Oconee County, GA Politics

Subway in Watkinsville donating percentage of sales on Sunday | Online Athens

This was what Chef Richard Miley of the Watkinsville restaurant Chops and Hops attempting to get in my way with this evening at Barberitos as I enjoyed their new mango salsa. I only wish Miley had done so about a minute and a half later so that Barberitos owner and BOE chair David Weeks could have flattened him with a block to his chest. I was merely trying to enjoy my dinner with my son when this co-owner of the restaurant down the way in Town Center decided to try a little fancy footwork with me. Lucky for him I spied my friends and talked to them in line instead. I probably should have called the Watkinsville Police on him, but they have more important things to do than to clean up the mess of restaurant wars. I know Miley is a former Marine and probably could mop the floor with me, but I do not wish them violence such as that which was talked about in their infamous black and bleu burger about six weeks back. I guess he is in no hurry for me to eat at his restaurant anytime soo...

Many Georgia restaurant fans will fondly recall Harry Bissett's in downtown Athens at 297 East Broad Street. This longtime New Orleans themed Cajun eatery has closed since the first of the year primarily due to lack of payment of taxes, but a host of other ills had tainted this recent convert to chain, and series of poor business decisions doomed the once grand dame of the Athens seafood restaurant. Along come Mike and Nona Thornton of Watkinsville with a plan to resurrect the style and substance of Bissett's with their new N ew O rleans ' N A thens restaurant called NONA in the same Broad Street location that was once a bank in Athens.  Contrary to recent reports in the Oconee Enterprise newspaper, Thornton in not in bankruptcy over the development  behind the Oconee County Campus of Gainesville State College on Bishop Farms Parkway South by Georgia Aquatics Center (although proceedings have begun against his partner in the project and the bank has refused to finance ...

Watkinsville diners will soon have another choice for breakfast, lunch and dinner in Town Center. Normally this would not make me bat an eye, but biking past local restauranteur and former UGA football coach Ray Goff coming out of Mirko's Pasta, I saw a "coming soon Subway" banner adorning the middle section where the clothing store used to be. Once upon a time there was a Quizno's where Mirko's is, so things have changed in this downtown space before. I would well imagine Mike Thornton is behind this one as well, but I do not know that. There are some Oconee County diners who will surely be happy to have a choice out of the David Weeks continuum of Mirko's and Barberitos and not wanting to take their family to Chops and Hops. There are others who dread the continued encroachment of a national chain and would rather keep Watkinsville weird (to paraphrase a slogan swiped from Austin and fitting for Athens). I worry about the negative effect on the sales t...