(no subject)

Beer Tasting take 2!

No step by step photos this time.  Really, how many times can you watch a person sip a beer?

We bought these weeks ago, before St Pat's, but they're still well within their freshness dates.  This time we're drinking them "properly" - out of glasses - on a suggestion from the last beer review thread. 

Sunshine Wheat Beer - purchased because we bought a glass with the logo on it months and months and months ago, because the back of the glass said "not a lemon."  Having tried it, I have to say that they are right.  It is not a lemon.  It is a beer.  It is a GOOD beer.  It tastes crisp and light, without being watery.  It is what Coors and the other American beers are supposed to be.  The label says there is coriander and orange peel in it, but I don't pick up either of those flavors.   New Belgium certainly beats out Shiner as a small brewery.  They don't keep livestock in the vat rooms.

Warsteiner - until I looked it up, I thought it was Wacfteiner, or possibly Wacsteiner with the funky Ye Olde Longe S.  But nope, that's an R, not a C.  Babelfish tells me the label reads "A Queen Under The Beers."  It seems to be the German version of Budweiser, so I suppose that's rather fitting.  It also says it was naturally brewed according to the German Purity Laws.  I'm going to assume that means no Jews, because I'm an asshole.  (We're allowed to be assholes if we're both of German descent, right?  If not, I'll just be an asshole anyway.)  Speaking of which, I'm writing this in realtime as we're drinking it.  Justin just took his first sip of it.
Justin: It tastes like an American beer, but with that German touch.
Me: You're saying there's Jews in it after all?
Seriously, it does taste like Budweiser.  Like slightly concentrated Budweiser - not quite as watery as I remember the last Bud I had tasting - but nothing to write home about.  It's still better than the Shiner, for what it's worth.  I don't really want to finish it.  I'll have to try chugging it like a frat boy.  Bring me a funnel and a straw.

Ok, chugging it was a bad idea.

Moving on.

Pisner Urquell, from Plzen, Czech Republic.  The original pilsner, as you can guess by the name of the city it's from.  I think the whole label has maybe four vowels.  How do you pronounce languages like that?  Is there a particular vowel sound that is implied by the lack of vowel, or what?

Oh god it smells RANCID.  I don't see a date on it to tell whether it's skunked, but it SMELLS skunked.  I'm not sure I can do this. ... Closer examination of the bottle reveals a code that says 09056, which decodes to May 9 of this year.  It SHOULD be ok, then...

It's a dark amber color, much darker than the other two beers we've tried tonight. 

And it doesn't really TASTE skunked.  It has some of the same almost fruity undertones as St Pauli Girl.  If it didn't smell like a fart, I'd kinda like it.  Justin comments that it smells like Shiner, but tastes decent.  I am serious, though, when it's sitting in its glass on the desk, and I'm leaning over it to type, the smell that wafts up is 100% fart.  It is BUTT GAS BEER.  BUTT GAS.  BUTTS.

The last beer in our four-pack was another Guinness Stout, which I drank on St Patrick's Day, so that's it for today.  Next time we have the disposable income available we'll try Corona, Fat Tire and a couple other random imports.

(no subject)

Show on the History Channel about reconstructing a fort that Lewis & Clark built.  They made a HUGE deal about how they were doing it in historically accurate methods with historically accurate tools and it was going to be just like the original and everything was going to be SO historically accurate it was going to HURT, just to prove that we can do it the same way they did back then.

Ten minutes into the show, they're ripping apart cedar trunks with a chainsaw.





Toward the end of the show they added a deerskin door, and the host said "When I enter this hairy portal, I really feel like I'm deep in the wilderness."

Heh. Heheheheheh.  Heheheheheheheheheh. Heheheh.

(no subject)

Conclusion: Lewis and Clark DID have a chainsaw.  It was powered by mules. 

Little tiny mules.

Little tiny mules on little tiny hamster wheels inside the chainsaw, and when you pull the trigger it lowers little tiny carrots so the little tiny mules break into a little tiny trot.

It's true!  I saw it on the tee vee.

Ok, they didn't show the tiny mules, but they were definitely implied.  And anyway, Justin told me, so it must be true!

(no subject)

Hairy Portal and the Prisoner of Asskaban

Oh hey a meme.

Saturday five time!

1. Of the various cultures, ethnicities or nationalities you belong to, which most strongly do you consider yourself?
Probably Irish.  I'm a lot more German than Irish by genes, but somehow I identify with the Irish part more.  Couldn't really tell you why, though.

2. Is there a culture you cannot claim heritage from but which you feel quite close to?
English. 

3. What's one language you wish you knew fluently?
Spanish.  It would be really useful.

4. If you could move anywhere in the world and be guaranteed a job, etc., where would you go?
Somewhere on the isle of Britain.  And I'd go around to the rest of Europe on visits pretty often.  That's a big part of the draw England has for me as a physical location - the proximity to the rest of the world, as it were.  America's pretty isolated.

5. If you had a time machine, and could witness any one event without altering or disturbing it, what would you want to see?
Queen Elizabeth I's Armada speech.

(no subject)

There is a crayfish outside.  He's still alive, but I can't figure out how he got here - I don't think there is a creek nearby, and there's certainly not any water on the property for him to be hanging out in. (The pool is probably too chlorinated to be a proper crayfish habitat.)  I took some pictures, but I can't find the cable to hook my camera up to the computer to upload them.  I don't know what to do about him.  I feel bad leaving him there - he will die!  But I don't know of anyplace I could take him, even if I had suitable Crayfish Transportation in hand.

(no subject)

An empty two-liter soda bottle is a really lightweight thing, and you wouldn't think you could injure somebody with one.  But if the bottle is sitting on the counter with its cap screwed on, and you knock it off the counter, it's going to come down cap-first, and that cap can deal some serious damage.  It just hit me in the middle toe of my right foot, and it hurt so bad I couldn't even move for a good thirty seconds.  Now I can't bend that toe.