Sunday, October 21, 2007

A Fall Day on the Farm

10/21/2007

It is a beautiful fall day here on the Farm.  At this moment the sun is slowly dropping below the western horizon just beyond Cacapon Mountain.  The sky above it is very blue and nearly cloudless.  The contrast between the multi-colored leaves, the blue of the sky and the reddish hue of the waning sun is nothing short of spectacular.  The wind is blowing from the west and the remaining leaves on the trees are dancing in what remains of the sun light.  I am really a spring guy, but this fall day is just perfect in every way.

My day began at 5:20 this morning.  Without saying The Nancy woke me up with her snoring because I am not allowed to speak of her snoring to anyone but her; however I was awakened by strange noises in my bedroom that sounded a lot like The Nancy when she snores.  I tried to get back to sleep, but something in the room that sounded strangely like a buzzing chainsaw let me know my effort would go unrewarded, so I got up. 

By 5:40 I was outside in the morning blackness talking to our cat Lisa, and looking at the clearest night sky I have seen since last winter.  Thousands of stars and a half moon lit up the heavens and I was awestruck with its vast beauty.  I stood gazing at this heavenly picture for several minutes before saying out loud, “Screw this, I need coffee,” with no one but Lisa to hear me.  So much for beauty, caffeine took precedence.

The Nancy and I ended up doing a lot of nothing today.  We got some chores and some odd jobs completed before we settled down in our favorite chairs to watch some football, drink some beer and enjoy each other’s company (which means The Nancy is sitting across the room from me reading a book and I am typing BS on this laptop while Maryland and Virginia try to tear each other’s heads off.  Man, this is the life!

Oops!  My beer is empty and Virginia just stole the game from Maryland.  Well, so much for fall days, beautiful skies, radiant fall colors, chores and odd jobs, and, oh yes, bullshit stories.  It’s time for bed.

And that is all I have to say about that…

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Canadian Beer - An Assessment

10/20/2007

In just two words, my assessment is: It sucks!!  Now, having read my assessment, you have a choice of reading why, or just take my word for it and go bowling, or do something else equally exciting.

Sitting on a United Airline’s mini-jet headed in a southerly direction having spent seven out of the last ten nights in Toronto, it feels wonderful to be going homeward to the land of microbreweries and really good beer.  Beer, decent beer that is, ain’t easily had in Maple Leaf country.  I think if I had to grade Canadian beer on a scale of one to ten, I am not sure I could go above ½.  Allow me, if you can stand the parade, to list the said yucky brands and an evaluation of those I consumed.  My assessment solely based on my keen tastes, of course.  Note, that I am a hophead and not a beer connoisseur. 

The first beer I had was a Carlsberg.  The bar tender, who was flat out gorgeous, told me the Carlsberg was the hoppyest beer she had.  She was very misinformed, but she was good looking, so I bit.  Carlsberg is a pilsner, I believe, and probably not brewed in Canada.  It is very wimpy with just a hint of flavor, about like a Heineken.  I think Carlsberg translates in English to “nasty beer” and was too lousy to score.

The next really bad beer I had was a Keith’s India Pale Ale.  In the US this brewer could be sued for misleading the public and false advertising.  Keith’s is not a good beer and certainly not and IPA.  IPA’s are to be over hopped, hence the term India Pale Ale (India is a far piece from England and had to be extra hopped to preserve the beer from going bad).  This one is totally devoid of hoppy character – it does, however, rank right up there with all the beers brewed by Anheuser-Busch.  Score: 1/2.

Two beers, so far! Score ½ out of a possible 10.  I am not a math genius but I think that makes the score ¼.

Next I had a Rickard’s Red Ale.  I wish I hadn’t.  It is as bad as the previous two.  Rickard’s tasted like a Carlsberg and the Keith’s IPA.  As far as I could discern, the only difference is that someone slipped some red dye in the vat during the “non-brewing” process to mislead the public.  Yucky!  I did refuse to drink Molson or LaBatts, both are really no more than perfect examples of Canadian mass produced industrial swill and not suited at all for my hophead taste buds or human consumption.  Does this make me picky?

I tasted a few of others (maybe five or six), but none gave me the beer experience I was longing for.  Then I found one brewed by the Mill Street Brewing Company called Tankhouse Ale.  Tankhouse is not the best beer I have ever had, but it did have a nice bouquet, a pretty good mouth feel and a taste that is mostly pleasant.  Drinkable, for sure.  It redeemed my opinion of Canadian beer, a little.  My opinion went from really poor to just poor.  I think my overall assessment of Canadian beer is fair and right on the mark. 

I suppose I shouldn’t attempt to go back to Canada anytime soon.

After reading this some of you may now vote “yes” on my wife’s “Is David a beer snob?” survey.  What is your opinion?  Could I possibly be a beer snob?  Hell, no!

And that’s all I have to say about that…

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Back to Toronto...

10/14/2007

Have you ever had weeks where you felt you accomplished nothing at all?  This past one was exactly that for me.  I did little and accomplished less than that.  It all started with the demise of my cell phone when I was here in the Land of the Maple Leaf last weekend.  I think from that point I created (for I am totally responsible for what happens to me in my life) a downward spiral.  “Down, down, down into a burning ring of fire.”

Last Monday evening just as I was about to turn off the light in my hotel room and hit the sack, all hell broke loose.  Part of the ceiling in bathroom of my hotel room gave way, and a torrent of water came crashing down on the bathroom floor.  I thought for a moment Niagara Falls had relocated itself.  Water was everywhere with even more dripping through the light fixture over the sink.  This happened about 10:30 and by 11:00 I was in another room – a two-room suite.  The part of the ordeal wasn’t shabby.

Tuesday morning I awoke and prepared to go to the airport for a 10AM flight back to Washington-Dulles.  It was 5:30.  I wanted to catch the 6:30 shuttle just to allow plenty of time to check-in and get through Customs.  Since this is my first visit here in a very long time I wanted to make sure I didn’t miss my flight home.  Well, I did not.  In fact I had about two hours to spare, even though the shuttle ran late.  The flight was on time and I got back to DC at the exact time the flight itinerary indicated.  This is not the norm with flight travel these days. 

When I got to my car, I plugged my car charger into the cell phone, but it did not allow the cell phone to work.  I stopped at a Sprint store on the way home to get my cell phone checked out.  The dude I spoke to put a new battery in it and it seemed to work just fine.  It was short lived.  After a few phone calls on twenty-nine mile drive to the Farm, it ran out of juice.  I, again, tried to charge it in the car…no luck, it was dead.  So, Wednesday morning on my way to Snow Shoe, WV and another conference (mainly to pick up The Nancy and bring her home) I made a twenty-plus mile detour and bought a new cell phone for a whopping $37.00.  Fat and happy, but a little disappointed my old phone contact list couldn’t be transferred to the new phone, I continued on my way.  Another cell issue ensued.  My charger (plug in type, not car) was fried as well, and would not charge the cell phone.  Of course I discovered this when I got to Snow Shoe, some four hours from the Sprint store.  But, it didn’t much matter one way or the other inasmuch as I could not get service at Snow Shoe, so the phone was rendered useless, too!  I got little done at Snow Shoe except consume copious quantities of beer and hob-nob with some people who are no longer my customers.  Nonetheless, I was there and I got to represent my company in a fashion.

The Nancy and I were to board a plane at noon on Friday to Toronto for a weekend conference.  We will be here until Tuesday and I need my cell phone to work.  There was no way I could get back to the Sprint store Tuesday morning before our flight to pick up another charger, so I went Monday evening after we returned from Snow Shoe.  New charger in hand, at a cost of $5 more than the new cell phone cost me. I was set for my trip.

The fried cell phone replacement and charger cost me three trips to the Sprint store, $79.00 out of my pocket, and at least eight hours of my time and four days of consternation and nearly lacking in positive results.  I was ticked, but I know I created all of this for myself. 

Isn’t it funny how we bring this stuff on and immediately want to take it out on everyone around us?  I was somewhat out of sorts and tried to take everyone down with me.  It’s all behind me now, and truly a wonder The Nancy didn’t whack me over the head with my burned out charger.  I bet she wanted to do it more than once. 

And that is all I have to say about that…

Monday, October 08, 2007

Panic in Toronto

10/08/2007

I am breathing heavily; my heart is pounding at an unnatural rate.  I am sitting here in my Toronto hotel room having a huge panic attack, and this is new ground for me.  My damn cell phone is the cause of this uneasiness – it quit.  Kaput!

You know, for over fifty years I lived without celluar technology.  What hath God wrought?  I also made it without this damn laptop for longer than that.  I made it forty-three years without a fax machine, for crying out load.  These days I cannot live without these gadgets.  I am hopelessly under their control - mesmerized.  That’s pretty daggone sad, isn’t?  Talk about conspiracies!  We have all been programmed.  It must be Bush doing this.  I wasn’t dependent on any of these things before he became president.  Damn Republicans.  Hillary will fix this mess, right?

Maybe it’s Al Gore’s fault?  He invented the internet, you know!

All kidding aside, this really sucks.  I am truly panicking.  This is not fun, but the funny thing is I am due for a new cell phone, a Blackberry, because my company wants me to be more connected.  It’s an electronic umbilical cord.  Big Brother lives. 

And that is all I have to say about that…