Virginia trip

Last week, I attended a training class on QSM’s SLIM tool in McLean, Virginia. The tool suite is awesome, but this post is about something far more important…beer! Ok, it’s more of a stream of consciousness dump of my entire trip. But it’s mostly about beer. I was on the prowl for Weyerbacher Double Simcoe and Troegs Nugget Nectar.

I watched the new Star Trek movie on iTunes on the flight. Awesome movie! Upon landing, I immediately went to Brickskeller in Washington DC. They have the world’s largest beer selection, about 800 bottles but only 12 taps. It was a bit of a hole in the wall, but I like this sort of aged, disheveled appearance in a bar. I had a Brooklyn Blast Imperial IPA, Victory Old Horizontal Barleywine vintage 2003, and a buffalo burger. All were good. After dinner, I became hopelessly lost on my way to the hotel in McLean. It took me over an hour to make a 30 minute drive. Bring a GPS if you go to DC or Virginia.

On Wednesday night, I had dinner with my Uncle Terry and Aunt Carolyn. We had dinner at Artie’s in Fairfax. I had filet and crab cakes…mmmmmm. Everything was yummy, especially the crab cakes. I enjoyed visiting with my aunt and uncle, who I only get to see about once a year. We went to Total Wine together and I was pretty impressed with the beer selection and prices. I bought a sixer of Troegs Nugget Nectar.

I made a total of 5 stops at liquor stores. I was at Total Beverage 3 times and Norm’s Beer and Wine in Tysons Corner twice. Norm’s had big bottles of Weyerbacher Double Simcoe. These are unfiltered and even better than the regular ones. I think I bought about 6 bombers of Nugget Nectar, 6 fifths of Double Simcoe, a sixer of each, and a few assorted Terrapin. I was able to get 6 big bottles in my luggage and I shipped the rest home by FedEx.

On Thursday night, I had dinner at Dogfish Head Alehouse in Falls Church. I sat at the bar and ate crab soup and jambalaya – both were great. I had a taste of Worldwide Stout (18% alcohol) and a 75 Minute IPA. I’d never heard of that, so I asked the bartender…she said that they pour half a glass of 60 Minute IPA and half a glass of 90 Minute IPA. It was really good.

Class was done by 11:30 on Friday. I stopped at FedEx to ship the boxes, then headed to the airport. My American flight was leaving around 3:00. Unfortunately, we boarded the plane, entered the runway, and returned to the terminal twice. I was moved to a United flight and arrived in Chicago around 8:00 sans luggage. So instead of getting back to my house around 5:30, I arrived around 9:00. My suitcase (beer intact) was delivered to my house at 2:30 AM on Sunday.

- schneid

Lego Bionicles are being discontinued

My son Ben is sad that Bionicles are being discontinued. Please visit his petition http://savebionicle.blogspot.com and leave a comment on one of his posts to show your support. If you really like spam, you could go to http://petitionspot.com but we don't recommend it.

- schneid

Lucky To Be Alive

We were hit by a drunk driver on September 5. Only Suzette and I were in the car and we are both fine, just some minor cuts and bruises. We are very lucky. The red car is my car, the blue car was the other driver. We are thankful that the kids weren't in the car and lucky to be alive.

- schneid

Our new dog Capri

We finally got a dog! We picked up Capri on Memorial Day. She is a 10-month old purebred tri-color collie. She is small for a collie, about 40 lbs right now and won't get much bigger. She is very sweet and is adjusting to her new life as are we! Ben and Anna really like her as you can see from the photos.







- schneid

Don't buy Dark Lord on eBay

If you desperately need to get your hands on some Dark Lord, skip the details and go to the bottom of this post.

Dark Lord Day, the day each year when Three Floyds Brewery releases their beloved Dark Lord Russian Imperial Stout, is almost here. April 25 promises to be a fun day at the brewery. In addition to Three Floyds and guest brewery beer, music, food, and camaraderie among beer geeks, there will be beer as far as the eye can see. Hundreds of people in attendance bring their favorite rare beers to share with everyone. The picnic tables are literally covered with beer bottles.

In the past, each person in line could buy 6 bottles of Dark Lord. At $15 per 22-oz bottle, we're not talking about Miller Lite, but it's a reasonable price for such a great beer. Every year, they produce more beer. Last year, unfortunately, many hundreds of people didn't get any Dark Lord after waiting 5 hours in line. One reason is because many people only buy the beer to sell it on eBay. So Three Floyds came up with a new system.

This year, just to have the opportunity to buy Dark Lord, you had to purchase a Golden Ticket. One person can purchase two tickets, with a maximum of four tickets per household. Each ticket costs $10. All you get for the ticket is the right to purchase your allotment of Dark Lord (ok, you also get a cup of Dark Lord on tap and to me, that's worth $10 right there). Proceeds of the Golden Ticket sales are going to charity, which is pretty cool. We don't yet know how many bottles you can purchase per ticket, but it is probably about 3-6. The tickets went on sale in the wee hours of the morning on March 17. I decided to check before I went to work, and it's a good thing I did...I purchased my tickets then, and by the time I arrived at work, they were sold out.

This is a great improvement because now you won't stand in line for hours and NOT get your Dark Lord. Unfortunately, it's not stopping the eBayers because now people are scalping the Golden Tickets! I think it's unfortunate because there is no reason to pay $100+ for a Golden Ticket or upwards of $300 (in the past) for a bottle of Dark Lord. Since the production of Dark Lord has increased, the bottles have only been going for $50-60 on eBay. But there's an even better way to get Dark Lord if you can't go to Dark Lord Day.

Go to ratebeer.com or beeradvocate.com and trade for it. Simple. If you want to drink Dark Lord, you can find someone who will trade. The trade market will be flooded with it soon. Beer trading is good for your beer karma. eBay is bad for your beer karma.

- schneid

P.S. Suggestion to 3F for next year: print the Golden Tickets with each person's name and last 4 digits of their credit card. You must either show a photo ID or the credit card with those numbers. If I want to give the tickets to my friend, then I'll have to give him my credit card too.

Dine with Top Chef Dale Levitski at Relax Lounge

For Suzette’s birthday, I wanted to do something fun. We are huge fans of the TV show Top Chef on Bravo, and we’ve been dying to have a meal prepared by one of the chefs. After some extensive research (i.e., Google), I learned that Stephanie Izard (Season 4 winner) and Dale Levitski (Season 3 runner-up) hadn’t opened their new Chicago restaurants yet. Stephanie’s new restaurant is called The Drunken Goat and will open in Fall 2009. Dale’s restaurant, Town and Country, should open in 2009.

With a little more digging, I found out that Dale Levitski is cooking at Relax Lounge on Thursday nights – they call it Dine with Dale. It's a three-course dinner for $30 per person. I was surprised that I could get a reservation on short notice, but it’s not well-known yet. So we made plans to go into Chicago on a Thursday night (March 12, 2009), which for us is unheard of.

Relax Lounge is a long, narrow space. Foremost it is a bar, with bar food and not much dinner seating – there are about 12 tables. They have a tiny kitchen which turns every Thursday into a Top Chef challenge for Dale.

We sat at the bar and ordered some interesting drinks – mine was a Calientini made with Absolut Pear, St. Germaine, jalapeno, and cucumber; Suzette had an Eau de Veev made with Veev (acai vodka), Domaine de Canton (ginger liqueur), pear, and grapefruit. I know they sound strange, but they were really delicious. They were savory and not sweet, with the alcohol in perfect balance with the flavors.

We were soon moved to our table where we finished our drinks. We thought we might feel a bit out of place in a bar for hip, young people. After looking around, we could see the other dinner patrons were almost all over 30 and probably Top Chef fans as well.

The first course was a salad with smoked salmon, avocado puree, bacon, corn salsa, and a matzo cracker balanced on its side. The salmon was delicious and avocado was smooth and silky. You could taste each individual component and they were all really fresh.

We each ordered a glass of the recommended wines: a Hess Chardonnay and a Santa Julia Malbec. The Malbec was very fruit forward and easy to drink, and matched the entrée really well. The Chardonnay was better with the food than without, but I wasn’t crazy about it.

The entrée was Chicken Marengo, crawfish, tomato, and olives with a chicken breast atop a potato. I love comfort food and this was it! The Malbec was a perfect match for this dish.

Dessert was a brownie sundae. When I read the menu, I thought dessert wasn’t as exciting as some of the previous weeks’ desserts, such as cardamom brulee, lingon berries, and lemon crepe. All doubt was erased when our dessert arrived. The brownie had huge chocolate chunks, the whipped cream was so light, and the chocolate sauce was delicious. It was chocolate heaven!

Around 8:30, people started trickling in for the second seating. By 9:00, it was just slightly crowded. During the evening, we had a few glimpses of Dale working near the kitchen. After everyone received their dessert, Dale came out and chatted with some of the guests, but didn’t make it past the third table. He needed to prepare for the next seating. Fortunately, they were very accommodating and we were able to sneak into the back to compliment the chef and have our picture taken.

The pace of the entire meal was unhurried. At the end, I was surprised that two hours had elapsed. Two hours for a three course dinner may sound like a slow pace, but it didn’t seem like that at all.

The food was fantastic, service was great, and we really enjoyed the entire experience. Get a reservation and give it a try! If you are a foodie, you won’t regret having a meal prepared by a Top Chef!

Here are some links to good interviews with Dale Levitski:
Interview: Dale Levitski, "Top Chef" Finalist
Dishing With Dale
Life after 'Top Chef': Where's Dale?
Chicagoist Re-Grills: Top Chef Finalist Dale Levitski

- schneid

Ponzi Schemes

It's amazing how Ponzi schemes can happen right under your nose. Then things get bad and everyone tries to get their money out. But they can't because there isn't enough money! This is happening to everyone you know. It's called banks. If everyone tries to get their money out, the bank goes out of business. Sounds like a Ponzi scheme to me.

- schneid

It's Tuesday...It Must Be a Blizzard

I'm getting tired of these Tuesday snowstorms. On the first day of my new volleyball league, December 9, it snowed during the afternoon and rush hour. It took me about 30 minutes to drive 2 miles on my way there. The next week, it snowed so badly on December 16 that we decided to cancel. On December 23, we were planning on going to my mom's house for dinner - but we couldn't due to another snowstorm. We didn't play volleyball again until Tuesday, January 6 - guess what - more snow that day.

Now we have a game tomorrow January 13 and they are predicting a blizzard starting today. However, we might not make it to work due to the weather, but it should be cleaned up by game time.

- schneid

Keep Governors Out of Jail

In the wake of the arrest of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, now is the time to start an aggressive program to keep our governors out of prison. We must reach out to this at-risk group, help them stay out of jail, and show them how to become productive members of society. The following graph shows that governors are now incarcerated at a higher rate than whites and hispanics.


Convicted US governors from the past 30 years:

Governor	State	Term	Notes
John Rowland	Connecticut	1995-2004	resigned in 2004, convicted and sent to prison
Don Siegelman	Alabama	1999-2003	convicted in 2006 on corruption charges and sent to prison
George Ryan	Illinois	1999-2003	convicted in 2006 on corruption charges and sent to prison
Bob Taft	Ohio	1999-2007	convicted of misdemeanors for failing to report gifts, remained in office
Fife Symington	Arizona	1991-1997	convicted in 1997 and forced to resign, conviction was eventually overturned
Jim Tucker	Arkansas	1992-1996	convicted in 1996 and forced to resign, received probation and house detention due to poor health
Guy Hunt	Alabama	1987-1993	convicted in 1992, sentenced to parole, later granted a pardon by the parole board based on innocence
Edwin Edwards	Louisiana	1972–1980, 1984–1988, and 1992–1996	convicted in 1998 and sent to prison
Marvin Mandel	Maryland	1969-1979	convicted in 1977, sent to prison, conviction was overturned in 1987
Rod Blagojevich	Illinois	2002-present	arrested on December 9, 2008

Please help keep our governors out of prison!

- schneid

Fitness notes 12/5

I worked out 2-3 times the week before Thanksgiving, swam and went on a hike during the week of Thanksgiving, and worked out twice this week. This week really should've been 3-4 times, but it's a start. I'm going to start playing volleyball with my friend Tim next week. It has been, oh, almost 7 years since I've played regularly in an indoor volleyball league. It should be fun and I'm looking forward to it.

And if it ever warms up to 50 (it's like 12 degrees today), I'd like to start running with the other Tim again.

- schneid