Friday Smirk

J&M pointing out the obvious conflict between Science and Religion (or all wish-thinking based dogmas), much as the apologists would like to twist and contort their philosophies in an attempt to re-write reality.

Summer predictors

So, here's a picture of my "benchmark" springtime indicator tree, taken on the 15th of April. As can be seen it's pretty much fully out in terms of blossom, this compares quite favourably with previous years..

• April 18th 2019
• April 25th 2021
• April 14th 2022
• April 19th 2023
• April 10th 2024

I'm not sure that this necessary indicates a good Summer to come, last year full blossom was a week earlier but the rain was relentless the whole year, so...

5 Years Later

Had one of these at the weekend, it's a West Coast style IPA from Siren and Green Cheek (USA) that was first brewed in 2020 (i.e. five years ago) that version hit the dizzy heights of #2 in my beers of the year. This is the second re-brewing by Siren the first being in 2023 when the a tweaked recipe reached #14 on my list that year, the competition for Westys was fierce that year though. This version is more like the original, perhaps a tad more bitter but none the worse for it, classic West Coast flavours and utterly drinkable, it'll be interesting to see where it comes on the list this year, or will it even make it at all? It's been a stellar year for outstanding collaborations in the craft beer scene so far!

Midweek Mirth

 Who ever this receipt belongs to is having a lot more fun than me!

Tuesday Titter

How America see's the rest of the world ATM..

New Box

I noticed that we seem to have a brand new shiny post box at the end of our street, it's been updated to show the logo of the latest monarch (not shorthand for Carriage Return in the ASCII character set, in case you were confused..)

Tariff Tragedies

It's with great sadness that I have to announce the loss of a few UK and local businesses as a direct result of Trumps recent tariff frenzy. A local bra manufacturer has gone bust, a submarine company has gone under, a maker of food blenders has gone into liquidation, a dog kennel has had to call in the retrievers and a company supplying paper for origami ethusiasts has folded. Many of our most well known strip clubs have gone tits up, even Interflora is pruning it's staff and Dyno-rod has gone down the drain. The saddest of all though is the ice cream van man found dead covered in nuts and raspberry sauce, he just couldn't take it any more and topped himself...

Saturday Smirk

Sounds like American tariffs..

Friday Smirk

Yeah that's what most religions really are, observations of psychological behaviour pretending to be deep insights into the mind of a supposed "creator" and a huge dose of parochial self interest and desire to control others.

Brain Bruiser

Tried one of these last weekend, it's an imperial stout made by EvilTwin from NYC and Siren, it's not their first rodeo as this beer has been brewed several times before but this version is slightly tweaked and even more heady weighing in at a brain bruising 12%. Luckily my Son was home and we shared this can, it was delicious however, rich malted grains, chocolate, coffee and a banging licorice tinge, great stuff!

Old Banks

Went for a long walk through the woods in Crowthorne the other day and came across this section of banked track, it seemed totally weird that it would be in the middle of a forest but then I remembered that this area used to be part of the "TRL" or the transport research laboratory. This organisation was set up in 1933 to investigate all things roads, traffic and vehicle safety and their test tracks used to be spread all over this forest, which used to be closed to the public. Now all their test tracks are slowly being reclaimed by the forest critters but some, like this high speed section of track, still lurk in the woods waiting to be discovered.

Putty Friday

I had half an hour to kill last Friday while waiting for a train in Reading so I popped into the RG1 bar (Siren) to see if there was anything new. To my great surprise they had two Verdant beers on (as guests) Putty and Puttty the famous DIPA and TIPA that are released every January and are like hens teeth to get hold of. I missed them this year as we were doing dry January and by the time I visited their web site to buy a few cans they's all been sold out. 

Anyway, this year's Putty was certainly up to scratch, it tasted to me like there was more Nelson than usual, maybe they'd tweaked the recipe but I'm not complaining it's one of my favourite hops. Such a good idea to hold a keg or two back and a great stroke of luck to be trying Putty in April!

Monday Mirth

Sounds about right, I wonder what Americans are going to pay for their coffee or their bananas now, fuckwits...

Weekend Wink..

 Seems like the rational choice for Canada, and the USA (at least the "thinking" parts) ..

Miami Vice - Part 4

 

So, after a fairly uneventful 3 hour drive up from Naples we arrived in St. Pete's and checked into our Hotel. We'd booked in for five nights and were looking forward to some serious relaxation, St. Pete's is well known for it's craft beer scene and I was particularly interested to see what was around and how it might be different from say, the scene in London or New York etc. St. Pete's is a scruffy place, not like the shining glass and steel towers of Miami more like Shoreditch (but with Sunshine!) but what it lacks in modern sparkle it makes up for in authenticity and genuine, welcoming and slightly left of centre people.

The weather was cracking, around 28 degrees without the slightest hint of humidity, perfect for walking around popping into the odd museum, eating ice creams by the sea and, of course, visiting some really distinct and interesting taprooms. First on this list was St. Pete brewing, their brewery being only a ten minute walk from our hotel, most of the familiar styles were on offer, I opted for a nice hazy IPA to kick things off with (see above) but they also had a bunch of more esoteric options like sours and imperial stouts, we had all week so I only had the one, which was delicious, and we moved on.

Most of the tourist and restaurant action was happening along the sea-front, thats where most of the "TTD's" (things to do) were too. For our dinner we opted for steaks (and usual accompanyments) and I was pleased to pair it with a wine from Ridge (one of my favourite US producers) and doubly pleased to see that it was a lot cheaper than the same bottle in the UK (about 2/3 price!) I must say that we noticed a general trend for things, especially restaurants, being significantly more expensive that the last time we were in the USA (2022), maybe that was a Florida/Tourist thing but some of the prices were truely eye-watering and the quality of the food not great value for money compared to, say, London.

During our stay in St. Pete's we visited several museums and galleries, there were a couple of stand-outs, firstly the fine art museum in the centre of downtown. They had an exhibition of Ansel Adams photographs, I love his work and it was a real treat to see the originals! (see below)

I particularly liked this one of Half Dome in the snow, I seem to remember having a poster of this on my bedroom wall back in the 80's! Another place that took our fancy was the Salvador Dalí museum, an unlikely setting for such a place but apparently a couple of uber-rich people who lived in St. Pete's back in the day, had a long standing friendship with the artist and collected over 90 of his paintings, including some of the really well known ones! It was a really cool place, more melting clocks that you can shake a lobster at!

To finish off our stay in the area we visited perhaps the most well known of all the craft brewers from there, "Green Bench". For those in the know this producer has had a string of well regarded brews that have even made it as far as the wilds of Berkshire England, and I was keen to try a few from source!

Their tap room is a rather splendid space (above) with loads of outside seating, a really chilled place to sup a few beers. I opted for a couple of their hazy numbers (see below) all of them were excellent, fresh as you like and really distinct flavour profiles and in thirty degree heat they were just the job!

After a really pleasent afternoon in the sunshine at Green Bench we retired back to downtown and our last dinner in St. Pete's. 

The next morning we awoke early and loaded up the car to make the 4 hour drive back to MIA and our flight back to London that evening. Fortunately, our Airbus A380 was waiting and everything was on time, the jet stream was particularly strong over the North Atlantic and the night seemed to pass really quickly. Arriving into a misty Heathrow at around 6 in the morning I was very pleased to have kept a warm jacket in my backpack, it felt freezing! 

Anyway, a successful holiday, relaxed and interesting, I learnt a lot more about Florida and in particular the craft beer scene there, we both felt that maybe some day in the future (perhaps post Trump) we'll be back!

I wonder..

So, that talentless grifter Russell Brand has been formally charged with rape and sexual assault, I wonder if bears shit in the forest, the truth is out there somewhere...

Hey America..

Hey, Americans, guess what, the rest of the world will never trust your country or what your leaders say ever again, ever....  I spent a couple of weeks in the USA back in March and every American (yes, every single one!)  we spoke to in bars and restaurants etc. started the conversation with "we apologise for Trump". After the totally unecessary carnage on the markets today we're all looking forward to seeing all those garment sweat-shops opening in Ohio and New Hampshire! So, good luck, I hope you know what you're doing, we won't be back anytime soon...

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo illuminating the very real cognitive dissonance that our religious brothers and sisters suffer from when it comes to the subject of homosexuality (well, sexuality in general really) anyway, if their Gods didn't want it why'd he make them that way... still waiting...

Futuristic IPA

Tried one of these last weekend, it's one of the three celebration beers made by Siren for their 12th birthday (hence the logo on the can). Called "Persistence of time" it's an IPA made with some rather futuristic ingredients. Firstly the hops are all experimental varietals including Incognito®, Super Sauvin®, Cryo®, Dynaboost® and Hyperboost® it also contains "cannabis Terpenes" which are the chemical aroma and flavour elements (essential oils) of the cannabis plant. It was interesting to see if I could pick out the flavours but since hops are very closely related to cannabis anyway, and often very similar in flavour profile I couldn't honestly say that I detected anything particularly different. This beer is exceptionally "dank" (i.e. weedy) though, which people often say is typical of cannabis, anyway, certainly a futuristic IPA

Rainbow Boozer

Walking into town late last Sunday evening we noticed this rather odd rainbow effect on the side of a chimney stack on top of a local pub. It wasn't obvious what was casting the colours but the sun was very intense and there are a bunch of road signs (with reflective backgrounds) on the junction below, possibly the cause of this rather attractive lighting effect, either that or God is sending me a message telling me to drink more beer in this boozer, I think I should obey such a "sign", don't you?

Better than the original

Tried one of these at the weekend, one of Siren's 11th birthday celebration beers it's a spin on their house IPA "Lumina" except it's a lot hazier and also at 5.4% a bigger mouthfeel and a little richer and deeper in taste profile, I like it, better than the original IMO.

Monday Mirth

A spectacular piece of street art (in Aberdeen), what does it mean though? I reckon it represents all those people who voted for Brexit, i.e. they'll fall for anything.

Sunday Smile

Always love a good Larson..

Made it..

Spent the night in London on Thursday, managed to visit one of my checklist of  "must visit" pubs, The Lyric in Soho (see picture above). It's a proper London "stand-up" pub meaning there's not many seats and most people stand up (or stand outside) The selection of beers is very good, I opted for a couple of Siren brews (ironic since Siren is the local brewery to where I live in Berkshire) but they were perfectly on point, a decent boozer but loud and "standupy", don't say you weren't warned..

Friday Smirk

 Jesus and Mo discussing relativity in religiously inspired crimes, nice work if you can get it..

Load of Bull

Isn't it wierd what happens to Bull Rushes at this time of year, they seem to sprout "wool" that blows all over the place making it look like some sheep massacre has taken place!

Miami Vice - Part 3

 

One of the nice things about Florida and the USA generally (obviously apart from the Nazi politics these days) is the very large population of craft beer breweries, most reasonably sized towns and cities have at least one (Miami has around 15) and most of the bars and restaurants have a decent selection of interesting brews to choose from. The only exception to this is at the bottom end of the spectrum and the very top, cheaper, street food kind of places usually only had mainstream stuff and Michelin Starred places don't really "do beer" catering more for the wine and spirits crowd. Anyway, Kaledidoscope Brewery in Naples have a little tap room and is well worth a visit, I only had a couple of brews, one in an East coast style and the other a West coast example, but both were very good.

Naples is a funny old place, I felt is was like some kind of weird urban oasis where American millionares go to die. The streets are perfectly manicured, beautiful flower beds everywhere, huge houses, posh restaurants and supercars everywhere. It was pleasant enough but a little souless for us, we moved on after a couple of nights and headed North again towards Tampa bay and our next destination St. Pete's.

With so many rich, old white guys kicking around Naples there was a distinct "pro-trump" vibe to the place, I snapped this picture of one of the posh houses by the beach, says it all really..

More in part 4 as we head up to St. Pete's and Tampa..

Sandhi Chardonnay

Had one of these in a restaurant in Miami whilst on holiday there recently, it's from the Santa Rita Hills wine region of California which is essentially a part of the vast Santa Ynez valley, this valley is uniquely positioned along an East-West axis so that cooling air and fog comes in from the Pacific making it ideal for growing Chardonnay and Pinot Noir grapes. I visited the area back in 2014 while on a family trip to Santa Barbara and Yosemite and we stopped off at a couple of wineries to sample the fine wines available there. 

This one was from producer Sandhi (not even their best) and was terrific, stunning attack on the palate, upfront fruit flavours with a glorious smooth finish and balance, a world-class wine and compared to equivalent quality offerings from Burgundy, France pretty cheap in comparison. It's probably tricky to get hold of in the UK but I must seek some out, really memorable and the best white wine of the trip by a long chalk..

Miami Vice - Part 2

Following a few days in Miami we headed South along Highway 1 down to the Florida Keys (the picture above was taken at the mile marker at the very start of that road!). The keys are a chain of islands or archipelago that extend from the bottom of the Florida peninsula over a hundred miles into the sea towards Cuba. We decided that we should stay in the iconic Key West which is the furthest inhabited island in the chain from mainland USA, hence mile marker 0. After a rather warm and multi-hour drive we arrived into Key West and checked into our hotel, we quickly unpacked and headed out into the warm evening to explore.

Key West felt to me a bit like a rather scruffy English seaside town, albeit with rather more colourful buildings and obviously tropical weather. The photo above shows an old cinema, now converted into a store but the rather gaudy feel of the building could have easily placed it in Blackpool or Southend. Many of the larger buildings had ground and first floor verandas and reminded me of some of the historic buildings in New Orleans. One such building we visited (see below) was the home of famous author Ernest Hemmingway who lived in Key West between 1931 and 1939 seemingly dividing his time between authoring the novel "A Farewell to Arms", big game fishing and drinking to excess, it was clear he was a bit of a lad!

There are many quirky curiosities on Key West, the place is overrun with wild chickens and the Hemmingway house is overrun with cats, many of whom are polyactyl, meaning they have six toes. Apparently after a heavy drinking/gambling session in "Sloppy Joes" bar Hemmingway was given a white six toed cat by a sea captain, he kept it, and many of the 50 or so cats that now live in the grounds of his old house are descendents of that original feline. I didn't get a picture of a six toed cat, they were quite flighty, but I did manage to snap a cockrel running around on one of the streets and rather splendid he was too!

After a few days on Key West we headed back up North. On the journey we stopped at a Turtle Hospital in Marathon Key and were treated to a really interesting tour around the facility, I never knew turtles could suffer from so many complex "boat injuries" and diseases that need treatment, it was a great little place staffed by very dedicated carers, quite inspirational. Eventually we arrived back onto the mainland and headed up the highway across the Everglades, affectionately known as "Gator Alley" towards Naples, our next destination. 

We were sad to leave the Keys and having been a little unsure about Key West to begin with it certainly grew on us, a truely unique place that even though very touristy has great charm. The picture below shows the old pier at the most Southerly tip of the USA, a great spot to watch the Sun go down and only 90 miles to Cuba!

More in part 3 as we head North..

Appropriate

Seems appropriate at this time of the year in the UK..

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo pointing out the nature of a lot of religions, they're a kind of "do as I say but not as I do" kind of deal, it's almost like they were invented solely as a mechanism to control other people...

Miami Vice - Part 1

 

We spent the last couple of weeks in Florida in a desparate bid to escape the gloomy weather in the UK, flying into Miami the photo above shows the view from our hotel room when we arrived, pretty decent! The mission was to soak up some tropical heat and to see some bits of Florida that we hadn't seen before. Like a lot of people we did the whole Disney, theme park thing ten years ago when our kids were young but we never really got to see the other interesting parts of the state, now that we're "empty nesters" (and my Wife officially retired at the end of February - yay!) we decided that the time was ripe to rectify that.

Miami is a very big city, I hadn't quite appreciated how large it actually was, lot's of different districts each with a fairly distinct character, and like most big cities some areas were a lot more seedy than others! Our lodgings were in the Brickall district which is probably best described as the posh business area next to downtown proper, much like the City of London sits adjacent to the West End etc. It was a good spot to stay as it's pretty central and there are tons of shops, restaurants and entertainments right there. Downtown Miami seemed a little lack-lustre in comparison, fairly run-down and scruffy but not lacking in charm, we had a good look around. Walking a lot we visited the main museums, some local craft breweries and the more touristy bay-front markets, fortunately the weather was glorious, warm and dry without the crushing humidity that Florida gets later in the year. 

(picture above is from the downtown taproom of Biscayne Bay Brewery, I know it looks like OJ but I promise you, it's beer!)

We even spotted one of these monstrous Tesla truck thingys in the wild (above), a hideous "lego-like" thing, no class or design finesse whatsoever, a completely blunt instrument. Even though we had a hire car, one of the days we decided to take the "Brightline" train up to Fort Lauderdale and from there take a boat trip around the "canals" to see the posh waterfront houses. We were quite pleased with ourselves as we booked tickets and hiked over to the main station and hopped on the train up to FL, it was very well run, clean and on time, and we thought trains in the USA were rubbish? Anyway after an enjoyable day up the coast we recamped back to Miami and had a couple of delicious craft beers at the Biscayne Bay taproom, which is close to the station.

Having done all of the recommended "Miami things" during our 5 day stay there we jumped into a hire car and headed South to the Keys aiming to get to the furthest Southerly point of the USA, Key West, more on that in a later post.

Friday Smirk

J&M on the money as usual, the circular reasoning is strong with these two...

Memory Lane

Siren seem to be taking a trip down memory lane at the moment and re-brewing several of their old favourites. Here's another one, "Origin Story" an inky black Imperial Stout made with a crazy number of different malts and as smooth as a proverbial baby's bottom! Fortunately doesn't taste or smell like one though, expect roasted malts, coffee, chocolate, brown sugar and a silky smooth mouthfeel. First tried back in 2022 in mid-Summer, delicious stuff!

Rivington

I had one of these the other weekend, it's a collaboration between local brewery Siran and Rivington who are based up in Lancashire. It's a hazy IPA/DIPA brewed with American & NZ hops, its lush, approaching Verdant levels of murk, a distinct taste profile from the Nelson, fruit forward and very easy to drink. I must seek out some more Rivington beers, if this one is representative then they're most definitely worth a look.

Ooo-er Missus

In the roof gutter of one of the old buildings in my town I noticed a rather unusual object, perhaps a plumber left his pink plunger up there, who knows, I was going to point this out to the people in the building but didn't want to be a dick about it..

Shiver me timbers

Some very clear nights and freezing cold mornings this week, I snapped the picture above on an earlier walk, you see a lot of this kind of thing at this time of year..

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo, the religious pot calling the woke kettle black..