away anytime soon.

It’s still pretty busy, as all new Fresno things are at first. But it’s managable. And if you don’t feel like pizza, you can just show up for the beer. They even have a seperate counter now to handle just the beer.

Not having to wait to get a bartender’s attention is a nice change. Although I can see it getting annoying having to get up everytime you want more beer. 

I wouldn’t want every bar having this system. But it’s fun, glad it is in Fresno, I’ll be back – even if Big Brother is watching how many Luponic Distortions I can put down.

Something To Tear Fresno Apart: Raisins Or Craisins?

The Fresnan 5 Comments

There is an issue bubbling underneath the surface of Fresno that is not talked about. Something that needs to be discussed. Something that, if not dealt with properly, could tear apart the very fabric of this great city.

Are craisins better than raisins?

raisins-or-craisins Something To Tear Fresno Apart: Raisins Or Craisins?
Raisins OR Craisins (pic : andnowuknow.com)
To be more specific: Which is better on salad, craisins or raisins?

“Why bring it up now?” you might ask. “There is so much our city has to deal with, why drag this out into the streets at a time like this?”

I’m sorry, but with the pending opening of the new and improved Popolo’s Pizza (with the best salad bar in Fresno), this raisins or craisins debate needs to get settled today! We tried to sort it out in a recent episode of The Perfect Pour, but we got nowhere and only produced more tension.

popolos-is-coming Something To Tear Fresno Apart: Raisins Or Craisins?

You might think “Well of course it’s raisins! Fresno County is the Raisin Capitol Of The World, for damn sake!” Agreed! Eat local, I say. Why give money to faceless pricks back East? Pricks, who by the way, are probably using way too much water to produce one stupid craisin!

THERE’S A DROUGHT, PEOPLE! READ A CALTRANS ELECTRONIC BILLBOARD SOMETIME!

Debate over, right? Rejoice as Popolo’s new salad bar, the trendsetter for all Fresno salad bars, will finally feature raisins over craisins!

It’s not that easy. 

There are a lot of people that prefer craisins. Especially on their salad. Shocking but true. Take a look next time you’re at a salad bar. There’s a good chance the topping option will be craisins. I blame the millennials.

In these rough times, we must remember what got us here. What is the one fruit that is the soul of our city? For Fresno, the choice is clear: Raisins.

Southern California Is Too Hot? This Pleases Me.

The Fresnan 3 Comments
Tioga-Sequoia-pool-1024x768 Southern California Is Too Hot? This Pleases Me.
Fresno Life

Yes I am dangerously close to posting about weather too much. But dammit I need to again. Because something awesome has been happening as a bi-product of the current heat wave…

People in L.A. and San Diego are losing their shit.

Yeah, those same assholios who only think about Fresno to mock it for being SO HOT. Those same douches are filling their social feeds with pictures of their dashboard thermometers and even their Barbecues:
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There Is Hidden Joy Inside The Fresno Airport

The Fresnan 3 Comments

Fresno-Airport There Is Hidden Joy Inside The Fresno Airport

Maybe this is weird because it’s not a place you might think of, but a favorite Fresno spot of mine is… the waiting area at Fresno Yosemite International Airport:

airport-waiting-area There Is Hidden Joy Inside The Fresno Airport

No it’s not because of the fake redwood forest, although I do think it’s cool.

redwoods There Is Hidden Joy Inside The Fresno Airport

And it’s not the historic barber shop, but it too is cool. Next time you’re at FYI, peak in the window of the shop and gander at all the pictures of all famous people that have come through that shop, you’ll be surprised.

It’s also not the Starbucks or the sports bar restaurant thing. Oh, since we’re here, I miss the old coffee shop from way back. One of my favorite Lost Fresno memories is staring out the window, waiting for a plane to pull up to the gate.

The reason the airport waiting area is my favorite? All the reunions. The joy of seeing somebody that’s been away too long. The relief and buzz of people getting to their destinations after a tiring trip. There is no other place in Fresno that has that.

If you park in the ‘cell phone waiting area’ when picking up and don’t go inside, you’re missing out on a little bit of Fresno joy.

Who Is That Little Weirdo? Nobody Walks In Fresno

The Fresnan 7 Comments

walking-in-fresno-1024x768 Who Is That Little Weirdo? Nobody Walks In Fresno

I guess I am a shitty person. When driving around Fresno and I see somebody walking down the sidewalk or waiting at the light, I judge.  I think “What is the story with that dude? Why is he walking?”

Seriously though, where are they going? What has happened to them that they have to walk? You’re in Fresno, DAMMIT! We do NOT walk TO things unless we can’t find a parking spot. We. Suck.

I’m not talking about people who walk their dogs or kids going to school or the person obviously exercising or even a probably homeless guy. The person I am talking about is the regular looking adult just waiting to cross, pretty much, any major intersection in town.

And hey, I’ve walked to or from a thing or two. I’ve bucked the Fresno norms.

Once I walked back home after dropping off my car to get repaired. It was weird. It felt like every car was looking at me and thinking “What a sad little guy. He must not have many friends.”

We gotta change that (or, at least, I have to). We gotta change the way we think of people walking around Fresno. We gotta walk more. No matter how weird it feels.

Related music to listen to while reading this post:

A Lame Guide To Snapchat In Fresno

The Fresnan 4 Comments

No. Snapchat is not just teens trading nude pics. Not anymore. Now asshat marketers and old people (you know, people above 30) are on Snapchat.

Mainstream, Snapchat is. The only thing left is your mom having an account. Until then, Snapchat is hot as hell and isn’t going away for a while.

Sadly Snapchat has become another time-suck for me and I hate it for that. But there are a few cool Fresno things. My favorite is finding Geofilters while roaming the city. Such as the three Fresno ones you can use throughout Fresnerd:

fresno2 A Lame Guide To Snapchat In Fresno
It’s the perfect melding of Fresno drive-thru life and a Fresno Geofilter.

There is also a Fresno ag-themed one and a downtown skyline one. Not terrible, but probably made by somebody not in Fresno.

Location specific Geofilters are a thing too. These will only pop-up as a filter option if you are near the location:

fresno-high A Lame Guide To Snapchat In Fresno
Fresno High Geofilter

I haven’t seen any other High Schools or many businesses in town with their own filter, but give it time. We here in Fresno tend to drag our feet while adapting things.

FRESNANS SLOW TO RISE WITH THEIR SNAPCHAT GAME

I really have yet to find a Fresno Snapchatter that is terribly interesting to follow (including me, user: trenchrun22). But there are a couple local businesses that have it figured out. The number one is Dutch Brothers (dutchbrosfresno). They are killing it.

dutchbrosfresno A Lame Guide To Snapchat In Fresno

Others worth mentioning are Fresno State (Fresno_State), Fresno Grizzlies (FresnoGrizzlies) the Bulldog Marching Band (fsbmb) and Tioga Sequoia (tiogasequoia). I’m waiting for somebody cool like Bitwise to be snapping, but the local landscape is a bit snap-sparse at the moment.

GET IN ON THE SNAPCHAT LAND-GRAB

If you have a business or even just a big party, maybe even a real kickass spot on Blackstone to hang out at, you might want to look into getting an on-demand Geofilter. It’s really not that expensive and maybe not as hard as you think (TWSS) to get one. Check this out if you are interested:

FIND THE COOL KIDS AND THE FRESNO DORKS

The big knock on Snapchat is no discovery – you can’t search for anything within the app. And you can’t find anybody unless you know their handle or have their snapcode.

So, of course, there are Snapchat discovery apps popping up. Most notably is Ghost Codes. It makes it a bit easier to find people you want to follow.

DON’T BE AFRAID

As much as it’s unique from the big three (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram), there are just as many crappy, unassuming posts (sorry, “snaps”) as any other social media.

There are still all the social media classics: “Here I am going to the gym!” “Here I am at the gym.” “Look at my dog.” “How cute is MY kid!?” “Look at this food I am eating!” “Look at how good I look in my mirror!”

Point is, it’s not as intimidating as you might think. It may just take you a couple of days to figure out what works and how to make a story. Here is a quick tutorial for ya if you need it. And how to make a good Snapchat story:

So get on Snapchat today and enjoy it until your mom & dad get on there and ruin it just like your Facebook.