Tag: Beer

The Last Day at Papago

2017-12-04, 7:05 am
Categories: Stream of Consciousness

Papago Brewing used to be my regular watering hole. It closed on Saturday.

Papago Plaza -- the entire complex where the tap room was located -- is being demolished to put up condos. They've expressed hope for finding a new home, but no news yet.

My good friend Brad -- himself a brewery owner these days -- came in from Riverside to pay his respects, and so we got a Lyft van-full of the old gang together and headed up there for the last day.

There are pictures. I don't have them yet. Hopefully I'll get them later and be able to post them.

It was bittersweet. The fridge was mostly empty; most of the items on the menu, food or drink, were sold out. The life-size monk statue had already gone, as had one of the two dartboards.

The writing was literally on the wall; people had been saying their goodbyes in silver Sharpie for months (if one message, dated March, is anything to go on).

We had a few rounds, and then we walked a block south to McFate -- that's my regular watering hole these days. My friends hadn't been there yet, but they were interested in checking it out. There was a nice bit of symmetry: saying goodbye to the old spot, and hello to the new one.

The details of the day are a little hazy. I remember we told old stories, and I laughed some belly laughs.

I'm pretty sure I only drank five beers, and I paced myself, with a glass of water after each. But I do have a tendency to make a beeline for the highest-alcohol beer on the menu when I don't have to drive. (I can recommend the beers I drank at McFate, but can't remember their names. There was an IPA called Hazy something, and a Scotch-aged something or other.)

I'll miss Papago. I hope it reopens someplace. At any rate, it was good to get the band back together for a day, and talk about the good old days.

On Advertisements

2015-06-03, 4:41 pm
Categories: Comics, E-Mail, Stream of Consciousness

Dear DC,

Here is a list of DC Comics I would have purchased today if they had not contained obnoxious half-page Twix ads:

  • Batman Beyond #1
  • Bat-Mite #1
  • Bizarro #1

Here is a list of DC comics I purchased today:

DC, I do not have a fancy marketing degree. However, I can offer you a marketing suggestion for free: if one team of marketers suggests making money by releasing new comics that appeal to a different audience from the core DC line (albeit, granted, still pretty much just made up of spinoffs of Batman and Superman comics), and another team of marketers suggests making money through finding a really irritating and distracting way of putting advertisements in your comics, perhaps you might consider rolling out those two ideas separately instead of simultaneously. This is what is known as "isolating the variables".

I would also suggest that, if I were one of the writers, artists, editors, or marketers who had gone to considerable effort to create and market a new and different comic book to a nontraditional audience, I would be pretty unhappy right now with the people in management who had made a decision that actively sabotaged the appeal of that comic book.

I do not wish to be negative or ungrateful here. I greatly appreciate your decision to convince me to keep the nine dollars I would have spent on those three comic books. I went nextdoor and spent that money on beer instead. I had a Four Peaks Kiltlifter and a New Belgium Slow Ride. They were very good beers, and at no point in my drinking experience did they interrupt me and try to convince me to buy Twix.

Kisses,

Thad

A Great Day

2013-07-15, 9:11 pm
Categories: Announcements

Today it rained.

That in and of itself qualifies as a pretty good day.

And then my mother-in-law said we should go out to my favorite brewery.

Man, I feel bad for guys who don't like their mothers-in-law. My mother-in-law is cool. She likes beer.

Friends

2013-03-09, 1:22 am
Categories: Announcements

To my friends, and to my family:

I may not remember the details of this evening. Because, to be perfectly honest, you convinced me to drink rather a lot of beer.

But I will never forget that you were here.

Thank you. And I'll see you at the wedding.

Dranken

2013-03-08, 6:04 pm
Categories: Announcements, Music

By the time this posts I should be well into an evening of drunken revels. My good friends Brad and Felipe are furnishing homebrew for this, the party before my wedding. (Not really a bachelor party per se, as we've got ladies and children coming along as well.)

Maybe I'll have pictures to share later. In the meantime, here's my favorite drinking song:

Molé Stout

2013-02-14, 4:06 pm
Categories: Movies, Stream of Consciousness

There's not really anything I could say about Valentine's Day that wouldn't be either a cliché banality or a banal cliché. So instead I'm going to talk about this Ska Brewing Molé Stout I bought at Top's yesterday.

It's good! It's dark, it's chocolatey, it's got a hint of peppers. And it's four bucks a six-pack at Top's! I will probably buy more.

Guess that's it. Off to dinner and Die Hard 5: Son of Die Hard.

A Funeral and a Birthday

2013-01-04, 9:51 pm
Categories: Stream of Consciousness

Went to my first military funeral today. It's a relief that it was for someone who died of natural causes. Godspeed, Uncle Garth.

It was also my grandpa's birthday, so we went out to the Yardhouse. He can't drink anymore because of the meds he's on, so he ordered me an extra beer and insisted I enjoy it. I had two Breckenridge Vanilla Porters and a Stone Sublimely Self-Righteous Ale.

Nothing else to add, I guess. Enjoy life, youth, health while you got 'em.

More Random Thoughts

2012-11-28, 10:30 pm
Categories: Comics, Stream of Consciousness, TV, Work

Got an E-Mail about a Win7 update needs doin'. Only a four-day job but it'd still be nice to get.

Dizzy again today. It had been awhile. Don't know what caused it; did not like it.

Those Threadless shirts came in, and so far they seem like quality merchandise! I am happy with them. The Groupon deal still appears to be going on; it's worth checking out. (Though I now find that both shirts have been marked down to about the price I paid with the coupon since I ordered -- oh well, it happens.)

Ate dinner at Cornish Pasty. Good food, good beer.

Arrow has turned out to be a surprisingly good show, but man the dialogue on tonight's was overwrought. Geoff Johns? Oh.

Samuel Adams Boston Lager

2012-11-15, 9:08 pm
Categories: Comics, Stream of Consciousness

So far this week I have closed a house, looked for work, shopped for cars, and picked the spot where I'm getting married.

Now that I am home, about the only damn major decision I intend to make is what beer to get out of the refrigerator.

And some shirts from Threadless I guess, since I need new T-shirts and Groupon's got a deal.

I'm thinking 8-Bit Blues and Halfling and Wizard. (I'm sorely tempted by the Mike Allred Monkey Around shirt -- and it's only $10! -- but it looks like it would be goddamn hot in the summer.)

Rellenos and Republicans

2012-09-27, 8:55 pm
Categories: Games, Politics, Status Updates, Stream of Consciousness

Still can't quite get this beer batter thing right. 4:1 ratio of beer to flour is just runny liquid; 2:1 is pancake mix again. I'm thinking maybe next time I won't mix the flour in, I'll just dunk the chili in the beer and egg and then roll it in the flour.

I really do love that the Senate Conservatives Fund decided to say, "Hey, remember that guy who said that really offensive thing that made our entire party look bad who we said we wouldn't give any money to? Let's give him three hundred grand and see what happens." and he immediately turned around and said more crazy misogynistic shit.

First of all: instant karma is the best kind of karma. After all, if you wait an hour before you whack your dog on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper, he will not make any connection between what he did wrong and the fact that you are punishing him. This way, even the dimmest conservative organization can't possibly help but think "I just made a huge mistake."

Second: It's always better to see right-wing organizations throw their money down a bottomless pit than contribute it to races where it might actually help their candidate. (Like all that money Sheldon Adelson threw at Newt Gingrich. You know, for a casino magnate he's really pretty terrible at predicting odds.)

And speaking of candidates who they could have helped, that brings us to #3: this is actually hurting other candidates who they've endorsed in close Senate races. The Dems in Massachusetts are calling for Scott Brown to give their donation back and they're going to try to hang it around his neck until the election.

(Now, in point of fact, I don't especially dislike Scott Brown; I think he may very well be the only Republican left in the Senate who might actually be willing to compromise to get laws passed. And I wouldn't be devastated if he were reelected. Nor do I want him to lose his seat because I care unduly about the numbers game -- the Democrats couldn't pass shit when they had 59 seats plus Lieberman; there's really not a hell of a lot of difference between 45 Democrats and 60 Democrats, thanks to the automatic filibuster.

But Elizabeth Warren is legitimately my single favorite person running for office this election, and I would love to see her win, not because she's a Democrat but because she's Elizabeth Warren.)

Playing: Decided to take a crack at Soul Blazer. So far it's pretty neat!