Tag Archives: dime draft

Long ago and far away…

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Anyone who knew me in high school will probably attest that I wasn’t one of the kids that was going to show up at a party. Frankly, I’m still not one of the kids who shows up at parties. As a general rule lots of people and lots of noise makes me nervous and jerky. As usual, though, that’s not my point. My point (this time) is that I was a late sacwbloomer in the world of alcohol. I don’t think I had my first “serious” drink until I was 18 or 19. At that point my illicit underage drinking budget mostly allowed for such libations as “Mad Dog” 20/20, Milwaukee’s Best, Red Dog, and Honey Brown if it was a McPayday.

That all changed late in the summer of 1997. That’s when I met Sam Adams Cherry Wheat for the first time and realized that beer didn’t have to taste like ass. Unfortunately, you do have to pay a premium for non-skunky beer, but that summer opened my eyes to the idea that tasty adult beverages could be about more than drinking until you fall down. Sure, I still managed to do plenty of that during the last three years of my academic career (Hello quarts at Hi-Way, dime drafts at Repub, and the serve-all-comers dive in the basement of the Gunter Hotel), but the seed was planted.

My palate has widened considerably from it’s humble beginnings with Sam’s Cherry Wheat, but on days like today, when the humidity is up and sitting out in sun is the order of the day, it’s still my go to beverage of choice. There are surely better cherry brewed beers out there these days, but none of them will ever take the place of beer I fell in love with long ago and far away.

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

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1. Big Brother Knows Best. His distinguished honor the Mayor of New York City said earlier this week that “…our obligation first and foremost is to keep our kids safe in the schools; first and foremost, to keep you safe if you go to a sporting event; first and foremost is to keep you safe if you walk down the streets or go into our parks.” He went on to say “We cannot let the terrorists put us in a situation where we can’t do those things. And the ways to do that is to provide what we think is an appropriate level of protection.” Public safety is a key critical function of government, I agree, but we shouldn’t buy it at the expense of our other liberties. Whether they’re lost to a terrorist’s bomb to to the government trying to stop the terrorists, once those rights are gone, they’re never, ever coming back. If we let cowards change the way we live or lives, if we let government tell us how much privacy we should have or how much of other essential freedoms we need to have or how much we should be willing to surrender, well, I’m not sure I know what we’re fighting for anyway.

2. Moving the Goal Posts. I’m a tiny cog in a vast machine. As such, I’m cognizant that I have almost no control over my own schedule and even less influence over setting the agenda… but honest to God, I’ve had the same meeting scheduled and cancelled three times over the course of two days. Priorities shift, sometimes on short notice. That’s fine. I’m all for improvising, adapting, and overcoming. The hurry up and wait mentality is as old as the institution I serve – far older really. I have a suspicion that the Greek and Roman bureaucracies were not strangers to WTF moments. Expecting a schedule that everyone can agree to and stick with is a pipe dream… but that doesn’t make the constant moving goal posts any less obnoxious.

3. Thursday. Screw you, Thursday. You use to be cool. You use to be thirsty. You use to have dime drafts. Now you’re just as much a crank as any of the other weekdays – just another work-a-day trudging towards the weekend. Not even your neighbor Friday is good for much of anything these days. He’s in a pissy mood until the middle of the afternoon, so I don’t really have much use for him either. The only thing that makes either one of your tolerable is that the path to Saturday runs right through you. That’s the only reason you’re not dead to me.