Two Birthday Parties in one Night - 9/19/09

After getting my hair cut to an acceptable length again, I headed off to the birthday party of one of my sister's recently married, Mormon, ex-boyfriends. We went to a sports bar/restaurant. In the middle of the table sat we ex-Mormons, my sister and her friend Yasmin sipping their adorable little Bud Light Limes. I sat next to the Brit who had just cut my hair down at her salon, neither of us drinking in favor of stuffing our faces with fries, fried green beans, fried mushrooms, wings of various flavors, a muffalata, and about a dozen dipping sauces. Oh and then the birthday cake of course. I taught Yasmin how to make a good whistling sound with her straw, so that occupied us the hour or so we were there.

Then I picked up my 6 beers from ABC and headed off to party numero dos. I had actually had a beer on Thursday and Friday, and was feeling strangely hungoverish (well, the way I feel after drinking anyway), so I ended up not drinking much. Oh, the beers I had the previous two nights were draft beers, one at The Uptown Bar and one at Lazy Moon. I can't remember what the beer at Uptown was because I couldn't really read it. At Lazy moon I had a Beamish Irish Stout (Irish Dry Stout, 4.1% ABV) on tap. Oh how I love Irish stouts. So creamy...mmm... This was creamy, smooth, and malty, and it felt so good going down my throat.

Moving on to the party at which I drank beer. First up was Samuel Adam's Imperial Stout (Russian Imperial Stout, 9.2% ABV)Oh Sammy, you never fail to deliver that perfectly mediocre beer, do you? Sadly, I didn't have the most appropriate glass available to me, but I doubt the head would have improved much anyway. Really, for 9.2% ABV, I should consider this beer delicious. The first few sips tasted the best, but then the dark chocolate and coffee faded out in favor of the anise.

My second beer was a Black Dog Ale (American Amber/Red Ale, 5.2% ABV). The thing about this beer was that it had this coppery, metallic aftertaste as if I had been drinking it straight from the bottle. Other than that it was fine but not remarkable.








My final beer was a Warsteiner Premium Verum (German Pilsener, 4.8% ABV). I thought this one was delicious and gained an appreciation of the German Purity Law of 1516. It tasted like a biscuit in some ways. Mostly, my thought was that it smacks of Smacks.

Well by this point a straight girl had announced her crush on me, so my work was done, and it was time to head to bed.

Housewarming Party on 9/11/09

I went to ABC Fine Wine and Spirits to pick up some beer on the way to the party. I now have a frequent shopper's card, and I will definitely be using it. You get 10% off if you get 6 random beers, so of course I had to get 6. First up was Rogue's Mocha Porter (American Porter, 5.3% ABV). Pretty good sized head, but not as thick and creamy as I'd prefer. It was roasty, malty, and somewhat bitter. For something with "mocha" in the name I was hoping for a bit more coffee, whereas there was really only a hint here. Ah well, you can't win 'em all.

Next I had a Spaten Optimator (Doppelbock, 7.2 ABV).



The head here was pretty good, fairly thick. This was very drinkable for a 7.2%, probably due to the molasses and brown sugar one can relatively easily taste. This pushed me into nice and tipsy, prompting me to slow down on my drinking, further prompting someone to ask me if I needed latex gloves and a stethoscope. "What?" I asked. "You know, to help you nurse that thing." Well excuse me, miss rum and coke.

Haha, moving along... Samuel Smith's Organic Cider. Good stuff I'm sure, but I guess I'm just not a big cider fan. I'll stick to Sammy's ales and stouts. The next beer I hardly remember - I was at that point. Too bad I don't remember because I've been meaning to start exploring ginger beers. Left Hand Brewing Company's Juju Ginger beer (Herbed/Spiced beer, 4.0% ABV).

I went back to the fridge to decide which was next of the two remaining beers. There was only one. I walked around the party until I found the culprit, Capt. Douche: I was forgiving after letting him know he had stolen one of my beers. He wasn't exactly contrite, explaining that he had analyzed the contents of the fridge and determined this would be the beer to take. Let's take a moment: If there are a couple of unique beers alone in the back of the fridge as well as a couple of twelve packs of Yuengling, take the Yuengling, or YOU'RE a DOUCHE. He's pretty much a douche no matter what though as I've learned he spends an hour minimum every day to get his hair like that. Sexy, no?

Well after that I was offered someone else's random beer: Rocky Mountain IPA (American IPA; ABV?). I really have no memory of this beer, nor do I have any of the last of my purchased beers, Slim Chance Light Ale (American Blonde Ale, 3.9% ABV). I vaguely remember thinking it didn't taste bad.

Then we went to Steak and Shake to continue our conversation on eugenics since Pita Pit was closed.

My First Night out in Orlando: 9.5.09

I started the night at out with the two Guinness Draught Extra Colds (Irish Dry Stout; 4.2% ABV) my sister had in her fridge. While this beer is generic and relatively cheap, it's been awhile since I've had a stout (my favorite) so color me happy. Mmm, just look at the thick, creamy head, mmm... want more beer.

After those Cami and I headed out to go to dinner before heading out for a piano bar to meet some of her friends. The place to which we went first (because we were going to get Delta Sky Miles) looked shady, so Cami insisted we go somewhere else. I put up a bit of a fight (though I gave in) because, while the menu looked uninspired, I knew that leaving that place with no other definite plan would only lead to what it did indeed lead: getting lost for an hour and a half. We finally ended up at Cafe Tu Tu Tango as it was on the way to the piano bar.

Finally we got to the bar where I could drink again, my buzz having almost wholly disappeared. I had another Guinness first, though this time from the bottle, which was not nearly as good.

Then I realized they had Yuengling Traditional Lager (American Amber/Red Lager; 4.4% ABV) there, which is my ex girlfriend's favorite, so I had two of those. I asked about glasses, and they didn't have any. I should have taken the bartender up on his offer to at least give me a plastic glass though, and I will from now on. I already knew it to some extent, but this solidified my lesson that beer should always be drunk from a glass. It was too hard to taste anything other that metallic taste through that tiny hole.

From there, I got more concerned about enjoying my sister's friends' company, so I had a Corona Light with a lime and then two Bud Light limes, which I figured would be cheaper. Well actually, a girl bought me the last one. She and Cami's other friends wanted me to go to the gay club now that we were leaving the bar. I thought we were heading out for the club, but then Cami ended up telling me that it was too late and rather time to be getting home and into bed (11:10 when we left).

We did stop at this delightful place called Pom Pom's Teahouse & Sandwicheria. I ordered a Thanksgiving sandwich that included turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberries, and cream cheese (possible more) and was served with brown gravy. Dear god, mmm...

From Saturday, August 29, 2009

I was in Houston for a few days, so I had to try to find some debauchery with my good friends down there, Paige and Petty. So the three of us headed to a friend of Petty's to "pre drink". We stopped at an extremely ghetto convenience store to pick up some beer. There was, for instance, a random black and white polka dotted suit case in the corner, next to some random, off brand electronic gadgets and some porn mags. Was it for sale...? Anyway I got the variety 6 pack of Shiner again (last drinking in Texas for a long time!) because, for one thing, my girlfriend had had some of the ones I wanted to try. Also, there was a different kind of Shiner there - Shiner Spezial Leicht - I hadn't tried, so I exchanged it for the regular Shiner Bock in the 6 pack.

We got to the friend's house, greeted by a familiarly dismal scene: 2 guys playing Rock Band and a girl petting her two chihuahuas on the couch behind them, drinking a beer and alternating her sounds of encouragement between the two animal species in the room. I started to drink.

I started with the Shiner Black (Schwarzbier, 4.9% ABV) as I knew I like that one fairly well. Not bad, not bad.

Second up was a Shiner Kosmos Reserve (American Pale Lager, ?% ABV). It's not really my style of beer: mild, too carbonated, not much head, not very creamy or thick. It wasn't bad or anything, just kind of thick and unremarkable.

Next up was the Shiner Blonde (American Pale Lager, 4.4% ABV) that my girlfriend had yanked for her own consumption the weekend before. This whole Shiner variety pack became decidedly pointless about the time I got to this one. The head on this one was even more airy than the Kosmos. It tasted pretty much like any ol' lager. I almost would have been just as well drinking a can of Budweiser.

It was at this time that the girlfriend of the house opened her fridge too quickly and spilled my three remaining beers all over the floor. At least she knew she'd be cleaning it up. Well, perhaps that's the karma I get, considering that the only one of the three I really cared about and probably would have gotten around to drinking anyway was the one I semi-stole. Whatever, another time maybe.

So I had one of Paige's St. Pauli's Girl (German Pilsener, 4.9% ABV) beers. Well, as you can see, there was a lot of head, but that's about it. It was kind of crisp and bitter, kind of metallic. It just tasted like a cheap, generic Pilsner to me. I probably need to do a horizontal Pilsner tasting 'cause I just can't find them interesting and distinct from one another so far. Then again, we're talking about a 6 or 7 dollar 6 pack here.

After these and a tiff between the girlfriend and the boyfriend about whether or not they were going out, we went out (without the boyfriend) to a local bar. I had actually never been to a bar in Houston or the surrounding areas, so I was down for whatever. The bar was hoppin', if you will, but not too packed. It was being patronized mostly by hicks and trashy people (we were in Rosenberg, Texas after all), but they had Ziegenbach, and one of my goals had been to have some before leaving Texas for Florida, so I was happy. I got a glass, and then everyone wanted some, so we got a pitcher. I didn't realize I wouldn't be able to find a picture of the stuff on the internet, or else I would've tried harder to get a better picture of the stuff.

Well at least you can see a bit of lacing. Anyway, maybe it was just that I was tipsy-bordering-on-drunk, but this was the most drinkable beer I've ever had. Not only smooth but tasty. It was very enjoyable. It's not the most sophisticated beer by any means, but the perfect beer for mass consumption to get drunk. I will miss you, Zieg!

After this we went to Denny's for some horrible, tasty food of which I ate every bite.

A Birthday Party

This past Saturday my girlfriend and I went to a friend's 23rd birthday party (one week before mine!). We brought a six pack of assorted Shiner beers, one Coors Light, and one Honey Brown.

I started out the evening with Shiner's Hefeweizen (Hefeweizen, 5.6% ABV). I found this to be a good but unremarkable hefeweizen. I had been wary of a hefeweizen from Shiner, though, and it wasn't bad at all, so props for that. There was less of the banana/clove thing going on with this one - I guess they chose to stick mostly with the wheaty and citrusy aspects.

From there I went on to the Shiner Light (Light Lager, 4% ABV), each bottle of which they cutely have a citizen of Shiner, TX sign in approval of its taste despite its being a light beer. Well, I 'd say they were right, it's not bad...for a light beer. It was smooth and seemed to stick to a purer beer recipe (I'd guess they're not big on adjuncts to sweeten their light beers).

After that, I had the Shiner Black Lager (Schwarzbier, 4.9% ABV). I really appreciated this guy. I like my beers a little toasty, chocolatey and coffeey (:D) so this was right up my alley. Plus, I had just found a really cute glass our of which to sip it.

I would have had the Shiner Blonde, but my girlfriend has swiped that one in the meantime. I did have a stroke of luck, however, 'cause this one guy at the party had brought a 12 pack of assorted Dundee beers (the brand of that Honey Lager I'd brought), so I casually asked him if he liked the Honey Brown. As it turns out, it's one of his favorite beers, which made me judge him of course but which also made me happy as he traded me for one of his other favorite beers (then again, maybe this is just one of those guys who calls everything a favorite...) called a Weihenstephaner (Munich Helles Lager, 5.1% ABV). Unfortunately, I was getting on towards plain drunk at this point, so I don't remember much about this except that I distinctly recall thinking, "This beer doesn't taste exceptional or anything, maybe it's just my limited taste, or my drunkeness, but why the hell would this be someone's favorite beer?" I think that it's probably a really good quality beer and whatnot, but it's just that the original version of something will probably never be my favorite.

At this point I was drunk and indiscriminately grabbed other people's beers. I have a cap from one that says EFES. I googled it and didn't really figure out what the hell it was in the three minutes I allotted for that research. There's also a cap I kept that has a really cute couple of blue and yellow Egyptian looking pictograms. Maybe someone can tell me what these last 2 were:

Just a Night at a Bar 8/8/09

I just wanted some beer, so I called up a few friends, and we decided to go to Fox and Hound. Of course, I had a beer beforehand - I just drank the last of the Pyramid Audacious Apricot Ales (blech). Unfortunately, a bunch of men were beating each other up that night (UFC?), which meant there was a $5 cover to get into Fox and Hound, which I find ridiculous. Fortunately, no one else wanted to waste the cost of a beer either, so we were all in agreement to go to some other bar down the street.

We wound up ate a cute mid-sized bar called Sterling's that was featuring karaoke that night. The place wasn't packed, but it also wasn't desolate, which I find to be the Goldilocks amount. My gang pretty much just played darts all night, my only interactions with strangers (other than the bartender) happening in the restroom when some friendly drunk girls warned me, an obvious new comer to their close knit establishment?, of the flaws of the paper towel dispenser and air dryer.

Anyway, I had some new beers (new to me, that is, of course). First up was a Drop Top Amber Ale (American Amber/Red Ale, 5% ABV). I really enjoyed this beer. It had a flavor neither I nor any of my compadres could quite place (not to my satisfaction anyway. One of my friends thought the flavor was apple juice, but that wasn't what was triggered in my synapses). I'll have to have another one after I read someone's review as it might have been one of the flavors he mentioned: caramel oranges, artificial butter that you would get on popcorn at the movies, or pears.


The next beer of the night was a Widmer Hefeweizen (American Pale Wheat Ale, 4.7% ABV). Apparently I was to have a Widmer filled night as I have discovered while researching (if a search on Beer Advocate can be properly termed such) for this blog that Drop Top is a Widmer beer. I didn't think it particularly remarkable. There was the usual citrus, floral, and banana assortment of falvors going on. None of the hefeweizens I've had since has lived up to the Paulaner Hefe Weizen I enjoyed so.

After that, the apple juice friend (his name is Eric, I'm not really trying to be secretive) bought us a round, getting another Drop Top for me.

Cheers!

This Post is from the Weekend of August 1st

This was moving weekend for me, so I didn't exactly "go out", but I promise there will be beer in this post. We got the key to the new apartment Friday evening and spent the next day and a half breaking our backs moving furniture, packing, loading, cleaning, and stopping to randomly use things up we'd never gotten around to using in the past 1-3 years (for instance, I rubbed on a sunless tanning sample I'd gotten for free over the internet several months ago). On Friday night, our friend Katie brought her truck and took a load of our stuff to the new apartment. Right afterward, these two Mormons packed a load into their SUV and brought it to our new apartment.

Now, the two Mormons are a married couple, though one of them is clearly a lesbian (as in, dyke hair cut, has a soundproofed room in her house full of percussion equipment, is on a lot of medication for depression - due to being married to a man and a member of a religion that teaches homosexuality is wrong? who knows - etc.). So on Saturday night, after Kristen and I worked on the arduous task of moving for about 12 hours, we needed another run with a truck to finish the process. We ran out of all other options besides taking the Mormons up on the very gracious offer they'd made the night before to borrow their friend's truck and help us again.

We were loading up as much as possible so that Kristen and I would, at most, only have to do one more run on Sunday with just her car. I was carrying out one of those three-high stacks of Wal-Mart Bins (well, that's what I call them. You know those bins college students tend to buy.) I had just spent a couple of hours taking everything out of these bins, thoroughly cleaning them, sorting what had been in there, throwing away or recycling what we didn't need, and organizing them. As we packed up the apartment, all the important things that didn't really have any other place to go (like a piggy bank full of coins, a plastic bag full of coins, book covers, a few books, several wires, etc.). I didn't really pay attention to what I was putting where since I knew I'd be unpacking all of these things pretty much right away. I ran out of duct tape right before taking this out to the car (with the other bin stacks - full of socks and underwear - we'd duct taped them shut, just in case). So I was carrying the stack out to Kristen's car, where they'd be safe, but, as with everything else I'd tried to put in Kristen's car, the Mormon man insisted I should put the stack in the truck bed. I explained the nature of the bins and their contents, but he was sure it would be fine. I said, "Okay, well let me at least go get a few towels to put around them." I did that, and then he stacked some cheap patio furniture on top of them as well.

On the way, in Kristen's car, Kristen almost T-boned a cop who forgot to change our light to red. Neither of us heard or saw him until it was almost too late. That was scary. Then I started talking about how the Mormons could tell a story in testimony meeting, which I realized would be the very next day (first Sunday of the month), that they had helped these two lesbians in need (one of whom is an ex-Mormon) move that weekend. They'd probably go on to say that, while neither of us is likely to call the missionaries to set a baptism date this weekend, they perhaps planted a seed that might one day grow.

When we got to the new apartment and started unloading everything, we realized that the top bin and some of the contents of the middle bin, were clean gone. The Mormons promised they wouldn't stop until they found our stuff, or what was left of it anyway. I said I'd prefer to go with them. Kristen was too depressed to go, and pulled me aside to let me know that there were a few sensitive items in there that made this tragedy particularly shitty.

The Mormons and I drove the truck back to their friend's house to drop off the truck and get their own vehicles. At this point I realized their testimony meeting might go a little differently, and I couldn't decide whether I wanted to ask them to say a prayer with me. I quit praying years ago, for mental health reasons as well as non-belief. I thought A-it's always possible God is real, is testing me, and wants me to pray, B-believing that prayer will help can help in a number of ways (especially if it turns out that existence is all in my "mind"), and C-they'd have a way better story in testimony meeting if I asked them to pray. So, on sort of a whim, I went ahead and asked, and we said a prayer at their house.

Mr. Mormon and I drove his car up and down the 30 mile drive, retracing his and his gay wife's steps, while the lesbian did the same in her motorcycle (oh yeah, she also drives a motorcycle). Kristen texted me to let me know they must have lost the lawn furniture as well as it wasn't at the apartment with the other stuff we'd unloaded and that she was just going to start drinking beer (see, beer, a Bud Lite I think). Well the Mormons had apparently decided it would be best to take the tollway instead of sticking to the slower roads. This turned out to be the problem as, after two hours of Mr. Mormon and I driving together with our eyes peeled and singing songs from Camelot and My Fair Lady together, the lesbian finally spotted some of my stuff right at the entrance they'd taken onto the tollway. Apparently accelerating to 70 mph causes sufficient lift to pluck patio furniture and a bin with probably 40 lbs of contents (remember all those coins) up and out of a truck bed despite being tied down.

We spent the next hour or two walking along part of the George Bush Tollway, picking up bits and pieces of books, movies, wires, a pill bottle, etc. A few things were salvaged, one of which, thankfully, was a library book. All told, I think this probably has cost Kristen and me around 150 bucks. It turns out that we lost all of our phone chargers ($50), the iPod shuffle connector ($30 at Wal-MArt, waiting for the $1.50 one from Ebay to arrive...), the wire that connects the printer to the CPU ($16.82 after tax), all that change, the sensiitve materials ($45), two remotes we really needed to replace anyway, all kinds of crap that doesn't matter too much, a dvd, a piggy bank with a good deal of sentimental value as well as change, and a lot of change on top of that, and hopefully nothing else we still haven't realized is missing. I've found a broken wire from Logitech and some broken piece of plastic with a Logitech logo, but I can't for the life of me figure out what the hell it might be. "God" bless those Mormons. They were so kind and generous to help us with that. Sadly though, we would have saved money had we hired movers to do the whole damn thing for us in one trip. Then again, we wouldn't have had this interesting life experience.

Speaking of which, when we got back to the apartment finally, delirious from the late night, never-wracking adventure, we compared the various things each of us had salvaged. Lesbian said, "Well, I think I had the best find." At this point, I figured she'd found the bag of change with the sensitive materials of which, strangely, no one seemed to have seen a trace. She continued, "I saw a brown bag in the middle of the road, and it looked heavy, so I just knew I had found that bag of change you guys mentioned (we didn't tell her about the other contents). I figured I had the find of the night. It was two lanes down, so I waited for traffic to clear, ran out and picked it up, and it was a bag of poop. Just crap. Diarrhea maybe. It...got on my glove."

I laughed my ass off, so the night wasn't a total loss.