Uno Is Open in Oaks

The sign was lit on Monday night announcing the opening of Uno/Chicago Grill in Oaks.

All the lights were installed and working and the exterior of the building looked like a cross between a diner and any national chain restaurant.

I stopped by on Tuesday, their second day open, for lunch.  I was greeted at the door by three employees. Each welcomed me. Each waited for my acknowledgement. A bit much for me. One, even two would have been sufficient. I was led to a table. A menu was placed on my table and I was wished well. I removed my jacket and hat (it was snowing) and sat down to read the menu.

I arrived after 2:20pm and I was afraid I might have missed the lunch specials. I scanned each page like a pubescent boy looking for salacious words in Mandingo. I flipped through the multi-paged menu several times, back and forth, looking for the lunch specials and the time lunch stopped being served.  It seemed I was scanning and searching for a long time. Too long. I was pondering leaving and stopping for an Italian shorty at Wawa in Audubon.

I looked up from the menu and was finally greeted by my server. She introduced herself and asked if I wanted to start with a drink. I, figuratively, threw my cards on the table. I stated I was on lunch and had only thirty minutes remaining to be served and eat. I asked where the lunch specials could be found. She directed me to the specials listed on the reverse of the menu. The only place I neglected to look. She advised me that any lunch special ordered was guaranteed to be served in 10 minutes. Great! That would leave me 20 minutes to eat.

Not letting my server leave, I ordered a $7.99 lunched size Classic Cobb Salad and All-You-Can Eat Soup. I chose Chili. I added an unsweetened iced tea and my server was off to place the order.

Within a ten minute span I received my lunch, as ordered. Served with a side of Cobb Salad Avocado Ranch dressing.

I began with the chili soup. The soup included tortilla chips of both yellow and blue corn, onions, cheese and two types of beans. There was a whiff of vinegar that probably came from the hot sauce they used to add some heat. Very little heat, I must add. I should have brought my own Sriracha sauce. Overall, the chili was just one level above that of a canned chili available in any grocery store. I wasn't satisfied with the soup.

The salad was much better. Fresh ingredients of greens, chicken, avocado, tomato(nothing like home grown tomatoes), gorgonzola cheese and bacon. The creamy avocado ranch dressing was perfect for this salad. One teaspoon more dressing would have been the icing on the cake. Included was a bread stick seasoned with coarse salt. The salad was good. No, better than good. Whoever made the salad did a great job.

I ate everything and I was sated.

As for the atmosphere, the room was hard. The floor, oak and stone walls, furniture, everything was hard. I can only imagine the sound level when the room is full. Visually contrasting was a gas fueled fireplace with a raging fire. There were several large screen TVs in the room I dined. Two in the back and one mid-room, over the fireplace. Three too many TVs for me.

Overall I liked my lunch and the price. The staff was obviously newly trained and it showed. I will definitely return for lunch. I will choose a different soup next time but I will return. I will eat at the bar, next time. I felt uncomfortable by myself at a table for four in the middle of the floor. The bar will be more comfortable. Although, I won't like those big screen TVs directly in front of me. Silent bright visual distractions that hinder conversation. Even with strangers. Especially if your not interested in sports, as am I.

©Damyon T. Verbo - all rights reserved

Are Bird Feeders Selfish?

Is it a selfish motivation to put out a bird feeder?  For many years I felt birds should fend for themselves.  They should forage for their own food.  Isn't that the natural way?  I felt providing food for birds, even in a severe winter, was akin to giving a beggar money, making them dependent on handouts.  I feared I was doing the birds an injustice, making them lazy, shiftless and demoralizing them.  As I age, I have changed by thoughts on the matter.  My reasons may be selfish, but I want birds in my garden. 

Available from Lowe's via mail order item# 335583

My youngest daughter gave me a bird feeder, including bird food, for Christmas.  I had my eye on this feeder for some time.  It has a central hopper for seed and four holders on two sides for suet cakes.  I filled the hopper with sunflower chips. 

Available at Lowe's item # 215668

Lots of birds like sunflower seeds, like titmice, chickadees, finches, wrens, nuthatches, cardinals and bluejays.  I placed a suet cake in the feeder.  The suet will attract woodpeckers.   I then hung it outside my breakfast room window.  As I stood admiring my new feeder, feeling good inside, I wondered how long it would take for the birds to find the feeder.

I turned to my son, who was standing in the kitchen, and asked, "How long do you think it will be before the birds find the feeder?"


"Three weeks," was his reply.


Three weeks?  I was hoping it would only take three days.  


One week later, early morning New Years Day, I sat at my iMac writing this blog.  I looked out the second floor window into my back yard.  I saw several crows on the grass.  They were the first birds, of any kind, I saw since I started to look for birds on Christmas day.  I hadn't seen birds in the trees, bushes or even flying in the sky, until these crows.  I thought, maybe, there was some sinister force at work.  Some animal eating all the birds.  Or maybe, some kind of cataclysmic natural disaster about to happen, that only wild animals could sense.  More rationally, I was beginning to fear my timing was too late in the season for this feeder.  I began to doubt the value of my actions.  The mercury level began to fall on my confidenc-o-meter.


Late that afternoon, I had my first visitor to the feeder. 

Damned squirrels!  They will do anything to get food.  I have seen them chew through plastic feeders, leap 20 feet from an overhanging tree branch to a small suspended feeder to get to food.  Squirrels are tenacious critters.  This feeder is all metal.  I think it will survive the squirrels. 

Source:Junco

The next Friday, I was at home all day.  I noticed several birds near the feeder, but none at the feeder.  I saw several Juncos and two House Finches, and a woodpecker in a nearby tree.  

Source:All About Birds

I don't think I will ever see Juncos at the feeder.  They only eat off the ground or a low platform feeder.  I don't know how they find enough food.  I didn't see the House Finches at the feeder, but I may have startled them from the feeder when I approached the window.


Whilst looking on the web for bird images for this post, I found a site called Project Feeder Watch.  They have a program for ordinary citizens to count birds at their backyard feeders and then report their numbers to Cornell University for statistical reasons.  Their counting season is from the second week in November through the first Friday in April.  Although I put the bird feeder out almost six weeks later than the beginning of feeder watch season, I joined and will receive tallies and member supplies within the next three weeks.  That will leave me all of Feb and March to count birds and add my findings to the data base at Cornell.  I will enjoy adding my data.


I want birds in my garden.  I enjoy watching birds.  I think they are beautiful.  For those reasons, I put out a bird feeder.  Some people may call me selfish.  I can live with that.


©Damyon T. Verbo - all rights reserved