What the hell is the Dance of the Seven Ales!? It had to be one of the most unorganized-zany-fun-stoopid-cool-off-centered Dogfish Head / Grey Lodge Pub events that exist. I have never been to the Grey Lodge Pub before but have heard good things, and as you know I am a huge Dogfish Head fan – so it seemed like a good idea to check it out.
So, Robert and I went to check it out, this is how it was billed: “Dogfish Head Dance of the 7 Ales with Sam Caligione. The Grey Lodge Pub and Dogfish Head will present Dance of the 7 Ales. Separately Dogfish Head and The Grey Lodge Pub are known for crazy (OK “stupid” might be more accurate) ideas and events, so a combined event should be extra “stupid”.
There will be 7 dances, on video, to go with each beer. And patrons are invited to create their own interpretative dance (costumes are a bonus) for a Dogfish ale or ales of their choice (bring your own music). There will be prizes for the most creative dances.
And of course there will be amazing 7 Dogfish Head ales on hand, some super rare, some less so but great nonetheless. Dogfish Head ales have been known to be effective in the aiding of dancing.
Sam will be bringing Dogfish’s Hoppy the Clown dart board game. Clowns are scary, but this seems to be OK; we can throw darts at the clown. For some of the time, Scoats will likely be wearing an old mummers costume, which was fun for everyone but him last Groundhog Day. Most likely there will be additional idiocy as well.”
Of course they had great Dogfish Head beers available: Black & Blue, Festina Peche, Fort, Raison d’Etre, 90 Minute IPA, 60 Minute IPA, Red & White, and World Wide Stout. I believe the beer rotation went R&W, Festina Peche, WWS, B&B, Raison, and then a 60 Minute. The WWS was priced basically at store price and the B&B was $20 a bottle, not a cheap night to say the least. Basically the idea was that they paired YouTube videos with the different beers. So essentially everyone gathered around a computer screen to watch the videos. The funny thing is, that is exactly what Robert and I were doing before we left – Pickle Surprise!
Later, Mitchell came up. We played many a round of Cricket. The Grey Lodge had a dope score board called the DartMaster III. After abusing the Grey Lodge for several hours we wound up at Kildaire’s Irish Pub for a while. Drank some more, ate (sliders, nice), and played more Cricket. It was a good long night, things got started about 6PM and I got home around 2:30AM. It’s going to be a long day at work. Check out some of the pictures above.
This past weekend I had my first trip up to Boston in over 10 years. The last time I was there was for the Phish New Year’s Eve run of 1996 – I have fond memories of wearing Birkenstock sandals in the middle of a blizzard, staying at a relative of a friend with way too many people in such a small place. Ahhh, what a great time.
Fortunately for me, I had a great time this time too, and I actually got to see some of the city this time. This year I went up with the five lovely people above: Jody, Dave, Karen, Heather, and Paul. From what I gather, JDH&P have gone up to Boston annually for the past couple years, I think it was all originally based around going to a Red Sox game at Fenway Stadium. So, this year Karen & I were asked to join the crew on their annual pilgrimage to Boston. We made reservations at the exclusive Omni Parker House right in the middle of downtown. The OPH is a historic building and the originator of the Boston Cream Pie (my favorite). The hotel was very nice, but because of its age the rooms were smaller than I would have preferred. Because of the location of the hotel using the public transportation or walking wherever we went was a snap.
We actually left on Thursday night so we could get the majority of the driving done before the weekend and not waste all of our time driving. Since there were six of us and we wanted to all ride in one vehicle we decided to rent a Toyota Sienna mini-van for the weekend. I must say, the mini-van was dope. We all fit comfortably, it drove like a dream, it had a DVD player (which we never used), and got great gas mileage. I totally think it was a smart thing to do, plus we got hooked up through my buddy Todd because he works at the dealership. So, essentially Thursday was boring driving. We stopped about 30 minutes from Boston in Framingham, I believe.
The next morning we decided to head into Cambridge and get some breakfast and kill some time before going to the hotel, we weren’t sure if we would be able to get an early check in or not. Found a nice little diner and chilled out. After the diner I suggested we look for the Cambridge Brewing Company and grab a beer. We got shitty directions from our waitress and began looking for the CBC. Well, after about 45 minutes we still couldn’t find it, we decided it was time to head into Boston and try to find the hotel. When we did get to the hotel we were able to check-in early and got adjoining rooms. For whatever reason I was kind of out of it by this point and kind of continued to be for the rest of the day.
After checking in we were off again. This time we went for a walk to the open air market area and then to a neat Irish bar called the Black Rose. We only stayed for one beer and I guess I should have gotten a Guinness, but instead I drank another Boston favorite Harpoon. After the Black Rose we walked into the Little Italy area and found a few nice spots to stop and grab another beer and some excellent espresso. After heading back to the hotel and regrouping a little we headed out for dinner at the 21st Amendment, kind of a little hole in the wall bar with maybe 20 seats right on the outskirts of downtown. The beer selection kind-of sucked but the food was better-than-average bar food. After dinner we went for a walk through the ‘rich’ area of town and headed back to the hotel to hang out and have a few beers. While we were chilling, the decision was made to rent and watch Borat around midnight. I must say, it was a lot funnier than I was expecting, plus lead to many quotes for the rest of trip, ‘It’s a nice!’
Saturday was the day I was looking forward to. We already had dinner reservations at a nice restaurant and essentially the rest of the day was wide open. Dave & Paul headed off to the Red Sox game at about the same time that the girls and I headed off to Harpoon Brewery. We knew that they did free tours on Saturday and wanted to try and get to the early one. The ride out to Harpoon wasn’t too complicated though we almost missed a transition from the train to the bus. The “tour” was pretty cool. Basically they have a little shop where they sell merchandise and beer with a bar set-up in the middle. Pretty much they had like six or seven beers on tap and there tour really consisted of a tasting of all the beers. We also got to go out on the brew platform, but in all honesty it isn’t very exciting. I did wind up picking up four beers from their 100 Barrel Series, so I was stoked about that. I got the Peche, the Refsvindinge Private Stock, the encore series Barleywine, and the encore series of the Smoked Porter.
After Harpoon it was back to the hotel to drop off beers and then to decided to where next. Originally we had planned on going to Sam Adams Brewery and getting a tour and tasting there, but we decided instead to try and find the Publick House and grab a couple beers there instead. It took us a good hour to pull our shit together and get an address, phone number, and directions, and then another good forty-five minutes or so to get there. By this point it was starting to get later than we wanted it to be and we still had not eaten lunch plus had out fancy dinner in a few hours that night. Regardless we all got food and beers. I must say I really liked this place. The closest comparison around here would be Monk’s Cafe in Philadelphia but with more room and less snotty attitude, but with just as great a beer selection. This is the kind of place that would be a do-not-miss kind of place if anyone ever asked me about Boston. I had a nice calamari salad and a glass of St. Bernardus 12 followed by a Founder’s Imperial Stout for dessert. Everything was cool and eclectic, I really enjoyed that break in the day.
After the Publick House it was back to the hotel to chill out and clean up before dinner. The restaurant we made reservations at, Grille 23, is a Boston steak house destination for sure. It was a very nice restaurant where they are listed as being in the 10 best steaks in the country, and have hand selected beef from a private farm, sounds tasty to me. We all got dressed-up pretty and grabbed a cab out to the location. Originally I was a little off put by the volume (noise) of the people inside the restaurant, but that was quickly evaporated as we were lead upstairs to a private little nook that made the place feel just right. We enjoyed a bottle of Pinot Noir and a bottle of Cabernet, I don’t remember what brand they were, but I do remember that I was totally blown away by the Cabernet, great wine. Along with the wine I started with a Nantucket Clam Chowder, which was a slightly thinner spicier clam chowder in comparison to a Boston Clam Chowda. Most of the table enjoyed the traditional Wedge Salad, but Grille 23 threw their twist on it by serving the lettuce wedge with an 8th of a small wheel of blue cheese and a large fresh piece of bacon versus the standard blue cheese crumble and chopped bacon – it looked delicious. For my main dish I chose the 10oz Fillet Mignon cooked medium-rare and it was perfect. And in all honesty after looking at all the other meals, mine looked the best, simple but perfect. For dessert the table chose to split a fresh strawberry ice cream cake, it tasted very much like a frozen strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries, delicious also. After dinner we some how wound up walking back to the hotel, I guess it was closer than I initially realized. That night we just chilled back at the hotel again, which was about all I could have handled.
By the time Sunday morning came around most everyone was ready to be home. We did the slow get ready to go and hit the pike. We decided to wait until we got on the road to stop for breakfast which quickly turned into two hours later and stopping for lunch. The car ride home was mostly unproductive, but we did manage to miss almost all the traffic which was sweet. After getting home and dropping everyone off, we still needed to head to the car rental place and drop off the car. All-in-all it was quite a wearing car ride home, but so totally worth the trip. I hope the six of us get to do something like this again sometime soon.
Sunday was the Annual Sly Fox Bock Fest & Goat Race. Per usual it was a helluva-good time. Don’t even know where to start except for the fact that we didn’t score a goat for the race, so there was no Grundles McFister Maibock this year. Oh well, beer happens.
It was cool, I wound up going up with Robert this time again and we ran into a few characters. We ran into, Guy, Prague, and Tommy of the Team Fuck-All-Y’all fame, Rick and Natalie from Stewart’s, and Jason from Keystone Homebrew. It’s always cool to run into familiar faces. We unfortunately showed up in time for the final heat of the goat race. So once again I was all pissed-off. They seemed to have run out of food, glasses, and some beer rather quickly – but otherwise it was once again a rather chill cool event. It makes me wonder when they are going to out grow their current facilities?
What I look like through the new “Grundles McFister” Maibock.
Saturday the 28th was the annual Trail Dawgs Triple Crown event. At this event there are multiple races to choose from: a marathon (26.2 miles), a half-marathon (13.1 miles), a 10K (about 6 miles), a 5K (about 3 miles), and theTriple Crown which is the half-marathon, 10K, and 5K back-to-back-to-back. We participated in the half-marathon.
This was our third year running the Trail Dawgs half-marathon (nice cheesy picture of us after the race). Overall I’d say it was probably the best year so far. The first year was a decent run for Robert but was a royal pain for me. The first year it had rained for like two days before hand and was still raining in the morning. Plus this is a 13.1 trail run with two creek crossings, so that made it quite difficult. It sounds weak to point it out now, but I was just about to buy new sneakers before that race, so my old sneaks just could not get traction during that race, and there are a bunch of up hills – regardless it was very tough for me. The second year was better, well for me (my best time out of the three years). That year I had a decent run, actually a pretty good run, and Robert was all jacked up. He had just finished reading a book called Chi Running which has a neat theory on how to run better. So Robert was trying to apply the Chi Running techniques during the half-marathon, but hadn’t had enough time to practice the theories so it actually made his run harder on him. But, this year we basically both were on point. It turned out to be Robert’s best time of the three which is good. During the race I never felt completely drained and afterward we both were feeling pretty good, especially after we cracked into a bomber of Rogue’s 2006 Old Crustacean Barleywine and a Three Floyd’s Dreadnought Double IPA (only small beers, snicker). Trail Dawgs day is always a good time, just a long day overall.
After the race we decided it was time to go to Twin Lake’s Brewery and pick up some growlers. Unfortunately since it was an unplanned trip we didn’t have any empty growlers, so we had to pay $10 for two deposits on glass which made it so we bought 1 less growler, but we still got 2. We each sampled 3 beers while we were picking up our growlers. There new beer was available the Caesar Rodney Gold. It was good, just to similar to there other beers, what they need now is something ‘different’ for them. The Twin Lake’s sales man Matt Day joked that they were working on a sports beer, a la Gatorade beer or something, it was pretty funny.
On Friday the 13th was Don “Big D” McCloskey’s CD Release “Party” Show at Johnny Brenda’s in Philly. As far as I know it is his first time playing there, to a sold out crowd no less, plus he had his new band in tow with him. To say it was a blast for all is an understatement.
The new disc “Northern Liberties” came out about a month ago on Big D’s own Lemon Hill Records. One of the songs “This Just In” was also featured on WMMR’s Local Shots Volume 3 disc. I think because of the LSV3 CD Big D was getting some air play on MMR, especially during Jaxon’s show. It’s nice to see a local favorite take it to the next level; radio play and interviews, going from solo act to full band sound, playing new and larger venues, and dropping a new disc all within a month or two span – Big D’s prayers from “Open the Door” may have just begun to be answered.
The show itself was a blast! I went up with Karen, Todd, Jody & Heather and met up with Mikey, Wooly & Mitchell and later Big Steve “The Hammer”. Unfortunetly, the show sold out before Mitchell could get a ticket, bummer. We all basically hung out together for the night which was fun. The opening act Nervous Cabaret was LOUD. That is pretty much the best way to describe them. They are a 7 piece out of NY with only 3 member there that night. I seriously thought my ear drums were damaged. I did start to get into them at the end, but all in all – not so much.
By the time Big D came out (11:00ish) Todd was recked, and he knew it. He was trying to roll with it and have fun, but it eventually caught up with him. The band took the stage burning hot – a lead guitar/banjo player whose sound was good and full, a mellow bass player, an almost non-existent keyboard player, and a very charismatic drummer, plus Big D tore the place up. Johnny Brenda’s has a capacity of 250 and I think they were pushing 325+. Initially they played a lot of stuff off the new album (not surprising), then threw in some off the old album (Bombs Over Bristol) but more rocky/funk-style then the album versions. Big D then let the band take a break and he played maybe 4 songs acoustic style. When the band came back it was time for the long 14-different-encores-kick-you-in-the-shins-wrap-up. Several highlights from the show, but one good one was during “Up In This”, Big D pulled an Eddie Vedder from the Even Flow video and climbed up onto the front of the balcony to perform with his mega-phone. After he was done with the verse how else are you going to get back to the stage besides drop into the audience and crowd-surf? It was very enjoyable to say the least. Todd was walked out to the car at about 12:00AM to pass-out, and Big D went off about 1:30AM so we all could go home and pass-out.
You can watch a video of Big D’s “Up In This” from Johnny Brenda’s on YouTube here:
You can pick up the new album at some of the usual places: CD Baby, iTunes, Amazon – check it out!
Last Saturday Wooly through a Birthday Party for himself. It was a great time and I’m really not going to go into too much detail. Erik Mitchell’s band with Robert and Corey played which was really cool because they decided to have a lot of fun with it, check out the set list below:
4/7/07 The Rodney Latimer Memorial (Stonehenge) Amphitheater, Wilmington, DE Old Man*>
Wanted Dead Or Alive*
Baba Dochia
Need You Tonight*
The Humpty Dance>
Catapult*>
The Humpty Dance
Worst Woman
Chili’s Theme Song*^
The Bride Of The Black Sea
Pepper’s Ghost
Dukes Of Hazzard Theme*^
Ocean Man*
She’ll Follow
What I Got*
Eye Of The Tiger*
Elderly Woman Behind The Counter>
Dick In A Box Tease
The Jefferson’s Theme*+
Morning Dew*
Staying Alive
Real Men Of Genius*(see below)>
Happy Birthday*
America, Fuck Yeah*>
So Ronery*>
Montage*
Martyr
Locomotive Breath*%
Easy*
In The Bayou*
Hells Bells/Kells Bells*$
Cracklin’ Rosie*
If This Is It*#
Grandma’s Hands
Bri-Bri Beer Spill Jam*>
The House Of Osiris>
Franklin’s Tower*@
Son Of A Preacher Man*
Dirt
What’s Going On*~
Easy To Love You
Piece Of The Pie
Cherry Hill Nissan Theme*+
Out In The Rain
Wharf Rat
Sleep
I Try
Every Rose Has Its Thorn*
all songs with Corey Bonser on bass, Robert Desjardin on drums (except Locomotive Breath and Real Men Of Genius)
*first time played
^w/Dan Woolard and Erik Mitchell on vocals
+w/Mike Kavanagh and Erik Mitchell on vocals
%w/Robert Desjardin on vocals
$w/Mike Kavanagh on vocals
#w/Corey Bonser on vocals
@w/David Carson and Mike Kavanagh on vocals
~w/David Carson on vocals
Real Men Of Genius:
This week we salute you, Daniel Craig Woolard.
(what’s up Wooly)
Without you, Don McCloskey would have no one to hold his harmonica.
(slobbering on his hand)
We know you like to be at the concert five hours early, and that your pockets are full of Immodium.
(no poop pills pack me up tight)
You have an entire room in your house dedicated to porn.
(57″ wide-screen gapes, yeah)
You’re the only human over twelve years old who Tivo’s Battlestar Gallactica.
(he’s so gay for Gaius)
Rule #137 – No one is allowed to drive your car… ever.
(it smells like dead french fries)
Your friend once made you a beer with your name and picture on it, but you couldn’t drink it because it wasn’t in a green bottle.
(so sorry Bri-Bri)
So put this on the list Mr. Listmaker, right after you buy your new Ikea writing table.
(you support the Swedish economy)
Even though we know your circles never cross, we believe you truly are having sex…
Happy Birthday Wooly
It was an awesome night to say the least. Thanks, Wooly.
Last weekend (March 31st, April 1st & 2nd) Robert and I went for a 3-day 45 mile backpacking trip. We have tried to go every year for the past 5 years, but somehow it has turned out to be every other year or so. With Robert completing an Outward Bound course during the summer of 2006, I think we were ready for another adventure. Some of the prerequisites for this trip were: it had to be during a specific time frame (Robert’s spring break), it shouldn’t be more than about 4 hours drive away (this was 3 and a half), and going south sounded better than going north (OK, we went west). After all the planning was done, we were off. All basically went to plan except for one thing, we planned the trip without a map. We tried to order one over 2 weeks in advance and it never showed, so we had to buy it the day of. Originally we were hoping to do three 15 mile days, instead it turned out to be more like a 15, a 19, and a 11 mile day.
Since this has now been over a week ago, I may not go into as much detail, but I’ll run through each day. Saturday (March 31st) I got up about 4:30AM to finish packing, take my last shower for several days, and eat some breakfast to pick Robert up by 6AM. I left the house a little after 6 running late and we were officially on the road a little after 6:30. It was about a 3 and a half hour car ride south on I-95 to Baltimore than west on I-70 to GRSF. We checked in at the office, paid our fees, and got our map. After looking at the map and seeing the state had built a few Adirondack Shelters, we decided to get going and aim for one of them – about 15 miles away, which turned out to be mostly down hill. It was a long day to say the least. I was up late the night before, up early that day, had driven a decent drive (why does driving take so much out of you?), and was now hiking in the “mountains” of Maryland with a 50 pound pack on my back.
Robert and I quickly slipped into Bundles McFister and Duchon Mandik mode rather quickly. That night we stayed in one of the shelters. It was both very cool and very weird. The coolness was that we didn’t have to set-up or break-down the tent, we were pretty much guaranteed to stay dry if it rained (we had a 50% chance for most of the weekend), and it gave you a place to sit down other than the ground. The weirdness for me basically boiled down to the fact of my sense of security was all wacked out while sleeping since these things only have 3 walls instead of 4 – it made me feel very exposed.
The next morning (April 1st) we woke up kind of crunchy. Fortunately it had not rained while we were asleep, so we got to start our day dry and prepare some breakfast and break camp. We knew today would be the most miles (we weren’t sure quite how long when we started) and the flattest of all the days, so that worked out to be a good combination. Funnily, as soon as we started hiking the rain started, it only really lasted an hour or two but the timing was hilarious. Just to get the morning off to a good start, while we were crossing a creek I slipped and fell. Just before my face was about to hit a rock, I caught myself and thought I was OK, but because of the momentum, my back kept going and busted me in the back of the head slamming my face into the rock. Robert was in front and didn’t see it happen, but when he turned around and asked what happened all I said was ‘I face-planted’. In the long run no major injuries, no stitches or anything just a funky bleeding nose for a couple hours.
We were hiking from GRSF to the C&O canal and we were going to follow the C&O canal tow path from Lock 67 to Lock 58. The exciting things about the C&O canal from my perspective were the Paw Paw Tunnel, the first couple Locks we saw, and the fact that we camped in a place named Devil’s Alley. Other than that, the C&O canal tow path has got to be one of the most boring, repetitive, straight, and boring, repetitive, straight, and repetitive trails I have ever hiked, especially for as long as we did. My feet were turning into meat-puppets and my attitude was not staying high. We eventually hit Devil’s Alley campsite which was feet away from the Potomac River. And right when we hit camp, right when we took our bags off – it started to rain again. This almost broke me. I was so exhausted, I was starting to feel like Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump when he is yelling during the storm on the shrimp boat. It rained for about another hour – long enough this time to get most stuff wet while we set up and most of the easily accessible firewood wet too. I would have loved to have had another one of those shelters again that night. Everything else went alright that night. After we went to bed, a few hours later it really started to rain for a little over an hour, lightning and thunder – the whole deal. So to say that sleeping wasn’t easy isn’t saying much at all.
The next morning (April 2nd) we were both drained. Two nights of not enough sleep after too much physical activity can just wipe you out. The positive was we knew it would be the shortest amount of miles, the negative was that it was basically all uphill. Actually let me rephrase that, it could have been all up hill, but instead it was repeatedly up really big hills just to go back down again and to do that over and over again about 4 or 5 times. And when I say big hills, I’m talking 1 to 2 mile stretches with 500+ feet elevation gains and drops. That third day was an ass-kicker of a day. Even with the shortened miles, but because of the elevation changes, it still took us a full day to do the hike. We arrived at the trail head where the car was about 5PM.
We both brought a clean set of clothes for the car ride home (lesson learned from the past), changed, called our girls, and hit the pike – next stop, Brewer’s Alley in Frederick Maryland. Brewer’s Alley is a brewpub about an hour from GRSF and about 5 or so miles off the interstate. It was nice to have a beer, and food someone else cooked, and to sit in a stable environment, but it is always weird to have to deal with people, and traffic, and not peeing wherever you want. The cask-conditioned dry stout was excellent. It took us longer to get home than I would have wished, but home and safe we made it all the same.
I hope we get to go on another trip soon. We try to go once a year which doesn’t happen, but I’d really like to go twice a year to once a season. We started to talk about a trip in June when Robert is done school, we’ll see. Even though it probably comes off that I am bitching about this trip a lot ( and we bitched a lot on the trail too), I still really enjoy myself and feel a great sense of accomplishment when I have finished. Good job buddy.
