Touring the tap rooms

I managed to make it to four different tap rooms this past weekend in the Twin Cities. Dangerous Man, 612Brew, Indeed and Fulton. Here is a quick run down.\

Dangerous Man: Do you like Vampire Weekend and Arcade Fire? And I mean did you like them before they got all popular and stuff...Vampire Weekend is popular right? Well, then this is the brewery for you! Seriously, their logo is a guy with a big beard, there was more flannel there than the Annual Pacific Northwest Lumberjack Convention and more thick rimmed glasses than Buddy Holly's place. I might be exagerating a bit, but of the ones I went to. On the plus side, the Chocolate Milk Stout and the Cream Ale were tasty, sadly you have to go to the tap room to get it since they don't sell it in stores or bars. Lame.

612Brew: Want to see what the place you'll eventually be murdered at looks like? Go here.  Turning into the parking out, outside of the cars, you'd think you were talking the slow walk to your death. Nothing but an overpass and empty warehouses. Then you get inside and you have been transported to a dance club. The lights were low and the music was blasting. I'm trying to recall which beer I liked from there but honestly, none of them stood out much.  The mural was pretty sweet though.

Indeed Brewery: Not sure how to describe this place. Imagine a big Vikings hall, and I mean the Norse Vikings from Scandinavia, not the Minnesota Vikings, otherwise a sex boat scandal would have broke out or Randy Moss would have gotten angry about the food or something (There was no food). Big space, a lot of wood and while some interesting beers not the best beers. The Day Tripper sounds like everything I should like. A beer that is ridiculously hoppy, but it's just too much. Then there is the Hot Box Imperial Smoked Porter.  Ever wondered what it might be like to just suck down a camp fire in liquid form? This is it, and it was not good.  Of them all, the least favorite.

Fulton Brewery: I've been here before, but not since they updated their place. By updated I mean they tore out their bathrooms and just had Bifs inside. Easily the most industrial and stripped down of the tap rooms.  Just a big empty space, a couple of tables and the bar serving up beer.  These guys went to St. Johns so I feel like I should like them more than I do.The beer isn't bad. Sweet Child of Vine is actually a really good IPA, though a little sweet.Outside of that nothing really does much for me.

All in all, I learned that there are a ton of beers you can have locally in the Twin Cities area, but not all of them are that good. To be fair, not all the beers made by anyone is good. Some places don't make any good beer. I am worried how long any of these places will manage to stay open. There really is only so much beer people can drink right? Maybe I'm wrong.

Roll Out!

February comes to an end and with it a new personal best for mileage at 302 miles and outside of one day spent traveling to California I ran every day. I guess I could have ran around the airport, but that would have been weird, not to mention I doubt the TSA would have enjoyed it and I don't need to give them a reason to pat me down, they seem to enjoy stuff like that.  I'm already well above the pace I need to reach my goal for the year (which I may be adjusting) and with March my training logs gives me some sweet motivation to keep my mileage up. Who doesn't get motivated by Autobots? Even Bumblebee is motivating, and he's lame.

On the shoes front, I figured that I could use a new pair since I'm burning through the ones I have now pretty quickly. Ordered a pair, got them, realized they were too big, then finally looked in my bedroom to see two stacks of shoe boxes and determined, I don't need more shoes right now and sent them back.  There has to be a point where I just admit I have some sort of problem with shoes, but I'm just going to ignore that for now. As soon as the two pairs I'm wearing now are shot I'm buying a couple more. It's not my fault they are so cheap. Some new shoes are coming out for Adidas and Mizuno that I'm excited to try out, just need to figure out a way to trick them into giving me free ones.

The Best Beer in the World....so they claim

Little over a week ago I was in California and got a chance to have what is considered to some the best beer in the world. Pliny the Younger is a triple IPA brewed by Russian River Brewing Company in lovely downtown of Santa Rosa, CA. There is a Barnes and Noble right down the street that I got to stare at for hours and hours.
The beer is released for two weeks, on tap and only at their brewery and a few select locations. This requires a special trip to the brewery to check it out.  Long story short, after waiting in line for six plus hours, over the course of two days, finally made it in to try some, and my impression? Not bad. To be fair, after that long of a wait, it would have to taste like tears from god, assuming there is a good, and unlike Chuck Norris, he does in fact cry, to be worth the wait. The beer was everything you want in an IPA, citrus, a ton of hops and you can't even notice it's 10.8% alcohol, but the best ever? I don't think so. I'd rather just swing by the liquor store and pick up some Surly Wet when it's out and enjoy that.  Just goes to show you, beer is completely subjective and you should drink what you like. If it's good to you, that's all that matters. Unless it's that new apple lager stuff, then you are just wrong and there is no hope for you.

On my own beer front, I bottled my own beer today and now just have to wait about 2 weeks for it to carbonate and it's ready to drink.  Probably won't be as good as Pliny the Younger, ok, definitely won't be, but still fun to try despite having to wait six weeks from the start to finally drink anything.  The other down side is also that my place smelled like grains for the week after I initially brewed it.  Yankee Candle won't be selling that flavor anytime soon. 

Two weeks of training and a fair amount of beer.

It's been a couple weeks, time for a slight update on all things running and beer related.

Running wise, my last two weeks have looked like this:

Jan 14-20

Mon: 6.00 miles @ 8:20 pace
Tues: 8.00 miles @ 7:22 pace
Wed: 13.00 miles @ 6:43 pace
Thurs: 6.00 miles @ 6:50 pace
Fri: 11.00 miles @ 6:59 pace
Sat: 6.00 miles @ 8:05 pace
Sun: 17.00 miles @ 6:42 pace including final 8 @ 6:25 pace

Total: 67

Jan 21-27

 Mon: 6:00 miles @ 7:31
Tues: 14.00 miles @ 6:52
Wed: 10.00 miles @ 7:09 pace
Thurs: 6.00 miles @ 7:27 pace
Fri: 6.00 miles @ 7:30 pace
Sat: 18.67 miles: warm up/cool down and half marathon 1:21:26
Sun: 9.33 miles @ 7:16 pace

Total: 70

Biggest thing was last week was running the Securian Half Marathon.  This is my fourth time running this race, and up until now I've never liked it.  It's cold. It's hilly. It's just not that fun. This year was a little different. It was cold. It was still hilly. Really wasn't all that fun, but it was the best I've ever run it. Two minutes better than last year, 30 seconds faster than a half I did in September. 9th overall, and a coffee mug that I'll never use because I don't drink coffee. Next race is Get Lucky Half.  Hopefully it's warm like last year.

On the beer front, I had two things going on.  First, last week I started to brew my own beer.  I got a kit from the Brooklyn Brew Shop, therefore I know it's hipster approved. It's a one gallon jug that comes with the grains, hops and the rest of the stuff you need.  Was a five hour process to get it in the jug brewing, and now have to wait 4-6 weeks for about 10 bottles of beer and let's be honest, do I really know how to make beer better than people who do this for a living? Probably not, but entertaining to be making it on my own.

 Seeping the grains. Basically making oatmeal

 Boiling the wort. Added the hops. Basically made my house smell like stale bread.

Into the jug with the yeast to turn that sugar into lovely alcohol.  

Also, after the race yesterday, I headed to the St. Paul Winter Carnival Beer Dabbler.  Over 100 breweries. 300 or so different types of beer. A lot of waiting in line to get about 4 ounces of beer.  I tried a fair number, but in the end, nothing different really stood out.  Some of the best were the old standbys. New Belgium. O'Dells. Fulton.  Mostly because after about 5 or 6 different beers, your palate is shot and you really can't taste much, and who wants coconut porters and cranberry ales? Can't we just get a bunch of IPA's? Biggest disappointment was just missing out on Badger Hill Brewing's warm stout with whip cream.  Sounded awesome. 

The best thing? Probably seeing Koo Koo Kangaroo.  Two white dudes rapping about dinosaurs and your favorite colors? It's ridiculous. Check out them teaching how to do the. Dinosaur Stomp

Now that I successfully have that stuck in your head it's my time to leave.

Week 1 of training done

Mon: 5.11 miles @ 8:03 pace
Tues: 13.55 miles @ 7:09 pace
Wed: 9 miles @ 6:44 pace (4 miles @ 6:03)
Thurs: 6 miles @ 7:53 pace
Fri: 5 miles @ 7:36 pace
Sat: 7.50 miles @ 7:05 pace
Sun: 16.00 miles: 1st half: 7:07 pace. 2nd half: 6:44 pace

total: 62.16 miles

After one week of training I have to say, this is going to be hard.  I still don't have the speed I feel I had during the summer, but hopefully I'll pick that up with a few more weeks of training. That Wednesday run was supposed to be faster than 6:03 so hopefully I'll see some improvement.  17 weeks to go.

Also, why the heck do I continue to plan for spring marathons? When do I think it'd be a good idea to train through single digit temps and icy roads? Granted, it's Minnesota, so my window for good training is limited to about two and a half months, I'd much rather run in 90 degree weather with humidity than putting 5 layers on just to make sure my junk doesn't freeze.  It's irrational is what it is.

First real workout

Training started this week and today was my first real work out. 9 miles, 4 miles at 15k to half marathon pace. Sadly, I'm not in that type of shape right now so it ended up being just under goal marathon pace.  Makes me realize I do have a ways to go still and a lot of miles to log before I get to where I want. In the mean time, I did determine that Girl Talk is some of the best music to have on my iPod while running.  I mean, who doesn't want to listen to a mix of music with Busta, Avril Lavigne, Fergie, Ace of Base, Jay-Z and the Beach Boys? Mainly it gave me an hour of music to figure out how many different songs I could recognize. I'm guessing I'm way behind on this, but I don't care.

In the beginning, was this lame post

Well, I guess it's time that I start a blog about running, because we all know that everything I say is gold. "GOLD JERRY!!!!!" What better name for my blog than Shoes and Beer, the two things that I spend the most amount of money on.  Heck, I'm drinking a Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale right now, my favorite winter beer. If only I got discounts on beer, then life would be good.  Anyways, tomorrow starts official training for my quest to sub 2:40 in the marathon and I'm sure I'll have a lot of pointless, slightly humorous things to say. Please, tell your friends.