Posts in category Running

Married life and more

Mar01
2011 Written by Andrew

Married life, to put it bluntly, feels no different than the life my wife and I had the day before we were married, with one exception: I can’t get over saying “my wife.” The ring around my finger feels completely natural by this point, but I still marvel over the fact that I have a wife. How very, very strange.

On the bright side, too, Hanne hasn’t kicked me out yet, so married life is still somewhat agreeable with her.

The wedding itself was a lot of fun, though I was disappointed that I couldn’t get the specific beers I wanted for the reception. I would have appreciated the caterer offering me a list of what they could get, but I can’t really fault their choices in the end as none of them were disliked beers. I had very little time to enjoy the food that made up the bulk of the wedding budget, but I hear that it was all quite tasty. Afterward, Hanne and I dropped our stuff off at the hotel, changed out of our wedding attire, and met our friends and her cousins for drinks at the Hair of the Dog tasting room and later Bunk Bar, and with the exception of the rings on our fingers it felt like any other Saturday night.

Let me back up a bit, though, and mention the bachelor party that my best man organized. When one thinks of bachelor parties, one typically imagines a night of drink, debauchery, strippers, etc. One does not typically imagine an evening barhopping in a limo with one’s friends and family, and yet that is what happened for me. I was completely surprised by the level of deception that had gone into hiding the plans from me, so naturally I can never trust any of the involved parties ever again. I knew something was up when I was asked to meet my best man at the Green Dragon and saw my Dad outside. I had further suspicions when my sister arrived. When my soon-to-be father in law walked in the door I knew the game that was being played. When the rest of my friends and the limo pulled up, well, I can say I was pretty shocked.

“Andrew’s Classy Bachelor Party Pub Crawl,” as it was emblazoned on the hat I was forced to wear with my picture on it, took us from the Green Dragon to Produce Row Cafe, to Amnesia Brewing, to Saraveza, and finally, to the Horse Brass. The end of the evening is a little blurry, but in all the pictures I’ve seen I’m having a good time, and that is how I will remember it.

I kept the hat.

I have begun the plotting for the bachelor party in which I play the role of the best man in June, but I have a feeling that I won’t be able to top that.

The other big thing to happen to me in the last four months is that I changed jobs. I didn’t even have to change my office! My firm ended up merging (it’s more complicated than that, but for simplicity’s sake I’ll call it a merger) with another firm in the same building, and while most everyone moved upstairs to their new spaces, I stayed behind on the old floor because there just isn’t room for me up there. My new job responsibilities are about the same as they were before, albeit somewhat more nebulous, but since much of the IT work is done from another office I have less ultimate responsibility as before when I was more or less running things. I’m not alone down here and it’s not permanent, but I feel somewhat disconnected from the rest of the firm because I don’t see people with the same frequency as I did before. The eventual plan is to acquire the rest of the space on one of the other floors, build it out, and then move us up. Until then, I’ll enjoy my relative solitude down here and continue to use the stairs to go up to the main floors.

I have continued to run on occasion, but since I weigh more than I did when I was doing 10k twice a week and even longer on the weekends, my pace has certainly slowed a bit. I started carrying my iPhone instead of an iPod and using a nice iPhone app called Runkeeper that automatically maps out your runs using the phone’s GPS as well as records distance, pace, etc. It’s been somewhat interesting to finally get distances on some of the runs I’ve taken over the years as well as know how I’m doing as I’m running. About five years ago I ran a 10k race and got a time of ~45 minutes, giving me around a 7:30/mile pace. Not bad. Now I’m consistently around 9:40/mile, so I have definitely slowed.

I went for a run on Saturday when it was 27 degrees out. Even bundled up, it was so cold it took my toes two miles to warm up to the point in which they weren’t numb anymore.

I would certainly like to run more often, but even ignoring the dreary Portland winter weather, my new hours interfere with my running schedule. For the last five years or so, I’ve been working 37.5 hours/week, but my new position is 40 hours/week. It doesn’t sound like much of an increase, but I’ve found that extra half hour every day really made a difference in the evening if I wanted to go for a run. It creates a problem in terms of cooking, too, and I’ve had to do more planning ahead to make sure that I have stuff on hand for dinner rather than go to the store after work. It’s taken a bit of getting used to, as I always enjoyed being inspired by a recipe I would come across during the day and then cooking the dish that evening. I demand to have my instant gratification returned!

Obviously I’m leaving out months worth of insignificant crap, so if you want to be more up to date on my insignificant crap than when I sporadically put words to the screen, my Twitter feed is usually full of said crap on a much more regular basis. You can follow me and learn the instant I drink a beer and where I am when I’m drinking it, or possibly even read a 140-character-or-less treatise on the subjective opinion of whatever I may be watching on television. It’s scintillating commentary, I can assure you.

Cheers.

Posted in Beer, Family, Food, Hanne

Miscellany

Aug18
2010 Written by Andrew

Welp, it’s official–Multnomah County, Oregon has on file a legal document signed by both Hanne and myself stating that yes, we do wish to marry each other and we would like for the County and the State of Oregon and the federal government to recognize this fact. It won’t become official until our officiant signs it and a couple of witnesses size us up and decide we’re right for each other, but the hard part is done. The hard part being handing over $60 in cash, of course. Well, that and remembering where my parents were born.

The wedding planning is going largely and surprisingly well. The invitations have all gone out, the photographer is paid for, the suit has been sized and ordered, Hanne’s dress has been picked up and will soon be fitted, etc. etc. etc. The two biggest things that have yet to be settled are the officiant (who we need to meet with, not choose) and the pastry desserts, which have been decided upon but not confirmed. Other than those two minor details, I think we’re about ready. Oh, and I guess we don’t have flower arrangements decided on, a menu finalized, or the tiniest detail like the actual ceremony worked out, but that’s neither here nor there.

Work’s been going pretty well now that I’m in charge, and it’s given me an opportunity to try and get some stuff done that I felt had been languishing for too long. Of course, I spent most of today working on setting up a new server only to realize towards the end of the day that we didn’t have the legal right to actually run it, but that was more of a bookkeeping problem than anything else. Other than things like that, it’s been thankfully quiet at work so that I have time to concentrate on the tasks at hand. Part of that is due to my coworker heading people off for everyday support stuff, but it’s also just been quiet. Last Friday almost half the firm was out! I don’t know why I was there.

I’ve been running more recently, despite the heat, and it’s been good to get back into a regular routine. I’m starting to thin back down, too, and though I have no desire to get back down to my ultra skinny weight of 175 pounds, I’d be happy if I could break 200–I’m currently holding at 215, but that’s down from 225 early in the year. My belt is comfortably buckling on a smaller hole and I can wear a smaller pair of jeans, though, so even if I’m not at my desired weight I can feel the progress. All I need is to keep things up as they are and maybe–just maybe!–by the end of the year I can step on a scale and not feel bad about what I ate for dinner.

Or more specifically, that third or fourth beer.

Posted in Beer, General, Hanne, Work

Um…hi?

May07
2010 Written by Andrew

Contrary to popular belief that I just made up, I’m not dead, nor am I planning on retiring my blog. Mostly, I got tired of writing and began to prefer the 140 character limit of my Twitter account. Having a random though and merely having to press Enter is much easier than logging in to my blog, clicking New, etc. etc. etc. But in the end, my better angels won out and I remembered that half the time I don’t remember what I had for dinner the night before to say nothing of what I did on a certain day in August of 2007. Yeah. This is as much my diary as I would keep, and I’ve neglected it for too long.

So. Here I am. Again.

A lot has happened since October. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s and Arbor Day have come and gone. Beer has been consumed, but oddly not brewed. Television and movies have been watched. Games have been played. Miles have been run, computers have been toyed with. Food has been prepared and consumed. But since I have already established that my memory leaves much to be desired, let’s pretend that my last update was sometime last week, shall we?

Today was a gorgeous day, though not terribly warm. Warm and sunny enough for a nice run around Laurelhurst Park after work, however. That’s my standard running route, but since the Morrison Bridge has been opened up to pedestrians and bikes, I at least have some additional options for runs around the same length. Hanne and I ran on Tuesday over the bridge, though, but since I was on my own I opted for my tried and true route (that she incidentally hates).

We both did the Bridge to Brews race a couple of weekends ago and were very happy with our times. It was an 8k race (just under 5 miles) and we finished with times of 48 minutes and 50 minutes, respectively. I think we would have had closer times, but I somehow managed to ditch Hanne about five seconds into the race, and I’m not entirely certain she’s forgiven me yet. The route was a good one, starting at the Widmer brewery, winding through a bit of NE PDX and rhen crossing the river on the lower deck of the Fremont Bridge. That was pretty cool, that they closed a lane of traffic and let us run across the bridge that highway 405 uses. From there, it crossed back over the Broadway Bridge and back to Widmer. Hanne’s parents live along the race route and so they came out to cheer us on. It was a great run, spoiled only by the endless line for the free post-run beers that took us coincidentally the same length of time to traverse as our runs did. After I got home and cleaned up, I did something I rarely do and fired off a letter of complaint. What can I say? I’m serious about people blocking my access to free beer.

It was still nice after my run, so Hanne and I walked down to Cartopia for dinner. Cartopia is a quintessential SE Portland landmark by now, once an empty lot but now filled with food carts that cater to those in seek of deliciousness. Among the crowd is a crepe cart featuring both sweet and savory concoctions, a fried pie cart (think something like an empanada, but more awesome), a French fries cart with many dipping sauces and poutine, a pizza cart with a wood-fired oven, and a few others. It truly shines late at night when the drinking crowd realizes they need food and wow, a fried pie would be totally awesome, but they do cater to the dinner crowd, too.

Hanne and I stopped by the pizza cart and had a small Margherita pizza, and it was delicious. I was jockeying for a fried pie for dessert, but Hanne got a milkshake to split, instead. Can’t win ‘em all, I guess. Since it was still sunnyish, we wandered over to the Green Dragon and I abused my free beer privilege and had 38 oz. of Southern Oregon Brewing’s Czech Pils. Though it was a lot of beer, it was light enough that I didn’t feel overwhelmed, nor do I feel the effects. There’s a critical shortage of light, low alcohol beers in the craft brewing community, and I hope to see more beers like the Czech Pils and Widmer’s 3% table beer.

On the topic of beer, last weekend was the Portland Cheers to Belgian Beers brewfest. It’s a true brewfest, and not just a beerfest, so I had been looking forward to going. The way it works is that a bunch of Oregon breweries get together early in the year and throw darts at a dartboard with four quadrants (high alcohol/light, high alcohol/dark, low alcohol/light, low alcohol/dark) and wherever their dart lands, that’s the style of beer they have to brew. The catch is that all the beers use the same Belgian yeast, but everything else is up to the brewers. The result is a wide variety of Belgian beers with a common ingredient, and you can see the difference that a common ingredient makes.

There were 33 beers this year, ranging from a 3% alcohol table beer (appropriately named “Bier de table”) from Widmer Brothers to a monster 11% alcohol called “DiaBlato” from Hopworks, the name a spin on another beer they brew call Diabolito. Some were forgettable, others were aged in fortified wine barrels or fermented with rose hips and various fruits. Truly, a one of a kind brewfest that gets better every year. We went last year and had a good time, but this was the first year that I really enjoyed myself there. Between Hanne and myself and various others we went with, I managed to either sample or taste 27 of the 33 beers, which is actually less beer than you might think. I actually went home and drank more beer!

Big things are afoot in my professional life, but I can’t say anything now because nothing is truly official. Stay tuned, assuming that I keep up with this thing.

The wedding plans are progressing, naturally. I don’t remember exactly where things left off, but we now have a venue, a caterer and a photographer. Save the Dates designed by my future Mother in Law have gone out, and the invitations are in the final stages. The website’s domain has been reserved, and next up is cupcakes. Hanne’s dress has been purchased (though I will not see it until the big day), my best man has been secured, and Hanne’s parents moved to a bigger apartment to have room for out of town guests. Things are moving right along at just the right pace so as to not totally overwhelm us at the last minute…though I suspect that will happen nonetheless.

My friends Dan and Kristine are still in town. What began as a three month stint got extended time and again, and now they have been here for a full eight months. They will be leaving on May 15, though, so it didn’t quite turn into the permanent stay I figured it would. We’ll have to cram some stuff into the last week, though–I can think of a few places we haven’t been yet that all coincidentally involve either food or beer or both. We’re taking care of a bunch of them this weekend, so we’ll have to see what’s left. It’s not like they’re going far, though–they’re going to spend some time in Northern California, then swing back through Portland and stay in Seattle for the summer. They’re already planning to come down to Portland for the Oregon Brewers Festival in July and then stay in Portland for a month or so leading up to the wedding, so we’ll definitely get to see them a few times before they head back to Minnesota just in time for winter.

And on that note, I think it’s about time for bed. After a run and a gigantic mug of beer, I think I see a heavy sleep in my future.

Posted in Beer, Beloit, Family, Food, General, Hanne

Musings, etc.

Apr21
2009 Written by Andrew

I swear to God, I’ve used every variation of “musings” or “rumblings” or some claptrap over the years, but really, it’s just because I can’t think of anything. Today it’s justified, though–my brain is still kind of off. I went for a run after work (which I have to admit, is the first time I ran since last time I wrote…I think) in the nice–very nice, actually–weather and I forgot what heat + exercise does to a body. I stumbled home and drank about three pints of water in a row, but that and a cold shower hasn’t been enough to flip the switch on my brain back on. Of course, it also might be the beer I have, but I’m only a few sips in.

On days like today (81 degrees att he peak) it’s tough to fight every urge I have that says “Go and sit in the sun, Andrew! Have a beer or two and soak up some sunlight!” and instead lace up my running shoes and plod around the neighborhood. If I were in better shape, maybe, but I just don’t have as much in me anymore. Well, not yet at least. I hope to change that at some point. In any case, I’m not in the sun, but at least I’ve got the beer.

On the other hand, at this time of day when don’t I?

Yesterday I crcked open the first bottle of my Belgian-style IPA that I’ll be entering in the homebrew competition, and it was quite good. I’m not sure about how well it will stack up against my competition, but I certainly enjoyed it enough that I don’t feel bad entering it on Friday. I have sort of a bonus for entering it, too–not only do I get a tasting glass and some tickets for the non-homebrew brewfest that the competition is attached to, but since I have to drop my beer off on Friday at Hopworks Urban Brewery, that means a trip to Hopworks is in order. Awesome. I love that place, and I feel a night of good beer and a nice long stumble home in my future this Friday evening.

OK, my brain’s just not up to writing level. Shutting down.

Posted in Beer, General

In the den of a mad scientist

Apr07
2009 Written by Andrew

Well maybe not “den” exactly. Backyard of a mad scientist? Dammit, let me start over. I’m at the Green Dragon and the mad scientist in question is Ron Gansberg, brewer at Cascade Brewing here in Portland (technically Hillsdale I suppose) who has something of a reputation for…shall we say, experimentation. Sure, he brews an IPA and a pale and a wheat and a stout, but I’ve always gotten the impression that his brewery is like a mafia front or a speakeasy–the outside is just for show, but say the passphrase and you go in the back where all the good stuff is. For example, right now I’m drinking a sour double Belgian ale fermented with cherries. In he past he’s brewed watermellon ales, apricot krieks, sour Flanders-style reds, and pretty much every combination therein. He loves fruit, and his specialty ales are certainly worth the effort he puts in. I’m sure if he could get by only brewing the specialty stuff he would, but you have to occasionally cater to the masses. Hanne’s been on a sour beer kick lately and she’s pretty disappointed she can’t be here tonight. I told her to ditch class, but since she did that last night, I think she decided not to become a complete truant her last term of law school.

Perhaps a trip to Raccoon Lodge, home of Cascade Brewing, is in short order. We’ll bus it there. Or get a ride. Either way, no way either Hanne or I will be driving that evening if his tap selection is decent.

I decided that it was all right to treat myself to a couple of beers tonight since I went for a run after work, but then again, days I don’t run certainly don’t really stop me from having a beer or two. I was fully aware that it had been a few weeks since my last run, too, and I have a feeling I’ll be stiff tomorrow. It’s not that I’m out of shape (which I kind of am), but those muscles tend to lose something if you don’t use them frequently enough–faster than other muscles, it feels like. I was also very aware of muscles in my back that I didn’t know I had.

The weather’s been so gorgeous here for the last few days that it’s almost made me forget the snowy winter and rainy last few weeks. A couple of days of sun tend to do that. On Saturday, Hanne and I went up to the Portland Farmer’s Market and walked away with some herbs and a few veggies in our possession. I took the opportunity to buy a boneless leg of lamb and some fresh rosemary, and I made a nice roast for dinner that night along with some roasted veggies. On Sunday we went over to my Dad’s house and had a good visit with my ailing grandmother and drank some beer with the family in the, but since Hanne had some work to do that night we had to beg out of dinner and head home early. No worries–we went to Lucky Lab for some beer, chips and salsa and then picked up a Thai curry to enjoy for dinner. Absolutely wonderful weather helped us along the way. I have a feeling this summer is going to be a lot of fun now that we better know how to use our grill and make good use of our backyard space.

As a finale for the weekend’s lovely weather (although technically not weekend anymore, I’ll accept Monday’s weather as a weekend extension), yesterday Hanne blew off her evening class so that we might sit outside and have sandwiches and beer, but I convinced her we should fire up the BBQ and grill some dinner instead–which we did very successfully, as a matter of fact. A grilled veggie and cheddar sandwich for her, a lamb burger on an olive ciabatta roll with hummus, red pepper, onion and feta for me. Grilled asparagus on the side. And beer of course, but what did you expect?

Hmmm. Half a mug gone, perhaps I should look into pairing it with some food.

Posted in Beer, Family, Food, General, Hanne

I chose…wisely

Mar31
2009 Written by Andrew

I was “agonizing” over what to do tonight–and I use the word loosely mostly because it’s like agonizing over gold shoes being too tight–because I had so many options open to me. Part of me thought I should probably get some exercise in the form of a run or walking…somewhere…since I’ve been lax about it for the last couple of weeks, but the lengthiest walk I was willing to undertake was to Belmont Station to buy some beer, which negates the walk for the most part. That option would have ended with a sandwich in my hands and playing City of Heroes until Hanne came home and started bugging me to entertain her and watch something with her.

Option 2 was to go for a run and then go to the Green Dragon for tonight’s “Meet the Brewer.” The beer isn’t terribly inspired tonight–Alameda Brewing in NE Portland, and I’ve had all their offerings–but I would have gotten a run in and some free beer. I didn’t feel like eating there, though, so that threw a kink into that plan.

So, I find myself at the Lucky Lab on Hawthorne for something ompletely different, drinking a Super Duper Dog imperial IPA and waiting on soup and a sandwich. Once I’m done here, maybe I’m mosey on over to the Green Dragon and see what’s pouring so I can still abuse my free beer. Green Dragon has recently started pouring a single cask-conditioned beer there in addition to their 18 or so other taps, so perhaps something hoppy and cirtusy will be on cask for me.

I’ve started playing a game on my iPhone that I bought last week called “Fieldrunners,” and it has me absolutely hooked. It’s all I can do to not pick it up at work and start playing, because I know if I did two hours of my day would just evaporate in front of my eyes without me even realizing it. I mean, it’s that addictive. It’s in the genre of “tower defense” games, where your only goal is to prevent enemy forces from reaching the other side of a map, and all you can do is to build defenses to keep them out. The trick, though, is that you can never completely block off the route to the other side–there always has to be an open path–so you can’t just turtle yourself in and prevent them from breaking through. No, you have to create a maze of gun towers and upgrade them against the increasingly powerful enemy forces trying to get to the other side. It’s amazingly simple, and yet somehow amazingly difficult to keep up with.

…as my 20-minute break to play clearly says.

Now I find myself back at the Green Dragon, but at least I’m not choosing among the scant food menu to scrap up some dinner. I guess that’s not really fair–the food is decent here, but there’s a lot of heavy stuff on the menu I can do without, and the lighter dishes I’ve eaten a lot of in the last year and change, whenever it opened. Last I was here was a couple of weekends ago for the Firkfin Fest, and I had once again found myself at a brewfest at the unfortuate hour of 11 AM thus ruining the rest of my day.

I have little else to write about. I could probably write for hours, but I really don’t want to. I want to take my phone out of my pocket and play Fieldrunners until I’m defeated. I’m such a nerd.

Posted in Beer, Geekery, General, Hanne

In which I kick it old school

Feb17
2009 Written by Andrew

Dunno where my brain is pulling these titles from, what dark recess of my mind implores me to begin writing “In which…” but I suspect that it has something to do with reading my second Neil Gaiman book in a row, because it sounds an awful lot like something he’d write. I’ve moved on from my Michael Crichton Memorial reading phase and am now into my Why Do I Own These Books If I’ve Never Read Them Before? phase. First up was Gaiman’s Anansi Boys that’s been sitting on my shelf for more than a year, and now I’m into American Gods which I started but couldn’t get into after I first bought it. Gaiman’s book Coraline was just turned into an animated film that’s getting excellent reviews and he coincidentally won the Newberry Medal for Children’s literature right before the move came out for his most recent novel, The Graveyard Book.

So. Kicking it old school, by which I mean that on this particular Tuesday night, I find myself at the Green Dragon Bistro and Brewpub, abusing my giant mug while drinking the wares of tonight’s Meet the Brewer, which happens to be Hood River’s Double Mountain Brewery. The brewers are around here somewhere, but I come for the beer and not always the conversation. Plus, I met enough brewers this weekend that I don’t need to talk shop or fawn over them. Hanne and I visited the brewery in Hood River about a year ago and enjoyed their beers there, but that was also stop #2 on our whirlwind tour of Hood River’s brewing operations, so I remember good beer and that the piza smelled delicious but not much else.

This past weekend was somewhat of a mixed bag of epic WIN and epic FAIL. WIN: Four brewpubs visited on Saturday. I began my trek at Deschutes, and knowing that I was going to be sampling a few beers I made the 2 mile walk to try and offset the caloric intake. I had one of their special Oregon Sequicentennial beers there, then moved on to Bridgeport for their tour. Nothing especially groundbreaing on that tour (and in fact, our knowledgable tour guide had a tendency to go off on tangents fairly easily) and they wouldn’t let us take beer on the tour to boot, so booo to Bridgeport. The Lucky Lab brewery on Quimby proved more interesting, and the operations were more in my realm of understanding. See that over there? I have one of those, only smaller! They also treated us to samples of a port-aged stout that won’t be ready for another year, as well as some of the Super Duper Dog imperial IPA straight from the fermenter. Damn that was good. I love that beer, and I always look forward to their yearly release. Last was Hopworks, where we came in late to the tour but got a few samples nonetheless.

FAIL: I got sick on Saturday. Not a “too much beer” kind of sick–because I know your mind went there since I just discussed all the brewery tours I took–but this was more of a “my stomach is unhappy and is trying to start a rebellion” sort of sick. While walking from Hopworks to New Seasons to purchase dinner ingredients, my stomach started cramping up, but I resisted and made it there, bought my food, made it home, and managed to squeak out passable herb-roasted lamb chops with garlic smashed potatoes for dinner. Unfortunately, that was all I managed to do, and as soon as I finished I told Hanne (who thus far had been very understanding of my ailment) that I needed to go lie down. I was asleep by 7:30. I felt so bad, I couldn’t even finish the beer I opened to drink while cooking. Let me repeat that: I couldn’t even finish a beer. Yeah. That’s how bad I felt.

But, after 12 hours of sleep, 2 doses of Pepto, and three Advil I felt pretty good the next morning. So at least I still have my health, unlike my pink-eyed sister.

I tried to make up for Saturday’s Valentine’s Day debacle (because even though I detest the holiday, I’m honor-bound to enforce the rules nonetheless) by cooking what I hoped would be an equally-inspired dinner Sunday night, and what it lacked in timing it did make up for in deliciousness: spinach, sausage and roasted red pepper rustic torta. I burned my tongue a bit, but damn, that was a tasty torta. The recipe called for canned roasted red peppers, but I rebeled and roasted my own. Real men roast their own damn peppers. It used sliced baguette for the crust instead of whatever other tortas use, but the crustiness softened up under the onslaught of egg, cheese, and the afore-mentioned headlining ingredients.

And hey! I finished my open beer from the previous night, too. Never let a good IPA go to waste, I always say. Or something like that.

I had Monday off, which made for an extremely good weekend once I discovered that the previous week. Seriously–who gets Presidents Day off? Well, aside from mail carriers, and DMV employees, and pretty much every other federal employee? I do, I guess. Word. Hanne did not, however, so I got to walk her to the bus stop and she got to buy me coffee. I had planned on meeting up with a friend for a beer at Saraveza that afternoon, and since it wasn’t raining and I certainly had the time I decided to walk all the way up to North Portland. It was a nice 4 mile walk, and I even got to see some parts of Portland up close that I don’t ever remember seeing before, but of course, once I got there and ordered a beer my friend bailed on me. Sigh. I walked back to the Rose Quarter transit center (another 2 miles or so) and caught the bus Hanne normally catches so I could meet her on her way home, though, so it wasn’t a totally wasted afternoon. No, that’s the wrong expression–I had a nice walk, I bought some beer at Saraveza, and earned the sandwich I bought for dinner, so I think I had a pretty brilliant afternoon.

Due to or in spite of–I don’t know yet–Rogue’s purchase of the place, the Green Dragon is hopping (Ha! “Hopping”) tonight for the Double Mountain Brewers. Hanne and I haven’t been here often in the last few months not because of that, but just because our schedules don’t match up very well this term. She has class until 8 three nights a week, and the other four nights we either want to cook for ourselves or want to go get slightly healthier food than the Dragon has to offer. As a similar example, tomorrow night at the Horse Brass pub (which I’m still getting used to returning to after a much-deserved two and a half year absence) they’re serving a number of Deschutes Brewing beers, including a vertical tasting of three years of the sublime Abyss Imperial Stout as well as a few miscellaneous beers. That, of course, demands my attendance but despite their excellent fish and chips, Hanne prefers to eat elsewhere. I guess since almost everything there is deep-fried in the traditional English manner I can understand that feeling, but damn, everything there is deep-fried in the traditional English manner. Yum.

OK, Caesar salad break complete. Back to work.

I went for a run after work today and once again confirmed that I need to run more often, but at least I’m not hating running like I did for awhile late last year. Dunno why that happened. As the weather gets better, I’m looking forward to some of my more interesting routes to try and keep myself interested and working toward losing a bit of this beer-caused weight gain. I regret nothing! I eat well and I drink well!

Taking my lunch to work has certainly helped a bit, as I can tell that I’m eating less because I’m hungry by the time 2-3 PM rolls around. I’ve started taking a snack when I take my lunch, a piece of fruit or something similar. When I buy my lunch, I tend to eat a lot and not be hungry until dinner. Eating less is good! I eat pretty well generally, but portion sizes are something I need to work on. For example, for dinner I ordered the large chicken Caesar salad, but I did go for a run today and I was pretty hungry so I can forgive the quantity of oil in the dressing. It’s usually olive oil, anyway, and my sources tell me that olive oil is like drinking from the fountain of youth. In fact, I’ve often considered blending together olive oil and red wine to make the Elixir of Life until I remember that oil and water do not, in fact, mix, no matter how good the resulting product would be. Maybe some dark chocolate would help the blend.

But, back to food. I have been browsing the Bon Appetit website and collecting recipes I want to make, and I have a pretty good stable of things to make. Our biweekly Organics to You box is like a mystery box every time we get one, so that’s been a good indicator of what’s on the menu any given weekend. This weekend I think it will be Baked Penne with Farmhouse Cheddar and Leeks thanks to a well-timed leek in our box (presumably–I haven’t opened it yet and just looked at the box list online), and I think that calls for some excellent cheese. We have some nice cheddar in our fridge right now, but some very nice cheddar might be in order for this very glorified mac and cheese recipe.

About leeks for one second–I hate to sound like Jerry Seinfeld, but what’s the deal with leeks? All the recipes I’ve used that call for them tell me to use just the white and pale green part–fine–but their quantities are way off. For example, a Thanksgiving recipe I used called for using something along the lines of five leeks to get five cups, and once I’d chopped two of the five I had more than enough. Are my leeks like superleeks and the recipes call for regular leeks? I dunno, but the above recipe also calls for five leeks making five cups, so perhaps they’re just squeezing the hell out of them.

OK, a discussion of the usage of leeks in recipes means I’ve run out of material to write about, and now I shall finish my Alpenbrew ESB in silence.

Posted in Beer, Food, General, Hanne

In which beer is bottled and some other things happened

Feb12
2009 Written by Andrew

I finally got around to bottling my batch of beer that’s been sitting in the living room. I couldn’t remember when I brewed it, exactly, but it didn’t surprise me that it was in mid October. I had really slacked on bottling it, to say the least. I had left it in the fermenter after I’d planned on bottling it because I took a gravity reading and it still seemed high so I wanted to let it ferment for another week, but then a week went by…and another…and another…and well, I have trouble completing projects that get away from me, as I’m sure any number of past bosses would attest to. So last night I bottled it and was not surprised to discover that in the two and a half months since I’d taken the first gravity reading, it had only gone down 0.02, which is pretty much insignificant. I wish that I had been able to leave it in a wooden barrel of some kind so that at least some flavor was leaching off the container, but I’m relatively satisfied with the final product.

Of course, it’s a strong ale, and I really could have used one of those over the last two and half months, so I guess that’s the misfortune and irony of neglecting uncompleted projects.

Tonight Hanne’s at class like any other Thursday night, but I have plans of my own. The February Oregon Brew Crew meeting is tonight, but I’m blowing that off and going with my Dad to a dinner hosted at a restaurant a few blocks from here where they’re serving food and Full Sail beer and John Harris, brewmaster of Full Sail Brewing will be in attendance. I figure, if I’m going to blow off my homebrew club’s meeting, it better be something worthwhile and beer related. I’ve skipped a few meetings in the past for reasons that had nothing to do with bettering myself or prior obligations, but I think this counts.

And speaking of beer related, this Saturday is Oregon’s sesquicentennial, and in celebration a number of breweries and brewpubs around the state are throwing open their doors and giving tours. Now, a great many of them give tours already, but certainly not in organized fashions such as this. I have plans to hit up Bridgeport, Lucky Lab, and Hopworks all in one afternoon for the hat trick, and if I get my act together I just might see what Deschutes has going on, too. I’ve only taken one brewery tour since I started brewing–Rogue in Newport, and it wasn’t all that exciting–and seeing how the pros do it just might give me some ideas. Plus, most of them are serving special beers that day, too, so it’s definitely worth a look.

Hanne, unfortunately, will not be joining me for at least 2/3 of the tours given her rapidly increasing work as the term goes on. I’ve planned with my Dad and her Dad for two of them, and then we’ll all meet up at the third so at least Hanne can experience some of the fun. After that, it’s Valentine’s Day of course, in which I am contractually bound to write my yearly comment of how I don’t think that there should be one day dedicated to showing your significant other how much you care about them, and how if you have to save all that crap for once a year you’re just a cad to begin with. But, I still end up doing something nice in the end, which in my mind means cooking a very nice meal which I can share with Hanne. It’s not like we don’t do that sort of thing on a regular basis anyway, but to me a Very Nice Meal typically involves doubling the price of the wine we drink along with our meal. And maybe some flowers. Last year I made her Shepherd’s Pie and discovered that parsnips mixed with potatoes for the topping is the cat’s whiskers, and this year I’m trying to keep it a secret for a little longer. I tried so hard to keep the meal a secret last year to surprise her, but I cracked under the pressure of being so excited to make it for her as well as a few beers. This year I don’t have a super-special dish to prepare for her, but it’s going to be very tasty nonetheless.

I’ve gone for a run twice this week so far, which puts me squarely back into the groove I’d like to maintain for awhile assuming I can muster the strength to go one more time. Maybe after work tomorrow? That would be lovely. Of course, while I’ve been out in the real world doing real running, Hanne tells me that my Wii Fit avatar is looking mighty sad and dejected that I haven’t played since last week. Perhaps I’ll pop on this weekend and do some hula hoops and mentally chide myself for falling for guilt-tripping computer programming.

And now my Dad’s here, so I think we’ll go drink some beer.

Posted in Beer, Food, Geekery, General, Hanne

With a beer by my side

Oct14
2008 Written by Andrew

I went for a run after work today, and though it was painfully obvious that I’m (still) out of shape, it felt nice to be outside for a bit, wheezing as I was. Now I find myself back at the Green Dragon, once again abusing my giant mug as I indulge in a free mug of Hopworks’ fresh hop ale.

I’m going to also try their Imperial IPA and a bourbon barrel-aged “DOA” (Deluxe Organic Ale) before the night is over, methinks. I haven’t had their DOA since I downed three or four pints of it at Kelly’s Olympian a month or so ago with a couple of coworkers and went home both starvingly hungry since I managed to miss dinner as well as quite intoxicated. I’m leaving out the stop I had at the Deschutes brewpub in the Pearl before I went to Kelly’s, but if nothing else, that stressed that nights that involve Key’s Olympian are–for me at least–bad news. I ended up calling a pizza place as I was waiting for the bus to go home, and after picking it up I weaved my way back to my apartment, eating pizza as I walked. Not exactly what I’d call a moment of coordination, but hey, at least I went to bed not hungry.

Fresh hop ales like what I’m drinking are, for the most part, an invention of Oregon breweries to my knowledge. The popular super-hoppy and bitter IPAs can marginally be traced back to the first brewing of Rogue’s I2PA, but in deference to the California breweries who took it and ran with it (as well as the Oregon and Washington breweries who have contributed nearly as much since then) that particular style is called a “West Coast IPA.” Fresh hop ales are pretty native to Oregon, though they’re expanding. Hops, after picking, are kilned and dried to remove the water in them so that the massive quantities breweries need can be shipped to them at a lower cost. Plus, by doing so and then sealing them up in preserves them for longer periods of time.

With fresh hops, though, you brew a beer with the hops right off of the vine. No drying, just the raw “wet” hops. The result is a beer that’s not quite as bitter (you have to use around 6x as many fresh hops to get the bittering of dried hops), but is almost spicy in taste. My last batch of beer (well, batch before last, since I brewed on Sunday) partially used fresh hops, and I’m really looking forward to trying it. Fresh hops are best used for aroma and not bittering, but plenty of breweries around here with their connections can muster enough hops to make a batch or three of a beer using all fresh hops. Matter of fact, Lucky Lab recruited volunteers to pick the hops from all the vines they’d cut, offering free food and beer to those who pitched in, but since they don’t know what hops they harvested in their record 175 pound haul, they call their beer “The Mutt.” Which reminds me, I need to go have a pint or two of “The Mutt” before it’s all gone.

So, enough with the beer stuff. Well, almost. I’ve decided that I’m going to take a course that Chemeketa Community College is offering starting in January, a five-class course on professional brewing that covers everything from the raw ingredients to marketing and packaging. Also covering, naturally, such fine topics as brewing. As a homebrewer this will help me a tremendously in areas (as I’m more likely to follow certain brewing concepts once I know what they’re good for), plus if I ever have an opportunity or skill to jump into professional brewing (something I may or may not want to eventually do) I’ll have a nice base of knowledge. The course is being taught by the brewer from Rock Bottom here in Portland and once of the brewers from Bridgeport Brewing, and I think it would be a hell of a lot of fun to do.

Earlier today I realized that come Monday, Hanne and I will have been dating for two whole years. Two years! The exclamation is mostly because it doesn’t feel like it’s been that long, not because I never thought we’d make it two years, incidentally. If you’d asked me after our first date if we would be together two years later, I doubt I would have laughed in your face, but I would have been surprised. Hanne and I have never had what I’d consider to be a rocky relationship (and I’m sure she’ll correct me if I’m mistaken), but there was awhile in the beginning in which I enjoyed her company, but I didn’t know if I wanted to be with her as a couple. Long story short, I got over myself and she’s about ready to be my longest continuous relationship I’ve been involved with. And I wouldn’t change a thing.

Of course, I need to make some plans, maybe rustle up a gift. I feel like making her dinner instead of going out, but that’s going to require planning and maybe a little bit of shopping to boot.

Tomorrow’s third and final Presidential debate should be fun, and I’m planning on repeating the plans I made for the last two debates: sammich and beer, also known as the Andrew Special. This is the Deluxe Andrew Special, though–lots of beer, maybe even brewing beer at the same time, and comments hurled at the TV in fits of disbelief. At this point I’m watching not to make up my mind about who I’m going to vote for, but for sheer entertainment value.

Posted in Beer, General, Hanne

In which I recount a race time and manly geek skills

Sep11
2008 Written by Andrew

The 10k Pints to Pasta race came and went, and I did better than I thought I would, but not nearly as good as two years ago when I last ran. I wouldn’t say I’m out of shape, just not in as good of shape. Carrying extra weight and running yes doesn’t help, but I still managed to come in just under my goal–I felt like if I could finish in an hour, I’d be satisfied. Well I crossed the finish line at 1:00:17, and I was annoyed that I’d come in 17 seconds late until I realized that I didn’t cross the starting line until nearly 1:30 after the start of the race. With 3500 or so runners, it takes a bit to get there. So, I ended up with a time of a little over 58 minutes, which I’m satisfied with. My time two years ago was just over 45 minutes, so I didn’t do too much worse–just a bit slower and more methodical.

I chose not to participate in the 18 mile “Tour de Lab” bike ride to the three Lucky Lab brewpub locations, though. I rode my bike to and from the race , and since the Hawthorne Bridge was closed all day on Sunday I had to go an extra couple miles out of my way each time. I ended up riding about 10 miles on my bike to get there and back, and I was absolutely wiped out afterwards. I don’t think I’ve ridden that slowly on my bike in years. I had originally made plans to have lunch with a couple of friends of mine from Seattle who came down to run in the race, but I had to bail on them after I got home because there was no way I was going out again. Nuh uh. Instead, I sat in a chair and alternated browsing the Internet and napping, pretty much until it was time for dinner.

Our upstairs neighbors asked if if they could split the cost of Internet with us and mooch off Hanne’s and my connection, and while I was initially skeptical about exposing my network to people I don’t really know all that well, after taking a few precautions regarding password protecting, I thought that perhaps splitting the cost might be a good idea. I even took the opportunity to upgrade the speed of our connection to compensate for the extra users and five-way cost split, which is something I’d wanted to do anyway, but Hanne was concerned about paying additional costs for bills as a student. I had a perfect excuse now! So now instead of a paltry 1.5 Mbps DSL connection, I have a much more mainstream 7 Mbps connection. I could probably go even faster if I did cable, but frankly, I just don’t wnat to have anything to do with Comcast. Qwest has served me well, and I don’t have to buy any additional equipment or change anything up–I did everything online and they just opened the Internet up a little more for us.

Once the speed boost went into effect, though, I started noticing that our connection was seriously dragging. Granted, I have a tendency sometimes to saturate the bandwidth as I’m downloading something, but it’s not for extended periods of time and it didn’t affect anyone except Hanne, who typically only browses, anyway. So, what to do? Knock on the door leading to upstairs and yell at them to stop whatever it was they’re doing? Nope. When people don’t hear anything, they think they’re getting away with it, and I don’t want to knock on the door every time my Internet connection slows down. Instead, I used my skills as a Network Support Technician and I simply guaranteed Hanne and myself a certain chunk of bandwidth to use at any given time. The way the connection works is that any one person can use as much or as little of the connection as their computer can possibly handle, and then when more than one person tries that, things slow down for everyone. I set aside a rule in my router to say that if the Internet connection is saturated by someone else, either Hanne’s or my computer are guaranteed to use up to the amount of our previous Internet connection speed, and the rest is available for everyone else to use. That’s only when the connection is busy, though, and so if no one else is using it, I or anyone else gets the full amount to themselves. I decided to be magnanimous about the amount set aside for my use, though–I had originally set it to be 75% of the connection, but I’m happy with my old speed back if it gets busy.

And sure, I could do this for everyone and make sure that everyone has a chunk of bandwidth set aside for them, but if the connection gets bogged down among the three people upstairs, I’ll let them sort out which one of them is hogging the connection. I felt this was a better option than simply degrading the connection for them. They are splitting the cost with me, even if I do own the equipment and have the know-how to make myself King of my connection.

Hanne takes off today for a weekend in Minnesota to see her college friends, and so I find myself without companionship for the next few days. Tomorrow after work I’m going to meet my Dad at the Bridgeport Brewpub for a couple of pints of their Hop Harvest fresh hop ale that’s debuting tomorrow, and then after that the weekend is pretty much on my own. I have a lot of stuff to do to prepare for Dan coming and staying with us next week, like organizing and cleaning, but that can’t possibly take up the whole weekend. Perhaps I shall find a game and play it until I can play no more, or cook myself a fine dinner and watch manly movies like Die Hard or Rambo.

Nah. I’ll probably end up doing a lot of cleaning, a lot of sitting around, and maybe watch one movie. Face it–I’m whipped.

Posted in Beer, Food, Geekery, General, Hanne, Movies

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