Cincinnati Unchained, + contest!

Earlier this week, Dojo Blogato wrote a post about BuyCincy's Cincinnati Unchained. It was the first I'd heard of it, though it wasn't the last.

Cincinnati Unchained is an event to draw attention to locally-owned and -operated businesses in the Queen City. As this is a big part of our journey, I wanted to make sure to spread the word here too.

For the event, Dojo is giving away a $5 gift card with the purchase of a $25 card. I'd like to give mine away!

Leave a comment here naming your favorite Cincinnati-based business for a chance to win a $5 gift card to Dojo Gelato. (Okay, $5 isn't much, but it goes a long way at Dojo!)

If you've already left a similar comment on another one of our posts, feel free to duplicate or leave a new answer. With any luck, I'll needle Dojo's Michael Christner into choosing a winner for us in a couple of days!

Cadillac Ranch = clunker

If you live in Cincinnati you may have already heard some Cadillac Ranch-bashing as a result of some serious party-foul action that went down during MidPoint Music Festival this past weekend. If you missed it (as I did because I was out of town), here's the gist from BuyCincy:

After hearing one band they were unhappy with, Cadillac Ranch pulled the plug on visiting Midpoint Music Festival bands scheduled to play Saturday night at his venue. After Cleveland's The Lighthouse and The Whaler finished their low-key 8pm set, Cadillac Ranch had enough and cancelled performances from bands that came to Cincinnati from New York, Louisville, and Nashville, citing lack of profit.

How embarrassing, to say the least. I find myself getting surprisingly defensive as one of our precious, awesome jewels (like MidPoint) is bullied by Big Restaurant. There is no excuse for behavior of this nature, and it's vindicating to notice that I'm not the only one up-in-arms. This has quickly become a media nightmare for at least this location of the chain-- there's even a Facebook page set up to encourage a boycott.

Hell, I'm in. One more excuse to Eat Local, amirite?

If you agree that this is unacceptable, might I recommend voting this location down on Urbanspoon?