Mr. Smith's of Georgetown, Georgetown, D.C.

Brian got hungry in the middle of the Emmys tonight and wanted to go out for dinner someplace. We walked to Georgetown and sat down in one of the little neighborhood French cafes that I like, but he decided he wasn't in the mood for French food and wanted to leave. After checking out the menus at another seven restaurants, he picked Mr. Smith's of Georgetown as his dining location for the evening.

Mr. Smith's is a popular bar with a long, narrow, dark wood paneled bar running some distance into the building. Televisions over the bar were all turned to some football performance (and they declined to turn one of them to the Emmys for us). A pianist/singer was ensconced at a small electronic grand near the back, and while Brian enjoyed him, I found the experience quite painful. He had a terrible, terrible habit of singing a phrase to the last, held note, then immediately going flat!

On our arrival, we were directed to the dining room in the back. It was a surprisingly large room with a ceiling reminiscent of a European beer tent, the rafters all wound with "grapevines" and other garlands of faux greenery. A large patio was adjacent to the dining room. Once we sat down and got our menus, though, Brian decided that he wanted to sit out in the dark, crowded, noisy bar for dinner, and insisted we move.

We ended up at a bar table near the main door, so we got a lot of cigarette smoke that was blowing in from the people standing out on the sidewalk indulging their addiction. It did have the virtue, however, of being about as far away from the piano as one could get in that room.

Brian ordered a Miller Lite and a cheeseburger. The burger came with a pickle spear and a mound of thick-cut potato chips.



I wasn't hungry, so I just drank some iced tea and had a piece of their dessert of the day, a red velvet cake with white chocolate icing. The cake was good (being moist, though in the dark I could not discern any specific "flavor"—were it not for the photo, I'd not have known the cake was actually red!) and the icing had a distinct chocolate taste. The plate was garnished with a trimmed orange slice.



Only one waitress was on hand to deal with the entire bar (other than the bartender), but, once she discovered us, I thought her service was surprisingly attentive.