FOOLCiRCLE

So, I just got back from a great week long vacation, and I was all over the place!

See the rest of the pictures from Ommegang HERE.

The trip was kind of a three part trip, first to Brewery Ommegang in Cooperstown, NY, second to Ft. Kent, ME, and third to the Bottle and Cork in Dewey Beach, DE to see Keller Williams. It was both a long week and a fast week if that makes any kind of sense. It started last Friday July 31st with Erik, Robert, and myself going up to Brewery Ommegang to volunteer for their Belgium Comes to Cooperstown (BCTC) event. This is the third year Robert and I have done it and the first Erik has joined us. It was very similar to the last two, but with a couple legal changes. It seems Ommegang ran into some issues with the State of New York and beer festivals in between last years and this. For my volunteer shift I was pouring beer for a brewery from CT called Olde Burnside Brewing Company, they were pretty nice guys and I had a blast. Both Friday and Saturday nights were of course big party nights, tons of fun.

See the rest of the pictures from Ft. Kent, ME HERE.

From Cooperstown we travelled to Ft. Kent, ME which is pretty much the northernmost most part of Maine. It was a 12 hour drive from Ommegang to Ft. Kent. We stayed at this cool lodge called the Trackdown Kennels & Lodge. It’s basically a hunters lodge, but since it was off season it was just a cool chill lodge for us to kick it in. We then spent the next two days with Robert’s family, who’s father is originally from Ft. Kent, for his parent’s 50th Wedding Anniversary. I originally was a little hesitant in going up, I had never even met his parents before, but soon after we met them I knew we would be OK. Ft. Kent is very laid back, almost additively so. Once I really got use to the vibe (which was just about when we were leaving) I could have kicked it there for quite a while. The Anniversary party was pretty much a family reunion with about 90 members of his family there and people traveling in from as far as AZ and CA, it was very cool.

See the rest of the pictures from Keller Williams HERE.

Then from Ft. Kent we travelled back to DE, it was about 13 hours, which is actually the fastest I have ever made that drive. I had been to Limestone, ME twice, which is very near Ft. Kent, and if my memory serves me right it was closer to 18 hours both times, so I was pleased to say the least. We got home about midnight-ish on Wednesday and on Thursday Robert, Karen, and I were leaving to head to Dewey Beach to see Keller Williams at the Bottle and Cork. There were a bunch of people we were meeting down there for the show; Craig, Alycia, Abby, and Wooly. The show was tons of fun though it took quite a while for the crowd to really get into it, lot of talking and such, but hey it’s a bar I guess. Keller played a ton of cover songs, so that’s both cool and also a little disappointing just because I would have liked to see more originals. Anyway, after the show we all went back to Abby’s dad’s beach house in Millville and hung up late and then got up early and got going. Friday Robert and I were wiped and we actually cut the beach portion of the trip a day short, originally planning on staying until Saturday.

Overall it was a really great trip, and a great way to spend a week off from work. Hopefully there will be more great trips like that in the future. If you want more details on anything or have any questions let me know, I just don’t feel like typing too too much right now.

This has been EVERYWHERE on the interwebs, but I thought I’d share too – and yes, I am a craft brewer too!

I Am A Craft Brewer

“I Am A Craft Brewer” is a collaborative video representing the camaraderie, character and integrity of the American Craft Brewing movement. Created by Greg Koch, CEO of the Stone Brewing Co. and Chris & Jared of Redtail Media…and more than 35 amazing craft brewers from all over the country. The video was shown to a packed audience of 1700 craft brewers and industry members at the 2009 Craft Brewers Conference as an introduction to Greg’s Keynote Speech entitled “Be Remarkable: Collaboration Ethics Camaraderie Passion.” As is tradition for the CBC Keynote, a toast to the audience was offered. This time, the beers offered for the toast were all collaboratively brewed craft beers including Isabella Proximus, Collaboration Not Litigation, AleSmith/Mikkeller/Stone Belgian Style Triple, Jolly Pumpkin/Nøgne-Ø/Stone Special Holiday Ale, and 2009 Symposium Ale “Audacity of Hops.”

I am a craft brewer!

A couple days ago on Friday I was invited to a “free” happy hour event at ZoT restaurant in Philadelphia.

My friend Sharon won a “free” happy hour for her work by putting her business card in one of those things on the bar, but she doesn’t remember putting one in there. Anyway, the happy hour was from 6:30-8:30PM and included free mussels and 1/2 price drafts – at a Belgian bar – you know I’m there! Basically the deal worked out that it was 1 free kilo of mussels (however you’d like them prepared, and they had like 30 preparations) for every 4 people that came. We had 10 people show up and kind of had to pry a little to get the third set of mussels to come out. Plus, I was surprised that they advertised over 150 beers but only had like 6 drafts, 3 beers from Belgium and like 3 American-style Belgian beers – whatever still cool.

All-in-all it was a really fun time and we didn’t leave until like 12:00AM. I would totally go back there again. And not to compare it to Monk’s (as I am sure every other Belgian bar in Philly is), but in comparison to Monk’s it was much easier to get into, much more room, and the wait-staff seemed less douchey. If you’re in the Philly area and what to check out another Belgian bar, check out ZoT! Thanks, Sharon.

It’s a wrap, or whatever such nonsense they say when all the shooting for a film is done. So, now time to celebrate!

We actually finished shooting yesterday, Monday, February 16, 2009. We were suppose to finish on Sunday, but we had technical difficulties and had to re-shoot a scene on Monday. The good news is the Monday footage was even better. Still, I’m not going to say much about the film. But, it is due to DFH by March 1st and the Film Fest is the first weekend in April, so probably between those two dates it will become available to all to watch. Now it’s time to finish the editing, focus on the soundtrack, and add some sound effects. It’s going to be sweet, though more of the burden has been shifted to Erik and Sharon now. Break a leg, or some other such nonsense

Yesterday was at Iron Hill’s event Belgium Comes to West Chester at their West Chester, PA location “hosted” by Chris LaPierre, the head brewer there.

Erik, Sharon, Robert, and myself arrived at West Chester at about 1:30PM. There was about a 20 minute wait for tables, so we put our name in and grabbed a beer. I knew I would be drinking Belgian-style beers all day, so I decided to start with something else. I got IH’s seasonal beer an American Brown, it was really good, but I think the one that Garrett and I brewed packed in more flavor.

After we got a table we all ordered the 10 beer Belgian sampler. At $20 a piece it was a good way to try a lot of different beers. I felt slightly bad for our waitress because she was going to have to bring out 40 little cups, but at the same time she already hada $80 tab running and we’d only been there 2 minutes, I guess it’s fair. Anyway, we got to try a pretty good selection of the beers, here are the ones I can remember:

• Eddy – Iron Hill, West Chester
• Abbey 6 – Victory
• Mad Elf – Troegs
• Cherry Dubbel – Iron Hill, North Wales
• Abbey Extra – Sly Fox
• Chocolate Indulgence – Ommegang
• Lil Pylon – Earth Bread + Brewery
• Honey Saison – Iron Hill, Phoenixville
• Otay – Nodding Head
• White Gold – Ithaca Beer Company
• Permanent Midnight – Iron Hill, Lancaster
• Stumblin’ Monk – Stewart’s
• Belgian Mild – Flying Fish
• Tripel Lindy – Manayunk Brewery
• Wild Hibernian – Harpoon
• Belgian IPA – Yard’s
• Heywood – Iron Hill, West Chester
• Oak-aged Quad-father – Iron Hill, West Chester

And, those were only the ones I tasted, there were others that kicked before we got to taste them and others that hadn’t gone on tap by the time we left around 7:30PM. Basically they had 10 designated taps in the back with a A, B, and sometimes C beer that would come on. So depending on when you ordered your sampler or what time it was when you arrived it would depend on what was available. I think we got to try a pretty large array. I think my two favorites were the Cherry Dubbel from Iron Hill’s North Wales location that the guy who worked there kept referencing as Larry’s Cherry which sounded all sorts of weird/wrong to me. Also the Permanent Midnight from Iron Hill’s Lancaster location was really good too. One weird thing about that beer, Robert pulled two plastic “pubic hairs” out of his sample, it was pretty bizarre. Fortunately he didn’t choke on them or anything. He really could have made a fuss with the management, but he played it cool instead and just wanted to warn them that it happened so hopefully to avoid any situations with other patrons.

Overall it was a real good time and am looking forward to going up again next year. My one piece of advice, if it is at all doable, to Iron Hill would be to have all of the beers on tap at once. That way, say there are 20 beers available, they could have four 5 beer samplers available. The samplers wouldn’t be so overwhelming for the waitstaff, there would be more beer options for the patrons, and you could choose more carefully what it was you are trying to drink if there were specific beers that you really wanted to try. Just a thought.

Recently back from our third year in a row of celebrating New Year’s Eve at Dogfish Head Brewpub.

(This picture just seems to capture the New Year’s vibe)

You can click here to check out the rest of the pictures.

Per usual DFH put on one hell of a party! For NYE DFH has two dinners available, an early seating at 6:30 so you can have a good dinner, but plan your own NYE festivities, and a late seating at 9:00 so you can have a good dinner, AND plan your NYE festivities around DFH. The first year we opted for the early dinner and to go back to the beach house and do our own thing, fun, but not as fun as it could be. So last year and this year we chose to do the late seating and get a hotel room within walking distance, smart – very smart. Things were only slightly different this year than last, last year I believe dinner last year was at 8:30 and was $75, this year it was at 9:00 and was $85. The difference? I think it gave DFH more time in between the two dinners to make sure everything was straight, plus the $85 included gratuity as the $75 did not. I liked that it was included, but it makes me wonder how many of the wait-staff got screwed last year?

The menu was bangin’, actually I think my favorite of the three years so far. Typically there is some course that I am not really big on, not really so much this year. Anyway, here’s the menu:

• Truffled Butternut Squash Soup paired with a pint of Punkin’ Ale
• Warm Lobster Salad paired with a 10 oz of Midas Touch
• Seared Foie Gras and Lingonberry Jam on Brioche Toast paired with a 10 oz vintage Black & Blue
• Prosciutto-Wrapped Beef Tenderloin paired with a 10 oz Palo Santo Marron
• Brown Honey Rum Tiramisu paired with a 10 oz vintage World Wide Stout

I’ll try to briefly run through the menu, but you know how briefly can go sometimes. I am not a squash kind of guy, I don’t really dislike it anymore, but it is not my friend. Anyway, the soup was ridiculous, I could have eaten enough for a meal. It was paired with the Punkin’ Ale which makes sense, but after about a half pint of Punkin’ – I’m good. The Lobster “Salad” was my king of salad! A big pile of homemade roasted garlic mashed potatoes, with freshly steamed big chunks of lobster, a little arugala spread around with large slivers of parmesan on top – delicious. None of us had had Foie Gras before so we were all excited and apprehensive about trying it. It was OK. This was actually the course I was looking the most forward to and it was the one I was closest to being disappointed about. I would definitely like to try it again, but it wasn’t a big seller for me. When the beef tenderloin came out I almost lost it. For a fourth course plate this baby was full! It was probably an 8 0z cut of beef wrapped in prosciutto (I liked this better than bacon), along with blue cheese mashed potatoes and some random veggies. I barely ate the veggies, and the mashed potatoes were great, but I had already grubbed on the ones with the lobster, but the beef, – the beef was delicious. I really could only eat half by this point, but it didn’t matter. My only complaint was they were not cooked evenly, in the sense that all of ours were medium except for Dave’s and his was medium-rare and tasted that much better. Oh, well. Finally the tiramisu (probably my favorite dessert of all time) was bangin’. Very well made with just enough rum for flavor but to keep it from getting boozy, I could only finish half of this also.

And the beers . . . ah, yes, the beers. We arrived at about quarter of 9:00 so we had time for a pre-game beer. Originally I tried to order a brewpub exclusive porter called Arms Akimbo Porter, but they had taken it off for the night for the special beers, bummer. So I went with a 60 Minute IPA which lasted until the beef tenderloin came out, geez. As I’ve already said the Punkin’ was fine, but not my favorite. Midas Touch was a good change because I hardly ever buy it, mental note – buy Midas Touch more. The vintage Black & Blue was OK too, I’d rather it was Red & White, but I understand the choice for it paired perfectly with the lingonberry jam. Before the Palo Santo Marron came out I was talking it up to Dave as one of my top 3 favorite DFH beers, he was stoked to try it. When it came out he took one sip and pushed his glass over to me saying I could finish it, different strokes I suppose. Then we ended with the WWS which is always an ass-kicker. I always know it, but always forget about it. WWS is one of those beers you should drink alone, not five beers in and drinking more later. Let’s just say this was the beer that made the night shift perspective, not completely in a bad way.

Also, for the second year in a row, Nate Myers and the Aces were playing. They are a blues-rock-harmonica-heavy band that randomly covers some fun hip-hop tracks, I really dig these guys. Also, they have a song called “Jager & Waffles” so you know they’re good in my book! Of course we picked up the CD.

The next morning found everyone in decent shape and we rolled like we meant business. A little greazy diner breakfast followed by out traditional shot and a beer at Irish Eyes. The shot and a beer kept on expanding until half the day was gone and we were all feeling fine. A Nic-O-Boli for lunch and we were ready to call it a day. New Year’s Eve has always been fun times for me, I think I enjoy the safe but ruckus NYE-style. Until next time I suppose!

I know, I know, it was over a week ago and my slacker-ass is only now getting around to posting about the Kennett Brewfest, oh well, deal with it.

So two Saturdays ago (yes, 10.04.08) was the annual Kennett Brewfest, probably the closest and best brewfest that I go to the most regularly. It’s funny, with me, Kennett has a reputation of being either really good or not so good, but never bad, and they seem to happen every other year. Well, since last year was the closest fest I’ve been to at Kennett where I almost didn’t have a good time, you know this one couldn’t suck!

A couple changes were made to help make things better, but really it boiled down to two changes that kind of go hand-in-hand, that being only a limited number of tickets were sold this year and there were no day of sales for tickets. They also happened to have more breweries this year (mostly distributor represented), so between the extra booth spaces for people to visit and the little bit less people it felt a little roomier and generally the lines moved a bit faster. Biggest complaint for this year, which has been a problem for a couple years now, is they have one section where there is an aisle where maybe eight breweries face each other from each side. Well, once the lines form for all sixteen of those breweries it is almost impossible to get through that aisle plus there appears to be a lot of line jumping. It was the only area where waiting for a beer kind of sucked.

Highlights for me? Definitely Voo Doo’s Big Black Voo Doo Daddy, one hell of an Imperial Stout, Oak Aged Arrogant Bastard from Stone never disappoints, and the beers from Oskar Blues were all great. Until next year!

Congratulations go out to all the local boys in representing another great year at the Great American Beer Festival!

Category: 5 Herb and Spice or Chocolate Beer – 72 Entries
Silver: Pangaea, Dogfish Head Brewery, Milton, DE

Category: 7 Specialty Beer – 21 Entries
Gold: Red & White, Dogfish Head Brewery, Milton, DE
Bronze: Palo Santo Marron, Dogfish Head Brewery, Milton, DE

Category: 8 Rye Beer – 24 Entries
Gold: Roggenbier, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – Phoenixville, PA
Silver: Right On Rye, Rock Bottom Brewery – Bethesda, Bethesda, MD

Category: 18 Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer – 27 Entries
Gold: Beekeeper, Bullfrog Brewery, Williamsport, PA
Silver: Cherry Dubbel, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – North Wales, PA

Category: 21 Smoke-Flavored Beer – 31 Entries
Gold: Rauch Bier, Sly Fox Brewing Co., Royersford, PA

Category: 23 German-Style Pilsener – 44 Entries
Gold: Kaiser Pilsner, Pennsylvania Brewing Co., Pittsburgh, PA
Bronze: Prima Pils, Victory Brewing Co., Downingtown, PA

Category: 26 Dortmunder or German-Style Oktoberfest – 16 Entries
Bronze: Penn Oktoberfest, Pennsylvania Brewing Co., Pittsburgh, PA

Category: 30 Vienna-Style Lager – 28 Entries
Gold: Vienna Red Lager, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – Newark, DE
Bronze: Clipper City MarzHon, Clipper City Brewing Co., Baltimore, MD

Category: 31 German-Style Märzen – 48 Entries
Gold: Dogtoberfest, Flying Dog Brewery, Frederick, MD

Category: 32 American-Style Amber Lager – 43 Entries
Silver: Old Scratch Amber Lager, Flying Dog Brewery, Frederick, MD

Category: 40 German-Style Kölsch – 42 Entries
Gold: Wind Blown Blonde, Stewart’s Brewing Co., Bear, DE

Category: 52 Scottish-Style Ale – 24 Entries
Gold: Highland Courage, Rock Bottom Brewery – Bethesda, MD
Bronze: Railbender Ale, Erie Brewing Co., Erie, PA

Category: 60 French- and Belgian-Style Saison – 37 Entries
Gold: Saison, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – West Chester, PA
Silver: Saison, Nodding Head Brewing Co., Philadelphia, PA

Category: 62 Belgian-Style Lambic or Sour Ale – 29 Entries
Gold: Lambic de Hill, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – Media, PA
Bronze: Cassis de Hill, Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant – Wilmington, DE

Category: 69 American-Style Stout – 23 Entries
Bronze: Troegs Dead Reckoning, Troegs Brewery, Harrisburg, PA

Category: 73 Strong Scotch Ale – 38 Entries
Bronze: Bag Pipe’s Scotch Ale, Allentown/Bethlehem Brew Works, Allentown, PA

Category: 75 Barley Wine-Style Ale – 55 Entries
Bronze: Scratch #4 “The Flying Mouflan”, Troegs Brewery, Harrisburg, PA

2008 Michael Jackson Beer Journalism Award Winners:
Trade and Specialty Beer Media – Lew Bryson

So on Saturday (10.11.08) was the GABF and it looks like there was a lot of Mid-Atlantic action in there, especially from our local favorite Iron Hill Brewery – all of their locations! A couple to me that are stand outs are Sly Fox taking a gold in the smoked beers, which notoriously goes to Alaskan Brewery’s Smoked Porter year after year, Victory taking a bronze in the German-Style Pilsner for their Prima Pils where they have usually done really well but were beaten last year by Sly Fox with their Pikeland Pils, Stewart’s going two years in a row with a gold in the German-Style Kolsch which is awesome especially on the system they brew on it makes it really sick, and Iron Hill taking three in the Saison, Lambic or Sour beers (I know I combined two categories), WOW that was inpressive.

Very good job all around, and I can’t wait to sample and re-sample many of these beers. Congrats to Lew Bryson too for winner one of the Journalism Awards there too, nice local writer/beer geek.

So last Saturday (09.27.08) I was down at Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton, DE for the 4th Annual Intergalactic Bocce Tournament, and it was ridiculous.

If you want to see the rest of my pictures click here.

This is one of those events where I don’t even know where to begin. Let’s see here. We were invited down again for the entire weekend, Friday and Saturday, but because we all have jobs we were only able to go for Saturday so the band could play, but we did leave Friday night to head down early since Dogfish Head had hooked us up with a hotel room for the weekend. This year the rooms were in the Brighton Suites which is where we stayed last NYE and this coming one also. It’s funny, the rooms are never in the same hotel two years in a row, I wonder what that says about the bocce teams. When we got to the room it was probably close to 10PM, and after checking everything out discovered that there were two 4-packs of DFH Palo Santo Marron beer in the fridge – shweet! So we cracked a beer a piece and then went on down to the brewpub, about three blocks away or so and chilled out for a while.

When Saturday came we all hopped in the van and went on over to the brewery in Milton, about a 30 minute drive. We showed up at just about noon and started unloading the equipment. This year DFH had two tents set-up outside and they had kind of reserved one of them for the band, really cool. So after the band was set-up and sound-checked they began their first of four sets. Each set was probably about an hour and fifteen minutes, so it was about five hours of playing interspersed with beer breaks, including 60 Minute, Black & Blue, and World Wide Stout. While the band was playing I mostly just hung out with the freaks and watched bocce, but as more and more teams dropped out of the tournament (double elimination) there was more and more stuff to do. By the end we had my Cornhole set set-up in the brewery and had almost a mini Cornhole tournament going on.

Some of the other side stuff DFH had set-up this year to keep everyone entertained was a graffiti contest with sidewalk chalk, a breakdancing competition, and a very heated costume contest. In the past all the teams had themes and most of them wore costumes, but it had started to get a little lax with teams just wearing like T-shirts with their team names on them and stuff. So supposedly in the email that went out to the teams they stressed that it was going to be much more important this year to roll with their themes, and boy did some of the teams bring it. Some of the team names I can remember are: El Borracho Mariachi (mariachi theme), Beer Junta (army theme?), Bocce Beer Monks (monks), Mama’s Roast Beef (purple freaks), Alpha Males (Jimmy Buffet), Midas Touch My Balls (old guys), Bonsai Bocce (Karate Kid), Holy Rollers (religious figures), Pallino Pimps (pimps), Punkin Drublic (pumpkin/punks), Catbird Ass Brewery (chicken chokers?), Don’t Touchdown There (Eagles), and Sam’s Team (Village People). The freakin’ old guys from MTMB were ridiculous. Not only were they in costumes, but they were in full character, especially two of them. They had gone so far as to shave the tops of their heads so they looked like old guys with major receding hair lines and wore Depends adult diapers – they were just out of control.

At one point the band had sent out an email saying if any of the teams were interested in requesting a song that they would take it into consideration and see what they could do. They received one email back with one request. The Bonsai Bocce team requested any song from the Karate Kid movies. The Erik Mitchell Band thought it was great and went through the effort to learn Joe Esposito’s “You’re the Best Around“. It’s so funny, this song keeps getting stuck in my head ever since they learned it. They did a great job pulling it off in there own way, and everyone at the bocce tournament loved it. It was funny to later on hear people singing it. The band also did the 2008 version of the Bocce Song which is basically an off-the-cuff song Mitchell pulls out of his ass which is freakin’ hilarious. This year he basically gave props to Audrey (the person who organizes the tournament) and then systematically went through each team and several individual players and ripped them. It might sound a little mean, but he does it in good humor and everyone is laughing, so I think all are on the same page.

Near the end of the tournament the band was just wrapping up their fourth set when the cops showed it. It was pretty funny to see Sam walk down to talk to the cop wearing his tight Village People police outfit talking to the real cop. Basically from what I can gather the cops came on a noise complaint because of the band, but he was cool and let the band play one more song. So, for their final song they played “Every Rose Has a Thorn” and invited up anyone who would like to sing along (see above photo). It was too funny seeing everyone singing along, pimps, Jebus, old dudes, monks, Eagles, the band – too funny. After that we packed up the band gear and put the van and gear away for the night. It was just in time to watch the last two games of bocce between Sam’s Team and the Bonsai Bocce crew. Sam’s Team actually beat Bonsai Bocce twice in a row (remember, double elimination), so theoretically they were the winners, but Sam announced that they would not accept the awards (four cases of vintage DFH beer) and gave them to Bonsai Bocce and basically pimped the praises of Bonsai Bocce all night. After that we all loaded into two buses and went back to the brewpub for dinner and the awards ceremony.

To say what I tried to describe is just the tip-of-the-iceberg is about all I can say. Go through the pictures, read the set list, watch the videos – this weekend is simply retarded in the best way possible. And I think as long as there isn’t any trouble that follows from the police showing up, I think the band (and me) will be invited back next year for the five year anniversary. This is my favorite beer event that I get to participate in every year.

If you want to check out more on the band go to Erik’s MySpace page here. There is plenty of band information plus if you look on the left side where he posts his set lists you can see the full scoop of what they played. There is also a video of the band playing “You’re the Best Around” on his page or here. Also, the “Unofficial Dogfish Head Photographer” Jess Daleiden was kind enough to forward links to the pictures she took and has given me permission to post links to her photos. So if you want to see a couple hundred good photos and not just my crappy drunken ones, then here are the Friday pictures and the Saturday pictures from Jess, thank you!

So last weekend (09.21.08) was the 3rd Annual Dogfish Dash. The Dogfish Dash is a 5k/10k charity run that aids the Delaware Nature Conservancy and is set-up/run-by Dogfish Head Craft Brewery. Above is the front and back of the shirts that were given out, as far as running shirts go these were pretty cool. Robert and I have run the 10k the last three years, so that’s pretty cool. The first year we both were in no shape to run because of a long night the night before, and the second year we both were in great shape and got to really enjoy the after run festivities back at the brewpub. This year, well, we still haven’t learned our lesson.

So we went down on Saturday so that I could pick up my race packet since I pre-registered and stop by the pub and have a couple beers then call it an earlier night. And, that’s how it started. After we had already left the pub and were waiting for a NIc-o-boli to eat and then head back to the beach house, that’s when things changed. We received a phone call that one of our friends, Steve “the Hammer” and his new wife Monica (congratulations), was having their wedding reception like three blocks from where we were and that we were welcomed to swing by. I’m not going to go into details here, but let’s just say in the long run that heading back at 8PM tuned into 1AM and the additional five hours of drinking in between – long night.

So, the next morning, the morning of the race, came way to early. We were out of the beach house and heading back to Dogfish Head by 7AM. To say I wasn’t feeling well is putting it mildly and was reminded in the car ride over what it was I ate the night before if you catch my drift. After we parked and walked up we had about two minutes before the race started, I decided I was going to go for it anyway. Very slow pace, but I did run the whole 10k without a re-run of the car ride over. The other exciting thing that happened during the run was between like mile 1 and 2 some how a bee hive got disturbed and there were some seriously pissed off bees on the trail. I made it by them OK, but Robert got jacked up! I think the final count was that he got stung 11 times and still had to run 4 miles! No one really knows what happened, but to say he’s a little bee shy now is an understatement.

After the run we went back to the pub and thought about having some breakfast and beers, but between the pain he was in and the state I was in we decided against it. OK, not true, I got one beer, got about three sips in and had to take a fast walk outside and around the corner to find some room to relieve myself of that beer. So we basically left and came home at that point, one of the longest rides home ever, for both of us.

So, on a side note, hopefully some things to look forward to me posting on this week are more kegging, more beer gun information, up coming competitions, new “fermentation chamber”, magazine reviews, DFH Bocce Tournament, and after this weekend Kennett Square Brewfest.