Today marks 75 years since beer was once again made legal in this country. After a few dark years of underground boozing and the rise to power of the mafia, the government wised up, at least momentarally, to repeal Prohibition and once again allow booze to flow freely!
So lift up a pint and celebrate 75 years of legalized beer! Here’s to you beer, and 75 more years of deliciousness!
Awhile ago the brewery attempted to get a license so that we could sell beer by the pint. The theory was that we would have a couple nights a week where we would do a happy hour. The town dropped the hammer on that idea though. Still, they ended up purchasing a couple of pub tables and some pub chairs. All of them finally arrived the other day and I put them all together, so in the retail front they sit. They look good there – they make the room look a lot less empty, but still, part of me thinks they seem silly for being there. Though it occurred to me that while they might not be overly useful in terms of the customer, they would make a great Ithaca Beer after hours.
Hey, it’s the random things that I think when it gets slow.
I always have the best of intentions to update this site with far more regularity, especially after all the issues (technical and political) with LiveJournal these days. Of course I haven’t exactly updated that with any regularity either other than to remind people of various Ithaca Beer going ons. I’m sure not really many people read this, which is entirely understandable with how infrequently it has been updated. Though with a good RSS aggregator it saves you from always checking a site for new posts(I love NewsFire, one of the numerous pieces of shareware I’ve registered these days).
Of course on the theme of updating people about events I’ll take this moment to plug our event at Felicia’s Atomic Lounge tonight. Tonight at 7pm Ithaca Beer Co. is having our release party for Kaffinator – a Double Espresso Bock. It’s a beer we collaborated with Gimme! coffee to make. It’s damn good, especially for anyone who loves coffee. There’s closing in on a shot of espresso per bottle. I have the feeling this will be the best release party we’ve thrown in Ithaca yet!
Last night we finally bottled the barley wine. At least with this style letting it condition in the secondary isn’t a bad thing. Tasted some out of the jar I took the hydrometer reading from. Pretty yummy. You can feel the heat from the alcohol though – I’m hoping that’s going to mellow after a nice long time conditioning in the bottles. I’m sure I’ll try some after a month or so, but with a beer like this you want it to age for several months in the bottle first.
Tomorrow I head to Ellictoville, NY for the Rites of Spring Beer and Wine fest. I’m going to be representing Ithaca Beer. I’m especially excited because they’re having a Real Ale competition. I’ve never actually had any cask conditioned beer before so I’m really anxious to try these. I’m bringing a cask conditioned version of our Flower Power. It should be damn good. But I certainly want to try a little bit of everything. It’ll also be good to meet some people from other breweries around the state and maybe make a few contacts. It’s nice to make the New York brewing community a more friendly place. Working together I think we can make the New York beer scene one of the best out there – at the very least we can give it our best shot. Also, hell, I just like talking about beer.
Last night was the release party for the White Gold. There was a decent sized crowd there. It was good to see a majority of the staff show up for it – it’s always quite the change hanging out with these people outside of the work setting. Sure, our work is really casual. Still, people always act a little different when they are outside of the workplace. It was really gratifying to see just how much of the White Gold they were pouring at Pixel. Looking around nearly every table was filled with people drinking glasses of it. We can only hope that the event for each beer gets bigger than the one before it. One down. Three more to go.
For the Sabres it’s four down, twelve to go. Sixteen is the magic number of wins. Sixteen wins gets you Lord Stanley’s cup. I don’t care what people say, it is the finest trophy in all of sports. It’s etched with history – the names of all those others who lifted the cup in triumph. It’s inspiring. The other series are nearly over. Today the Devils won thus settling the dust in the first round for the East. Next up the Sabres face another New York metro area team as they meet the Rangers. Sure, the Ranger’s surprised me with how handily they beat Atlanta. I was pretty sure they would beat Atlanta, I just didn’t expect them to sweep them as if the Thrashers didn’t even bother to field a team. Still, I’m not worried. I’ve seen the Rangers game. The Sabres have what it takes to play against them. No, they won’t roll over them, but I don’t expect this series to be a nail biter. Really, the only team out there that worries me right now is the Ottawa Senators so I am hoping that the Devils take care of them so the boys from Buffalo won’t have to meet them in the conference finals.
I’m watching the Detroit vs. Calgary game right now. This series has been ridiculous. Basically the home team has gotten all the breaks, scored all the goals, dictated all the plays. This game, in Calgary, is pretty tight though. I was wondering how it would be after game 5 in which the Calgary backup goaltender went berserk and smashed his stick across someones chest. Ouch. Goalies have a big fuckin’ stick. It’s a 1-1 game currently. Even if the “only win at home” thing holds Detroit has the advantage as game 7 is in Detroit. Though Detroit smells blood. A win tonight and they move on. They don’t want to give Calgary any chance to get back in to this one and I don’t blame them. The Flames are a tough team – and Detroit players are already feeling blue from last seasons early exit. They really want to avoid that one.
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