I found one new display, at the corner Cody Street and and 103rd Street. There have been large displays here in the past, but none many years, including last year. I can't tell if this is the same one back or something new, because at 7:30PM nothing was lit.

In Topeka a couple of the displays are smaller that last year, but still worth visiting. The only ones totally gone were ones which I had already checked on online.

This year the roundabouts in the Potwin Place Neighborhood Christmas Display have a brand new theme, "Santa's Village."

It was disappointing to find a couple of last year's displays in Lawrence did not come back in 2024. In particular, the neighborhood display which has included up to 40 homes near the intersection of Wildwood Drive and Woodridge Drive has disappeared.

In Eudora, all the displays from last year are back.

Santa's Village

In the evening, we drove to Olathe to check on the Olathe Christmas Light Tour and check on a couple of new displays. One of them, Paulie's Penguin Legacy, continues the fun walk through charity funding program which Paulie's Penguin Playground did in Olathe for 20 years ending in 2022.

We also discovered new displays for the tour at Woodland Road & 120th Terrace and a simple, but effective light display at 15452 Alcan Street. The Newall Cedar Street Lights sound and music program has added a new 20 foot digital light tree this year and I had a nice chat with Aaron Newell who was checking on some changes to the program.

We had supper at Crazy Good Eats, a BBQ restaurant which opened May 1, 2015, in the same location previously occupied by Big Bubba's Barbecue, followed by McGuire's Smokehouse. I get back there about once a year, usually in December. We had a 1/4 chicken and 3 rib plate, Mad Meatballs, onion strings, smoked chicken wings and French fries.

The food is still good, particularly the fries and onion straws. The chicken breast in the rib and chicken plate must have come from a really large chicken. My only complaint was that although they have Coke products, they do not have Diet Coke.

Paulie's Penguin Playground
 
 

Crazy Good Eats

For supper we tried the recently opened Strip’s Chicken & Brewing on Santa Fe, just east of Old Town in Lenexa. It is a small building which has housed many different restaurants in the past 20 years. A lot of work has been done to the interior, including adding tall booths, which have some privacy from each other, but which I didn't find to be very comfortable.

The menu is fairly short, mostly chicken tenders and pork, so we had a grilled chicken sandwich, pork tenderloin sandwich, French fries and onion straws. The fries and onion straws were my favorite part of the meal, though it did take ketchup for me to really enjoy the onion straws.

The pork tenderloin looked huge when it was brought out. It was large, the batter extended far beyond the pork. It appeared to have the same batter as the onion straws and I felt the batter went better on the onion.

For the second night in a row, the restaurant had Coke products, but no Diet Coke. Although I ordered Diet Coke, the server brought out Coke Zero, left it and didn't return until after our food came out 20 minutes later, so I could request water instead. We were still charged for the Coke Zero, but it was taken off the charge promptly when it was pointed out.

This time we had another seafood dish, Camarones Mojo De Ajo and Fajitas Mezcal. The head on shrimp was sautéed with a lot of garlic and butter and was quite good. The French fries served with it were shoestring sized and didn't impress until we got down to the ones which had been soaking in the garlic butter. Very Yummy!

I do wish they offered a pealed shrimp option on this dish. Not because pealing the shell and head off is an issue, but because it takes so much of the seasoning with it.

The fajitas were chicken, steak, bacon & chorizo cooked with bell pepper, onions & tomatoes, served with lettuce, pico de gallo, guacamole, rice, beans, sour cream, chile toreado and tortillas. They did need some salt for my taste, but were good as well. It was a generous serving and about half came home with me.

Camarones Mojo De Ajo

For me, the highlight of the meal was the escargots (which was my favorite the last time). I particularly loved the flavor of the mushrooms in the escargots with all the garlic. We also had Beef Medaillions and Aumon Poche, which were fine. The entrees came with a house salad which was just lettuce and and a drizzle of rather tasteless dressing.

We shared two desserts, cheese cake and cherries jubilee.

We were baffled when the check came and we learned that they had charged us $4 each for refills of soft drinks. There was no warning and the drinks were filled to the top of the glass with ice so there was little soda.

We followed the meal with a visit to a few of the displays on the Topeka Christmas Light Tour, to get some new night photos and check out some leads on possible new additions to the tour.
 
 

Escargots

Cheese cake & cherries jubilee

We had beef brownies (burnt ends), fried catfish, baked beans and fresh cut French fries. The brownies were lean and quite tasty. The catfish was good and I particularly liked the tartare sauce. The beans are sweet and my favorite at any Kansas City BBQ restaurant.