Category: Life

The 2010 Annual Fall Beer Review 2

Mike and I are back, talking about beer. (Shocker!) This time we are discussing another Pumpkin Ale and it had a bit of a surprise for us both. Judging from the amount of hits, comments and emails, our last review went better than I had anticipated. So this time we included a little skit. See if you know the movie.

Thanks for watching these. It’s nice to take a Saturday, drink beer and feel like you are being productive and creative. Or acting like a 13-year-old with mom’s video camera. Which ever. The next one will come later on this week with more beers and the much-anticipated Sierra Nevada “Tumbler”. Be excited. And if you’re not….lie to me.

(I still say “um” like 900 times. My college Public Speaking 101 professor is shitting twice and dying right now.)

 

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OH!…

…SHIT!!!!

So you know that race I ran a few weeks ago where I was trying to run 100 miles? Yeah…they miscalculated the exchange and we ran 83.4 miles instead. That means I damaged my body for little more than a “guess what I did” story that if I did tell people, they would certainly believe I am an idiot for such an endeavour. No 100 miles to log for future registered races or medals to hang in the office. Nope, just a beaten body and sparse memory of the journey itself. But…

I’M OKAY!!!

There will be other races and other chances. Thanks for all the well-wishes. Love you all!

The next beer vlog will be up in a couple of days. Get prepped for some awesome possums!

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Back In 100

I am updating this at about 11:30pm in the back of my Honda Element, snug in a sleeping bag with a huge thunderstorm pounding away. Why am I in the back of my car, you ask? Great question.
Tomorrow I am running the Xterra 100 race to the sea relay that started in NY. I just have to do the 100 mile portion.
So, here I sit in Bend, Oregon (greatest place in the world) trying to sleep and thinking of you.
I hope I survive this but should I not, it has been a pleasure. Please feed my cat.

Peace and love,

Will VM

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The 2010 Fall Beer Review: Episode 1

It’s that time of the year again! My liver always tells me so and so do the crisp winds of autumn, pumpkin patches on church lawns, fake severed limbs in a Rite-Aid and NFL dominated Sunday-Fundays. Such a wonderful time to be alive and we celebrate by drinking the seasonal brews that bottle the essence of what makes Fall so great.
This year you will be meeting me in a face-to-face review more commonly referred to as a Vlog. While I had some trepidation with putting my stuffy-nose voice and poor screen presence in place of a written blog, Sierra Nevada Brewery shot me an email asking me to review the Tumbler and suggested a video. I know I’m not the prettiest vlogger but if you drink with us on these reviews, I will get prettier. That’s number 312 of 5 gazillion why beer rocks and should be sewn onto the bottom right corner of our nations flag.
Also, to do this beer review properly I have included a dear friend and fellow blogger, Mike, who is a master brewer himself. As you have read in the past I am a not a beer connoisseur by any stretch. I buy seasonal beer based on the marketing and pretty pictures. Much like how I shop for salsa. So this year I put a little professional taste in the mix and I hope all of you beer snobs will be less irritated with me. (check out his blog. Excellent stuff)
I am happy this 4th annual blog er…vlog, can be something a little different for all you to watch and hopefully enjoy. remember this is a 3 part series and there will be a number of beers that we will be reviewed including some obscure shout-outs. If you can spot the five shout outs (all horror movie references) I will be mailing a prize to the first three who guess right. It’s a good prize too.
So enough of all this reading crap and on to pure visual ecstasy. Turn off your brain…right……NOW!
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So This Actually Happened

It hit me the other day that things happen to me and that’s normal because things happen to everyone. Only I tend to share them in a forum for many to laugh at. I find comfort, however,  that their laughter is marred by the deep-recessed knowledge that shit happens to them too.

This epiphany happened on Friday when a little kid accidentally peed on my leg at the mall. Let me paint the picture with words.

I was in the Spokane Valley mall this past Friday and after the long 130 mile trip from Moscow, two bottles of water and a coffee proved too much for my tank to hold. So, I went to the restroom. Quickly.

I don’t know about most other guys but when choosing a urinal I always try to pick a far right or left one just to lower the probability of having to pee next to someone. There is always an awkward period of silence and if it is broken, the awkwardness is increased exponentially. Here are three scenarios that happened over the past few years causing me to choose pee-solitude.

  1. 2004 Salt Lake International Airport: An elderly guy is peeing next to me and explaining that the first sign of prostate cancer is when the pee-stream goes “that way”, briefly taking his hands away from control position to demonstration position causing him to lose control, piss the front of his pants and scream, “DANG FUCK!”.
  2. 2009 Patty’s Too, Post Falls, Idaho: Guy peeing next to me farts and begins to fake cough. I couldn’t help but start to laugh which caused me to fake cough as well.
  3. 2002 US Naval Air Station San Diego: A drunk sailor steps up to the urinal next to mine and states as soon as he’s done he is going to punch me in the face. I finished first and calmly left, passing two Marines to whom he declared the same intention. You can guess…

So there are three perfect examples of why, given the choice, the urinal decision is important. But sometimes trouble comes to you and on Friday, trouble came in the form of an eight year old kid. This actually happened.

I walked into the empty mall restroom and before me where four urinals; two tall ones on the left and two shorter ones on the right. I chose the tall one on the far left. Shortly after an eight year old kid comes in and chooses the one right next to me and while I thought that was weird, I found it even more weird that he managed to pee positioning himself in such a way that his back was to me. Now it’s not that I was trying to watch a little kid pee (you perv) but there are some things you just can’t help but notice. Especially if it’s weird and kind of funny.

This little kid obviously wanted to use the “big guy” urinal and had no choice but to pee next to me. So, he tried as best as he could to do so discretely and he would have been successful but he forgot that there is a possibility of other people coming in the restroom. And people did. Realizing he was completely exposed by peeing with his pack to me, he freaked and quickly turned to his entire body position hard left, overshooting the urinal and crossing the stream over my leg…and then back again. With two lines of warm piss soaking into my pant leg I heard the kid let out a faint and defeated, “oooooh”.

You can not be mad at this. If you get mad at this, then you are a bad person. I know he didn’t mean such a faux pas and a faux pas of this epic scale usually involves a “talking to” but knowing that this kid was on the verge of tears over friendly fire, all I could say was “don’t worry about it, buddy”.

I walked over to the sink and proceeded to paper towel the accident away without making him feel worse. I fully expected him to sprint for the door, but God bless him, he remembered to wash his hands.

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