The menu reads: Original! Organic! Oceanic!
I am adding: Oh, my head!
A couple of nights ago, I set out to revisit Villa-O in Travis Walk. It was a lovely evening and we decided to join the throngs and thongs on the patio. I admit I wasn’t feeling well. The high pollen counts in Dallas have me feeling like my veins are filled with slowly solidifying cement. Which leads me to a little (cue the violins) problem food critics encounter when they have sinusitis–dead palates. Your olfactory senses shut down and everything tastes like pulp.
So, I am sitting at Villa-O with a dead palate and a headache and thinking it just wouldn’t be right for me to critique the food or wine. We order anyway because the people watching is delicious. I might even break my code and say, “The people watching was succulent.” (I hate that word.)
Jump off a bridge with me.
As a supposedly spicy sausage and peppers mixed into as supposedly spicy penne puttanesca fell tasteless on my tongue, I admired the crazy mix of clientele. Lots of SMU sorority types, more SMU geek-y types, and even more young chicks in cheap sparkly summer tops and tight pants. Oh, it was free food night! Silly me. Villa-O has a free entrée deal on Monday nights. No wonder the poor college kids were out.
However, there was oh so much more: Gaily dressed gays (dude, LOVE the yellow linen jacket and lavender shirt combo!), geezers from the Park Cities (how did they get that wheel chair through that revolving door!), and sockless slick Willy’s from the Dallas equivalent of Wall Street (cigars on the patio are legal!). Mixed in were Indians, Middle-Easterners, and Germans. I even spotted a very thin Mico Rodriquez, former M Crowd CEO, wandering around the room. Last I heard, Mr. Rodriquez was working with the Villa-O team so perhaps that is why he was shouting with someone on his cell phone.
So, if you are looking for someplace to people watch, I highly recommend Villa-O. The food? I can’t honestly tell you. Were you there Monday? Did you watch me? I was the one with her head on the table and the Sangiovese drip stuck in my arm.
