The 5th Annual Harrisburg Brewers Fest

You’ll have to forgive me for waiting three days before telling you about the beerfest out in Harrisburg. It’s just that it’s taken this long for me to recover.
This is the fifth year in a row for the Troeg’s-sponsored event to benefit the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. It was the first year I was able to attend, and I’m glad I did.

I’ve slowed down on attending beerfests in this area only because, well, if you’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all. Since this one was located further out in central PA it drew in a bit more central/eastern PA and Maryland brewers. This one was the most well-organized fests I’ve attended.

There were two sessions to reduce crowding. I attended the 5:00 session and I bet there were over 3,000 people there. It covered two large blocks of downtown Harrisburg (30,000 square feet) and the crowd was great (see picture below!).

There were around 35 breweries in attendance and they surprisingly brought some nice beers to share, not just the old standbys. I didn’t have a pen to take notes so I have to go by my very hazy memory, but some standouts included Abbey Wright Brewery out of Duboistown, PA; The Church Brew Works out of Pittsburgh; and the Bullfrog Brewing Co. from Williamsport, PA.

Is Pittsburgh catching up to Philly as the beer capital of the East? The afformentioned along with the Penn Brewery and their old standby Iron City are big players for the smaller city. The Memphis Taproom is hosting a Pitt-centric HH (happy hour) on Tuesday July 1 from 5 to 7 PM.

Oh, and also this year’s Brew At the Zoo (also the 5th annual) has moved to America’s oldest zoo right here in Philly. July 26. Maybe I’ll have recovered by then.

Philly airport

I don’t read Phillyist as much as I used to (too many inside jokes but not as bad as Philebrity but close). But a recent read made me laugh out loud. Take a gander at this post about an experience at our beloved airport. Here’s an excerpt (bold mine):

And, finally, there was the baggage claim. Why, why, why must there always be a problem with the baggage? Here is the drill as I understand it: plane lands, people get off, handlers grab bags, handlers drive in funny car with baggage and put it on to conveyor belt, which sends bags out to disgruntled travelers. I’m sure it is more complicated than that. There probably has to be a useless union representative there to watch as each bag is lifted. There has to be one arm available for each worker to pick his own ass while performing the actual job. And that doesn’t even take into account the time that goes into rechecking the bag to make sure that any valuable items stored within are stolen in the name of national security.

Still, overall it seems like an easy process. But not here. Here, I get to sit for 90 minutes waiting for luggage that is just sitting on a tarmac after an otherwise flawless flight. Here, I get to see my relations with my wife go from “I can’t wait to see you, Honey” to “When the fuck is your luggage coming in so I can go home and get some sleep?” Here, I get to watch three workers sitting around, joking and staring at every female ass in a 200-yard radius while their bag-handling co-workers play “Watch the Lakers-Celtics Game While the Customer Stews.” Here, I get to tell my wife to drive around to arrivals because the voice on the loud speaker said that the bags will be up in five minutes, only to see her whisked away multiple times by Rent-A-Popo when the process takes seven minutes. And by the way, thanks to the nincompoops at the World’s Worst Airport, you can bet that this brother didn’t get no kinda love upon his return to the city of.

Bottom line is I am tired of having to apologize for this airport any time a friend has to come remotely near it. I’m tired of pilots coming on the loud speaker saying, and I shit you not, “It looks like we will be getting you home on time, but with Philadelphia, you never really know.”

Hilarious. Dude can speak for all of us. I’ll put money on it that EVERY person who read this piece can relate. Hell, every person who’s had to fly through Philly just ONCE can relate.

And while we’re on the topic, I’ve always wanted to know why, WHY it is so unsafe to park at the curb? I realize we’re afraid of car bombs, but my God, is a suicide bomber really gonna take the time to blow up a car which might take out one Hertz bus and a couple smokers? Is the mile-long line of cars waiting on the shoulder of I-95 really a safer alternative? It just looks so ghetto!

Oh well. It’s all going to be moot anyway since the news is looking grim for the airlines. Seems like it won’t be too long till air travel will be out of reach for us middle class travelers.

Honor this Man, People!

Warning: This post is going to stray quite a bit from the usual BLCB topics and things might get a little cheesy.

Father’s day is almost here and since I forgot to send a card I thought it might be time to honor one of, if not THE most important and influential person in my life (besides Gene Simmons).

My Dad.

He has a short fuse. He’s hard of hearing. He snores (I shared a camper with him last weekend and almost slept on the picnic table just to get away). He cleans his ears with his car keys… in church. His nickname is “Dick”. But the guy’s got some redeeming qualities. Hell, he raised me and only had to bail me out of jail once.

Just one of his many skills is his carpentry. The guy builds beautiful furniture from trees he mills himself. And he doesn’t buy a speck of the lumber: He uses only trees that have been uprooted by storms or inflicted with disease. And he’ll build me ANYTHING I need. The accompanying photos are the only ones I could find after a quick search of my iPhoto library, but believe me, there’s a lot more. I’ll share just one quick story and then I’ll quit with the bragging:

His father built a workbench for his shop when he got married. He made the top out of Maple or Oak, butcher block-style, but the rest of it was partly plywood, which was all he had at the time so it didn’t hold up too well over the years. Dad just piled oily autoparts on it in the back of the garage and always felt a little bad about it. So he decided to restore it. He replaced all of the drawer fronts and added new dividers, a carpenter’s vice and a shelf for my mechanics toolbox (which was also my Grandfather’s).

One day early last spring he and Mom drove to Philly to see their Grandkids and Dad brought the finished workbench with him. (It’s the one in the background below).

Here’s the kicker: He felt bad that there wasn’t room to mount my other vice and my grinder so one day while I was at work he decided to make me another workbench. He found an old piece of rough pine that Peco left in the empty lot next door and HAND PLANED IT and cut it to fit in the tight spot next to my stairs. It’s nothing fancy, but it was all finished by the time I got home from work. I don’t even remember if I thanked him.

He pulls this shit ALL THE TIME- and not just for me- for anyone. I could honestly call him right this minute (as long as it’s not hunting season) and read off dimensions for, let’s say, a new sandbox for the kids. With a lid. He’ll not only build one, it’ll probably be built out of cedar (won’t rot) with beveled edges and sippycup holders. And he’d ship it to me if I said I needed it right away.

That’s just the kind of guy he is. What do I to deserve this? Not a hell of a lot, really.
Happy Father’s Day Dad!
Oh, and jeez, I’ll probably forget to send a birthday card later this month, so while I’m at it, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOO! (Private note to sister Amy- Tell Dad to read this site since I’ll probably forgot to call on Father’s Day too!)

Here are a couple other projects- a new mantle for my fireplace and an old barn he restored by hand. This pic is the barn mid-completion.

Just to prove the apple doesn’t fall too horribly far from the tree, here’s a project of mine from a long time ago- window/storage boxes for the old house in South Philly.

I have to live with this every day

True story:

One of the brake lights was out on my VW, so yesterday I picked up a bulb and attempted to replace it. Each tail light has 4 separate bulbs so in order to figure out which was the brake as opposed to the turn signal or running lights I needed someone to push on the brake pedal. My two-year old son tried but just didn’t have the strength to push it hard enough. So I asked my wife to get in the car and push the brake pedal. “It should only take a second,” I promised.

Now, to give you some background, my wife (and her friends) are just a bit, well, clueless. Maybe “dizzy” is a better word.

Anyway, the brake light on the “working” tailight wouldn’t light up either. “are you pushing it?” I’d ask. “Yeah” she’d assure me. This went on for a while with no luck. So I asked her to turn on the lights. They worked, but still no brake light. Then I asked her to start up the car, thinking just maybe, for some WEIRD reason, the brake lights didn’t work without the car running.

The car starts up and instantly redlines- she had the gas pedal pressed all the way to the floor and didn’t let up until I yelled frantically, “What the hell are you doing?!” “Stop, Stop! For the love of God!!” I seriously thought the friggin engine was going to explode.

So by now you’ve probably guessed why the brake lights didn’t light up.

You got it.

She was pressing the GAS PEDAL the entire time.

The WHOLE TIME I WAS TEARING MY HAIR OUT WONDERING WHAT THE HELL WAS GOING ON, ASKING HER OVER AND OVER, “ARE YOU STILL PRESSING IT??”

I’m gonna get a lot of shit for writing this but its just too good NOT to share. It’s just ONE example of what I deal with every day. Hell, I could write an entire BLOG devoted to her follies. But I won’t. A guy’s got to show his love some respect. Jeez.

BTW, this is the beauty I’m trading in for a new one.

The car silly, not the wife.

Clinic @ Johnny Brenda’s 5/30/08

This is my first time seeing the lads from Liverpool but Dave’s second- they played JB’s just last Spring.

Good show. Dave’s buddy JB (no relation) has some video/audio. Perhaps he’ll share so look for them in the comments section.

On the way home on my bike at 7th and Poplar, a block void of anything but empty lots, I heard a commotion on the sidewalk. With no street lights I couldn’t see a thing. I snapped this picture of two couples having a good drunken time singing and fighting each other with their shoes.

Strange but cool.