You know the story. A Tik Tok food critic, Keith Lee, with a gazillion followers visited a local sushi joint, FOB Sushi Bar, ate some raw fish, and gave the experience a mostly positive review. But before FOB Sushi could enjoy the boom of a "Keith Lee Effect," his fans claimed they saw a worm or something move in a piece of sushi he consumed. I do not want to go into whether there was worm or not, and besides I think we should eat more insects (and let me not get into how much I miss eating the hairy caterpillars sold in markets in and around Gaborone, Botswana), but the controversy was so loud, so viral, so relentless that it forced FOB Sushi Bar to close "Until Further Notice" its Seattle and Bellevue locations on Nov 19.
The business cautiously reopened on December 4. Was the smoke clear? Would people come? I did, and for the first time. I had never even heard of FOB Sushi Bar until it was trashed on social media. Also, I'm not a sushi fan in general because few restaurants actually do it well (big ups to Maneki for spoiling/schooling me), and those that don't aren't worth the trouble. I can eat a mediocre burrito or bowl of phở, but not a plate of sushi. And that is exactly what I ate at FOB Sushi Bar (so-so sushi), which sells its variety of pieces by the weight ($14.99 per pound). This is sushi for the masses. Sushi to make you full. Sushi that neither excites or disappoints. And, if truth be told, I think the sushi served at the QFC in Harvard Market is a touch better.
That was my experience. I left the reopening, which was busy with young and old people showing their support ("glad to see you are back"), and returned my thoughts to Hawking radiation. It is amazing that here, on the edge of a black hole, the general theory of relativity, quantum physics, and thermodynamics meet. That's truly something. And it's made possible by nothing. And nothing is not, it turns out, nothing at all.
