fun.
tomorrow i get to see animal collective play at merriweather post pavilion. now, if you are not from the mid-atlantic area you may be saying, "what? merriweather post pavilion is the name of their landmark 2009 album!" and of course you would be correct. it is also the name of the large amphitheater just outside of baltimore that the band named the album after.
it's probably been 7ish years since i last saw the ac at a tiny b'more club called the ottobar (the 2nd version - i was never able to make it to the original ottobar club) so this will be a huge step up in venues - for better and worse as ottobar was one of my favorite clubs to attend. i am particularly eager to see what kind of visual/light extravaganza will be in tow, especially after seeing footage from their coachella gig a couple months back.
oh yeah, we have pit tickets.
mind candy.
flux.
i think i've figured out arsenals plan this summer: fabregas is leaving. now some may say duh but they usually then try to find outside replacements for him under 35mil. the problem is you can't.
all of the rumors so far regarding arsenals transfer activity so far deal with wingers, not attacking midfielders. we're looking at 2-3 wingers. really? assuming fabregas leaves what does our current lineup look like? walcott can play rw/rs and even lw in a pinch. vela appears to be given another chance up front and at lw. arshavin can play either wing plus am and in the whole, same with nasri. nasri has plainly said he prefers, and excels, when in the center am role.
let's assume nasri is cescs replacement.
we know we can't count on walcott to be healthy year round, neither rvp. that leaves as thin up top and at wings. gervinho is a rw/rs. alvarez is a *w/am who can play anywhere in an attacking formation. add in the likes of chamakh and we suddenly seem to have quality depth in every forward position. song still needs backup/competition but i think wilshire, ramsey and diaby fill up the rest of holes plus the likes of landsbury, frimpong, etc and there is your carling cup squad.
that just leaves defense and i ain't touching that one with a 50' pole...
Labels: arsenal
perfunctory.
have you ever been late? no, not that late. oh, you mean pregnant? lol. no, no, no... have you ever delayed doing/going/performing/*ing something because you just couldn't be arsed earlier? and then when you do finally get around to *ing it you curse and gnash teeth and pull hair and moan and...
yeah, didn't think so.
with me it's often music. is it stupid, cliche shtick? is it popular? is it a difference of palate? likes and dislikes do change over time. why didn't you/me/i/we like this widget earlier? why now? this has happened over expanses of time from mere hours to years. that's a big swing but it goes both ways.
sometimes i'm one of the few way ahead of the curve...
ahead... behind... on time?
does it all average out in the end?
are we all just, average?
Labels: median
brew-your-own.
i hate sticking to standard recipes. why do something that every tom/dick/harry has done as well when you can make a few simple modifications and get something completely different? my spiced brown ale from a few months back was me going through several brown ale recipes, picking out some of the things that tend to stand out over them all then adding a few tweaks and extra ingredients to the party.
this last time i brewed up a double ipa based on the surly furious. i even bought the recipe kit - i swore i woudn't buy a recipe kit after that first disastrous failure back in sept 2010 - though this time i had a bit more faith in the ingredients as it was a new addition to their catalog and the brewery itself devised it. of course, being me, i had to tweak some things. recipe called for 2.5gal boil and i changed it to 3.5gal; this increased the hop utilization giving me a bit higher ibu. i also decided to add 1lb of local honey at about 10minutes from end of boil to up the abv a tad, dry it out a bit and hopefully give it a touch more sweetness to balance out the higher ibus. of course, all of my rationals behind my tweaks were strictly theoretical and pulled out of my ass, though i did perform some perfunctory reading to lead me to those ideas... none of it was from experience, yet it gained me exactly what i had lacked; experience.
brew day went well enough, even if a touch time compressed due to a event we had to leave for, and i left wort cooling on my counter for 6-7+ hours till we arrived back home that night to transfer to primary. i have to admit i had that slight nagging feeling i was setting myself up for diacetyl issues by not cooling it quickly but only time would tell in the long run. a couple of weeks later and i'm getting a little antsy about racking to secondary to dry-hop. gravity seemed to have stalled for over a week at 1.030 which is kind of high... had my hydrometer broken? after a few more days (3 weeks in primary) the gravity had fallen 1.020 and i knew it was readyish to transfer as calculations said it would finish at about 1.017. moved it to my glass carboy and added the almost 9ounces of hops. god damn the smell of hops is insatiable! could i wait the 7-10 days needed till bottling?
racking to the bottling bucket i quickly learned a few things: 1)do not dry-hop again by simply throwing quantities of pellets willynilly in the fermenter, 2)use a fine strainer bag instead of a mesh bag for filtration, 3)hops suck up and absorb a ridiculous amount of liquid and 4)the siphon and bottling wand will get clogged with hop debris. i ended up with maybe 3.5gals of beer with more than a few bottles with more than wanted floating debris: 27 12oz bottles and 2x 32oz growlers.
i am confident my next attempt at dry-hopping will result in a much larger final yield... thanks experience!
i have now tried it twice and will be taking a growler to the homebrew meeting tomorrow. the spiced brown went over well with 1 of the club leaders even trying to convince me to enter it into a competition in a few months (i cant due to submission requirements at the competition).
hopefully i can save at least a 12 for the phish shows early june...
Labels: homebrewing
.
unless you are completely unplugged you heard about the new radiohead release, the king of limbs. i saw the notice, added it to my what cue for the ratio boost, watched the lotus flower video and fb/tweeted about thoms wiggle/dance before i left for work.
who didn't?
did you listen to it during the day or did you wait/try for a proper listening environment after work? try a must, tempting links/streams were everywhere. i was the recipient of timing this weekend - an empty house - and wanted to take full advantage. i even completely avoided all talk of it and saved it all for tonight. get home, change clothes, walk/feed shadow, crack open a nice bottle and settle down in my favorite listening chair. ahhhh....
i've had a few listens and my general thoughts from the first time through appear validated so far. little by little is the only track that will not be going into my "must play" playlist, but i still like that track. ed had said this was going to be departure and you wonder how much less guitar con they do but this harkens back to elements of the kid a/amnesiac era recordings and then goes beyond. it evolvs to a point during the give up the ghost/separator ending that just completely bubbles over and explooges in your lap.
a friend of mine described it:
One thing that strikes me as very unique about how Radiohead mixes their recent albums is how heavy/thick they sound. Basically saying "we don't care if your speakers can't handle all that low end and low mid-range. ours can.". They mix it how they think it should sound and doing a fantastic job at doing so.
generally the producer/mastering goes the route of lcd (lowest common denominator) as you want it to sound acceptable on as many types of devices as possible. i'm glad i waited and didn't listen to this at work as tracks such as feral and give up the ghost would have been rattling around cheap plastic! anyone remember some of those cure cd/album covers in late 80s/90s "this is mixed to be played loud" things?
that. crank it.
i wish my first listen had been over headphones...
Labels: radiohead
ber.
last sunday i brewed a batch of spiced brown ale. it will either become the liquid form of a gingersnap crossed with a snickerdoodle or it will be absolute garbage. who knows which... yet. i need to take another hydrometer reading to see if my fermentation is complete, though honestly, i don't think it is as it is still bubbling slightly.
maintaining a constant fermentation temperature is harder than you may think.
Labels: homebrewing
immagonna...
stop me if you've heard this before.
for each of the last 2 years i have successfully held onto and met my new years resolutions: 2009-quit smoking, 2010-loose weight. i have no idea what, if any, resolutions were made previously. it seems as if my weight loss plan has hit a snag, or more truthfully, plateaued. i have long known that actual exercise/movement is a key and it appears as if my body has realized this as well.
i'm not talking about hitting a gym as i'm too lazy and a tightwad for that nonsense. i have a feeling that something as simple as walking the dog more often and actually breaking out the set of disc-golf discs i've owned but not used for a couple years will help.
Labels: resolutions
sol-stache.
that is not a misspelling. it's a combination of solstice and mustache. wtf do those things have to do with each other you ask? well, it's a pints-for-prostates fundraiser/party that is occurring on the winter solstice. ok, so where does the mustache come in you say. the icon for the event is nothing less than the great 'stache of a certain tom selleck! ahhhhhh....
tonight is the sol-stache party because, surprise, it's also the winter solstice. everyone in attendance will be wearing some form of upper lip hair, even the ladies - hopefully theirs are fake!
Labels: liphair
geekdom.
i should probably clarify that as beer geekdom... richmonds beer week ended on friday and i certainly donated large parts of my wallet and liver to the cause. a quick rundown of the events/brews i partook in:
legend brewery: lunch, tastings (brown, ipa cask, pale ale, porter), brewery tour, lots more brown...
cap alehouse (d'town): dfh india brown, st bernardus abt 12, art show benefiting ms society, ten-fidy, dinner, flying dog ba porter and single-simcoe casks
wine & beer westpark: ommegange beer theatre sampling hennepin, dubble, adoration, three philosophers and cup-o-kindess.
mekong: stillwater artisanal virginia launch party with tastings of saison darkly and existence black ipa in a dry-hopped cask. lots and lots of the existence...
williamsburg alewerks: brewery tour and stocked up on cafe royale for the cellar.
somewhere in there there was a stop at our fav bottle shop for a mix/match case of various bombers/750s and other assorted brews.
no, i am not an alcolholic. yet...
homebrewing.
i dabbled in it a few months ago with disastrous results. of course, i couldn't accurately know if the batch was ready to ferment as my girlfriend broke my hydrometer and i could barely get my stockpot up to a boil on my piece-of-shit cook-top and i was using a god knows how old ingredients kit. nah, it couldn't have been any of those things...
well, i'm about to begin again. i still need to replace that hydrometer and i need to purchase a few odds/ends but for the most part i am good to go. picked up a turkey fryer with a large 34 quart, 8.5 gallons to you and me, kettle with a built in spigot/valve this past weekend; that will solve my lack of heat from my cook-top issue and give me a much needed piece of equipment for when i, eventually, switch to all grain.
going through several recipes now as i will need to know that to determine what ingredients i will need. i'm thinking a nice brown ale... something session-able.
Labels: ber, homebrewing
time.
so yeah, about that post at least once a week thing... lol
i knew i couldn't keep up the schedule. maybe i need fully charged batteries? (joke, joke). it's amazing how often i just completely forget i even have this page. i almost wish it was more of a i refuse to post thing...
can i make time? i'm told no.
Labels: fail
memories.
well, that didn't last long (posting at least weekly...)
might as well recap the past couple of weeks: went to the local pub for the usa v england match - we drew - and got sick. the sickness started easing up a few days later for phish @ portsmouth. good show but no jams. :( group trip to mekong where we continually get served way too much food and some of the best beer in the world for ridiculously cheap prices, if we are charged at all. it was emilys birthday and ka brought out a bottle of a japanese ale, hitochino nest white owl... very good! i myself had a bottle of nostrodomus then split a bottle of chimay grande reserve with chad. a few days later jen and i attended a tasting at mekong of flying dogs gonzo imperial porter and the same brew aged for 3 months in a stranahan colorado whiskey oak barrel. while i appreciate porters, some of these bourbon barrel aged ones just arent my thing; tooooo boozy! jen loved them though! i had to grab some of the unibroue trois pistoles on tap just because. yummmmmm. a few days later i hit the local craft beer store, once upon a vine, to stock up on some brews for the upcoming phish @ merriweather weekend only to stumble into another tasting! i can't remember all 5 of the brews being tasted but the weyerbacher fourteen definitely stood out! grabbed a 4-pack and some other randoms - of course my 750 of gulden draak. top off the week with phish @ merriweather - great shows - and i'm up to date.
chad and i leave for more phish on thursday then jen and i head up to rhode island for a wedding this weekend. hopefully can score some russian river on the drive to the wedding and back...have to go by philly!
belgian.
i've come to the realization over the past year or so that i am a beer snob/aficionado and have recently started collecting various bottles for my reserve. while not at the cost of a good wine/scotch, certain bottles can be relatively expensive due to the low amount produced or the lack of availability.
luckily i am able to have and enjoy a couple of brews that are top 20 material in the trappistes rochefort 10 (quadruple) and the st bernardus abt 12 (quadruple) along with my personal favorite - though not in anyones top 50 for whatever reason - van steenbreges gulden draak (dark triple).
Labels: quadruple
sum sum summertime.
dc united is nearing the mid-season break with a run of 3 straight wins - hopefully 4 straight after saturday, phish tours starts in a week and the world cup kicks off in a week. what could be better?!
first things first, dc united. after a horrible start to the season that saw us not loose only 1 game in the first 8 of the league we have now won another. this win came between a win against ac milan in a friendly and a win against rsl in the us open cup. we face rsl again in the league this saturday... vamos united! with the mid-season break starting next weekend a succession of wins building up to it gives us confidence and a good head, mentally.
staying with the footie theme is the world cup. while i think the us can make it out of the group stage, i dont think we can get any farther. if we take second in the group we will likely face germany. i could care less if we beat england, though a win is always preferable to a draw/loss. a draw would be a healthy result for us regardless. the netherlands is my not-so-dark-horse to win the cup with rvp (robin van persie to the rest of you fools) the golden boot winner.
which brings us to phish tour. now, i am an atypical phish fan and i have probably made a mention to this in the past. in case i haven't... i look for things that seemingly most phish heads dont look for. it seems like everyone wants the big bust out, that ultra-rare song. me? i couldn't give a rats ass for the bustout. i am there for the playing, ie, da jammz! i dont ant to see a harpua or forbins> mockingbird as i'm paying $$ to see/hear trey rip the guitar, not blab his mouth. apparently most phish heads think i'm weird. screw em - let them waste their time chasing useless stories.
i'll see 5 shows this tour - er, tours. (the tour has been split into 2- june and august). the smallest show of the tours is right here in virginia! unfortunately, that doesnt always mean something great is in store as it could actually be a snoozer! i'll go in with the mindset that it will be snoozer so if it ends up being a barn burner i'll be very happy! merriweather can NOT be as bad as last summer, it just can't! raleigh could be interesting. i'm more confident that jones beach will be the better shows i see this tour if only because it is the tour closer and in the north-east, their home base. granted, i have seen some clunkers up north...
Labels: summertime
deservement.
my computers dictionary tells me that isn't a word but i couldn't find any other word that accurately describes my thoughts. if you're a soccer fan in the us then you will understand, or at least know of what i am referring to, the speculation regarding the us mens national world cup team that will be announced in about an hour. yes, i am posting this in advance of the team selection announcement. deal.
i have never been a fan of "gooch", ie, onguchi onyewu. he is too hit/miss and that is not a good thing for the heart of defense. don't get me wrong, when he is on his game, he is great. last night was his first game since october 2009 when he ruptured his left patella tendon. the rust obviously showed and frankly if you weren't expecting that you have serious blinders on. what concerned me though is that he was favoring that leg and had a very noticeable hobble/limp going on. he couldn't jump. at all. so much so that he let a under 6-footer out jump him to score a goal and he's 6'4"!
bradley announces his team today and i fear he may pick gooch in the hopes that he will be fit in 2 weeks even though he is probably only at 60-70% fit at the moment, and that value may be flattering to him. do we risk wasting a spot on someone who may not be able to play or do we suck it up and pick a fit defender, even if they aren't as good as fully fit gooch, and not worry about it?
don't overthink this bradley. that was very big bag-o-ice placed onto goochs knee last night after you subbed him off...
Labels: usmnt
fin.
l o s t ended it's 6 year run last night. i was a little iffy when watching it live but after sleeping on it and rethinking i am fine with the finale. apparently there are many who aren't and i wonder if some them even watched the show after reading some of their questions regarding it...
Labels: lost
doggies.
i want to take a quick momento to think of my shadow. he's half great dane and half black lab. he's bigger than your average dog at 85 lbs but he's not even close to the size of a full blooded great dane. he's the most gentle and loving dog i have ever known though he can be a bit of a spaz, but then again, how many dogs aren't?
shadow is not an outdoors dog. he couldn't be arsed to go outside other than to go to the bathroom when needed...unless it's raining outside in which case he would rather hold it. the longest i have seen him hold it is about 13 hours but that was my fault. poor guy.
in the five years i have owned him he has still not let me cut his nails...
Labels: shadow
catchup.
a week from hell is slowly lightening... time to get back into the daily routine missed the past few days. it's nice to decrease the growing piles on the desk to something a bit more manageable though only a fool wouldn't recognize that the piles will increase of their own volition in the future.
are you a "ketchup" or "catsup" person? catsup makes me think of cats and their plans for world domination. guess that's why i'm a dog guy...
Labels: ketchup
sourpuss.
i'm kind of curious as to the origins of the word but i can't be arsed to check its etymology. sour and puss...it can't be good!
my girlfriend was a sourpuss saturday due to drinking way tooooo much. actually, it's not that she drank but rather that she didn't say no to any of the drinks passed her way. i'm not talking about the random beer or even shots but the mystery tequila jello shooters or the even more mysterious daiquiri or the frighteningly more mysterious "pool water". add those to a few beers and double shots of soco and you have the recipe for disaster. she had to skip the game and lie down in the car with her head out the window puking her guts out. ha.
i became a sourpuss of a different nature on saturday as well but only because we lost again. by lost again i mean we didnt score...again. that and the hangover on sunday due to saturday nights festivities.
i'm even more a sourpuss at the moment due to when i walked into my office this morning my ac unit had frozen over and was dripping onto the rug. my office is warm enough as is due to it being the server room but now i have to have the heat running to finish thawing the ice on the ac so it is even more warm...
even my boss asked why so sour this morning.
Labels: sourpuss
management.
why does everyone want to schedule time and resource intensive projects to occur at the same time? i'm not vishnu!
don't get me wrong, i have no complaints about being kept busy. hell, i'd rather be busy than bored and falling asleep at my desk but at some point a line has to be drawn when other projects, like my normal daily operations, start to suffer.
Labels: vishnu