Forgot one!

Cascade Kriek Ale (Rating = 2)
This was one other one that came as a gift and we enjoyed it at my recent party.  This had high potential, but the beer soaked cherry flavor just tasted wrong.

Not good.  Blech.

Cross a few entries off the list!

Yes, I have now tried a handful of the 1,001 brews.  I have now settled on a format and what type of info to capture for each beer.  I won't bore everyone (anyone?) with the details, but you can see the full spreadsheet here.  I will do a better job giving a quick overview with each beer that I've tried.

In the meantime, here are the few beers that I've tried over the past couple of weeks (mostly thanks to a gift from my good friend Harvey).  NOTE: my rating scale is completely subjective, from 1-5 (5 being best):

Fuller's London Pride (Rating = 4)
Definitely had this in the old days in London, but it's been a while.  Really a good drinking beer.

Old Peculier (Rating = 4.5)
My favorite of this batch so far.  Great name, great taste.  It is dark-ish, but still fairly light.  Really tasty.  Worth finding more of Old Peculiar (also Harvey's new nickname).

Ayinger Celebrator (Rating = 3.5)
It had a cool little horsey charm around the bottle.  That was probably the highlight.  It was dark, was ok.  I might try it again, but would push down an old lady to get one (unless I was really thirsty).

EKU 28 (Rating 4)
This bad boy was potent.  11% alcohol kind of gave me a strong shove.  It was good, but I can only imagine having a drinking session on this one.

Weihenstephaner Vitus (Rating = 4)
A solid wheat beer entry from Germany.  I know they do some solid varieties (I think I might have actually had this once before on a trip to Germany).  Great summer beer with a little spice.  I'd have it again (notice the trend here?).

This from a recent Germany trip, I had the "small" beer while my colleague opted for a coffee (for the record, this wasn't an espresso, but it was one giant beer) in the airport lounge.  Needless to say, I slept well on that flight.

Murphy's Irish Stout (Rating = 3.5)
I used to be a big fan of Murphy's back in my younger days.  I thought it had a slightly sweeter taste than Guiness.  But after revisiting it, I think I will stick with old reliable.  Love the draught cans though.

Allagash Tripel Reserve (Rating = 4.5)
I love the big bottles.  And this was a nice surprise.  I do normally like Allagash generally, but this was even better than their normal Allagash White.  Nicely balanced fruit and really smooth.  When you can get a solid 2 beers from a bottle, that is living (Old English-style perhaps?).

Victory Golden Monkey (Rating = 4)
Victory Prima Pils (Rating = 3.5)
Victory Hop Devil (Rating = 3)
I found a nice treat at Julio's Liquors in Westborough a few weeks ago. They had a nice variety pack from Victory - which I had noticed rated 3 beers on this list.  No real surprises here - wasn't a huge fan of the hoppy one, the pilsner was fine (nothing special) and the summer-y one was light and tasty (I think I did have it on a warmer night).

That will do it for this update for now, more to come.  

1001 Beers to Try Before I Die.

Thanks to the gift of this book by my lovely wife, I am now on a quest to try all of these beers.  Yes, 1001 beers is the challenge.

I've enlisted a few friends to assist in the process.

The key is this - you must try the beer now - no grandfathering in of previous tastes.

Photographic proof is a bit too much.  But at least a brief update when you've hit one off the list is required.

Here is the list (1001 beers to try before you die)

Let the beer drinking commence.

All Time Top 20 Rap Hits Sweet 16 Bracket (ATT20RHS16B)

Gentlemen (and Lady),

I officially welcome you all to a very interesting project - aka ATT20RHS16B for short. We have quite a list of participants - welcome to everyone (as there are some friends of friends connections). The idea's originator was Jamie Myers, a good friend of mine from college. We've spent many an occasion discussing top 10 lists, best albums, etc. - many of them focused specifically on rap (as we have been fortunate enough to see quite a few interesting live rap shows collectively over the past few years - Big Daddy Kane, Digital Underground, Public Enemy, Slick Rick, Wu-Tang Clan to name a few). But I digress. Through emails with a few of you, we've improved the idea and come up with ATT20RHS16B.

This is built on a few very simple ideas:

* Everyone on this list is a big fan of the rap music
* We all grew up in the heyday of mix tapes
* We're all fans of sports - and the NCAA bracket is an enjoyable work diversion
* We all think our favorite songs are categorically THE BEST songs

So, I challenge each of you to create 1 single CD with 20 (if it can't fit on 1 CD, make it 2 CDs) of your favorite rap songs of all time. There are no other restrictions - interpret words like "best", "favorite", "rap" and "song" as you like. Simply create a CD with 20 songs and send it to us. We will then, via popular vote, attempt to identify the "best" compilation from our submissions.

Each of you should create 1 copy of your CD and send it to either Jamie or myself (your designated recipient is listed below) BY JANUARY 31. We will then copy the CDs and send out a package to each of you with 8 CDs (including your own). So, you will receive a total of 16 CDs. You will have about 2 weeks to listen, review and critique the CDs.

Then the bracket fun begins - we will put together brackets of each person's CD and everyone will get a vote to choose their favorite. The winners go forward to the next round, until we end up with the winner. Brackets will be constructed based on a random drawing of names.

At the same time, we will have a bracket to choose the all-time best rap song. Each person can submit up to 3 of their personal nominees for best rap song when they submit their CD. We will compile a list and put together a random bracket so we can vote on this as well.

Got it?

So, again, send us your 1 CD of your Top 20 Favorite Rap Songs. Please include the following information:

* Title and artist for each song on your CD on some sort of printed listing
* Title of your CD & Your name and address
* Your 3 nominees for Top Rap Song


I am quite excited for this project and have already been poring through old cds, tapes and journal entries to find my top 20 songs.

Good luck gentlemen (and lady)! Any questions, please let me know.

Thanks,

Goodbye Corey

As soon as I got the news this morning (via text message from my very "connected" wife), I was going to write something about Corey Haim's passing. Like many other people, I find it hard to be surprised with the news (especially if you had seen him on The Two Corey's recently, he looked like a mess). If the saying is true, these things come in 3's. We've already bid adieu to Andrew Koenig (Boner from Growing Pains, man I could have written about his dancing with Carol Seaver at the school dance as a seminal experience in my TV-viewing childhood). But, who would be next? The cast of Sixteen Candles, given how they looked at the Oscars, could certainly be next (If you see Judd Nelson on the corner, please give him a dollar or something). Maybe Skippy Handleman from Family Ties is feeling ill today. Or perhaps Cockroach from The Cosby Show.

Regardless, Corey's death hits closer to home to me. Only a couple of years older than me, he seemed like he was the ultimate kid actor sensation. He was out in a flash and pretty much gone that quickly. Yes, I had to do some quick IMDB'ing, but he had a nice little streak in the mid to late 80s. First was a supporting role in Murphy's Romance with the original Gidget (Sally Field) and Ben Affleck's Father in Law (James Garner). Yes, I saw this movie about a mother and her young son moving to somewhere in the midwest (Texas, perhaps?). This was back when HBO was one of the only options - if it was on, you probably watched it (hoping for some skin, for the record, I don't recall any).

Then came his 4-hit string. There are lots of other things listed that he appeared in, but these were the only other films that mattered (to a small few). Lucas, License to Drive, The Lost Boys and Dream a Little Dream. I think all of them could be described as good/bad movies. They were basically bad, but at the time they seemed pretty good (I guess I can chalk most of it up to youthful bad taste perhaps? Although that doesn't really explain why I still like them). All but Lucas co-starred his partner in crime Corey Feldman (who has a much more impressive list of credits - Goonies, Bad News Bears, Stand By Me, The burbs, Gremlins, and the voice of Donatello in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), with who Haim was often confused. And judging by things that I saw online today, people are still quite confused about the two Corey's. I kind of feel a little sorry for Corey Feldman right now - does he have to email and call everyone he kind of knows to just say "hey, I'm still alive - don't worry about me".

But, on to the movies. I think Lucas was the first one really. It was a great teen movie about an awkward teen trying to fit in. He befriends the new girl in town (when he starts mowing her lawn I think, also used in the Patrick Dempsey teenage chick flick Can't Buy Me Love), played by Kerri Green. She's another one of those fast flashes in the pan - she hit it big (relatively) with Lucas, Summer Rental (with John Candy) and Goonies and then - poof. She disappeared. Lucas and Kerri are friends as school starts, but then she starts to fall in with the cool crowd - the jocks and the cheerleaders.

Of course, there was a pretty stellar cast of cool kids. Courtney Thorne Smith (Allison from 90210 and the surfer chick from Summer School) was the head cheerleader. She dated hunky Charlie Sheen, the star football player. Also on that team was none other than Ari Gold (real name = Jeremy Piven). Kerri Green falls for Charlie, the only cool guy that is nice to Lucas. Lucas has a very young Winona Rider chasing after him (as the geeky nerdy girl), but he only wants Kerri. So, he goes out for the football team to show everyone that he can do it. He does it - but eventually gets beat up in the big game (after bothering the coach enough, they put him in and he drops a sure touchdown, then gets brutalized). At the end, the slow clap scene happens when the team gives him a varsity jacket and everyone is happy. But Charlie still gets the girl. Corey as Lucas (lucaplaciea, meaning cancer of the mouth) is the every nerd fighting for respect and the girl he likes. It is a heart warming tale.

My personal favorite was next - License to Drive. Corey is going to get his license, but fails his test. He neglects to tell his parents he failed and one insane night of comedy, love and hijinks ensue. Along the way, we get treated to some powder blue Cadillacs, some Sinatra music and our first dose of Heather Graham (as the cute Mercedes Lane, his love interest). Again, not exactly a movie for the ages, but entertaining nonetheless. Completing the mood was a killer soundtrack that included Billy Ocean (Get out of my dreams, get into my car), Sinatra, Nia Peeples (yes, the hottie host of The Dance Machine with Nia Peeples and the lovely lady from that top notch surfer movie North Shore), New Edition, INXS and more. Can't you just remember the tracks that Corey put together for his mix tapes to play when he drive Mercedes around? Oh, maybe that's just me. Also, I just read that Nia Peeples now has something to do with some guy called the Teenage Whisperer. I'm sure that there will be new Catch a Predator series looking for that guy.

Probably the one that Corey is best known for is The Lost Boys. Vampires in California - how can't you love this one. This also features an all star cast - mainly Corey, Corey, Jamie Gertz, Jason Patric and Kiefer Sutherland. Corey and Corey try to fight off the vampires. Actually, their best actual movie, with a large cult following.

Lastly was Dream a Little Dream - another one of those movies that was on constant loop on HBO back in my teenage years. You know, to this day, I really don't know what this movie was about - there was some body switching going on. There was a weird scene where Corey Feldman publicly admits and flaunts his love for Michael Jackson - wait, that was the best scene where Corey dances against himself (Feldman, not Haim). There is a girl in that they are chasing that has a large set of umm, personalities. I think that's all I really remember. Maybe calling this one a hit is a stretch. The old guy from Quick Change, a very underrated movie with Bill Murray, Randy Quaid and Geena Davis, was also in it. And the dad from Pretty in Pink too.

So, I guess Corey was still trying to relive the glory of this 4 movie run (maybe a 2 picture run in reality). But, still, he was just 38 and he was a mess. He was on all sorts of drugs and was convinced that he was still a good actor (was he ever?). It's pretty sad that he's dead, but he's probably better off. I guess if these guys would have come out now, they'd have all sorts of online stories about them on TMZ, sex tapes and even more appearances in reality television. Regardless, Corey Haim makes me think about my childhood - awkward goofy teenager, young vampire killer and failed driving school dropout. Rest in peace Corey. May the legend live on. Let's also hope that Feldman doesn't try to use this as a way to re-launch his career.

Snow in Hawaii?

It is now just past 3pm EST here in Waltham, MA. It is not snowing. It appears that there might actually some precipitous formations dropping from the skies, but it does not qualify as snow in my book. As we wait for the latest nor'easter to hit us, I continue to be baffled by our collective reaction to the snow (and for the potential snow). Every year the same things happen. At the beginning of the season, when the first storm hits, everyone exhibits behavior reminiscent of Tom Hanks' Saturday Night Live character - Mr. Short Term Memory. They forget how to drive in the snow. This normally causes lots of crazy traffic and accidents. Do our cars get nervous? No. Just the drivers.

Inevitably, there is 1 big storm that the weather forecasters get totally wrong early in the season. Either they predict tons of snow that never hits us or they claim that some storm will slide off to the south and miss us and then, surprise - a foot of snow. Yet, we continue to hang on their every word like they are much more specific Farmer's Almanac. Although I think a very vague weather prediction like chance of snow, cold is pretty much in line with the Farmer's Almanac's predictions. At least these girls have invented something that we really need - the nippleometer.

We've got all this new technology available - super doppler radars, massive statistical models and countless years worth of data. Yet, we (the collective we, but mostly Weather Peeps (since they are now some lovely ladies of weather in addition to good old reliable weathermen)) can not seem to do any better with weather predictions. Why is that?

The WPs are like Steve Martin in the Jerk trying to guess our weight. Guess your weight, win some crap. Ahh, I get it - it's a profit deal. I think Jimmy the Greek had a better streak of success than these folks do (on average).

Wait, I think I have just realized why there are now more women WPs. Just like many other jobs in the media, we've recruited more humans that are easy on the eyes to deliver information that is less than exact or potentially useless. Like when we went through dozens of attractive, less than informative sideline reporters during sports broadcasts. That seems a little sexist, doesn't it? Oh well. I just know that no Dick Albert or Bruce Schweggler would be getting a job in the current, umm, climate.

The other thing that really annoys the crap out of me is the trend to over react to the potential for snow accumulations. I was once in North Carolina when they had a ice storm a few years back. That area is ill equipped to handle this kind of weather - they don't have plows or batches of sand or salt ready to spread on the roadways. It crippled the state for a week or so. We've even seem more of this type of thing in the Mid-Atlantic this past week. Yes, I'm talking about Snowmageddon. Some of those areas don't normally get much weather like this - it's hard for them to deal with.

I know I'm taking a long way to get there, but my point is that WE LIVE IN NEW ENGLAND. Why do we act like we can't handle some snow? How can the City of Boston cancel public schools the night before a (potential storm) that was not even predicted to hit until around noon-ish? Have we collectively become such idiots and pussies that we have to close up shop and stay home because it MIGHT snow heavily? I really don't get it.

I work with a client based in Syracuse, NY - it snows there (on average) almost 12 feet EVERY YEAR. And it is quite regular for it to snow almost every day for most of the winter. Do they shut down school at a hint of snow? Nope.

It's snow, not the end of the earth.

Very Special

Most days at work I listen to my Ipod - I just put it on shuffle and let it play in the background when I'm in my office (which is most of the time). It always makes me smile a little bit when I'm sitting around doing some work and a really random song will come on. It might be one of the songs from the extremely excellent Best of Rocky Balboa soundtrack (getting me a little too pumped up at my desk). Or it might be some completely inappropriate song from NWA (RIP Eazy-E) or a song from some very forgetful album. In general, I enjoy the fact that I spent way too much money over the years on CDs and try to reminisce about where I acquired that specific CD as it comes on.

Today's smile inducing song was "Very Special" by Big Daddy Kane, featuring Spinderella. Those who know me know that I do have a strong affinity for hip hop and rap from the 80s through the late 90s. Big Daddy Kane was just a great rapper. He is probably best known for "Ain't No Half Stepping" (with a great video here - I remember these kids dancing in the background - perhaps Kid & Play's inspiration?) - a nice rap tune. But he's had quite the interesting career. There are a few things that I remember well and a few that I had to rely on the glorious interwebs for. I clearly remember when Madonna's book (Sex) came out during my freshman year at BU, it was all the buzz. Someone on my floor got the book and I remember how surprised I was that none other than Big Daddy was prominently featured in it (I have since forgotten that Vanilla Ice appeared in it as well). I think I've blocked out any memory of Big Daddy's little daddy (if indeed it was shown), but I still found it strange that he was in the book (apparently he appeared in Playgirl as well).


I knew that he was friends with another personal favorite - Biz Markie (I'm still waiting for my own personal Biz alarm clock). Apparently BDK was the brains in the operation, having written most of the lyrics for Biz's biggest hits. He also was one of the guys that gave Jay-Z his start - Jigga was actually a hypeman for BDK shows in the 90s (along with Positive K - the guy that sang that song "I Got A Man" and sang both the male and female parts on his one-hit wonder). I was fortunate enough to see BDK perform a few years back at small theater in New York City. Unlike some of the other "legends of rap" that I've seen over the past few years (Slick Rick and Digital Underground come to mind), Kane was awesome. He brought it and brought it hard for a solid hour plus. He got to all of his stuff, covered some other rappers' hits and even did a little move busting of his own. It was high energy and for any real rap fan of the era, a great show. So, I still enjoy and support BDK.

I digress a bit though. This song made me smile mainly because I get such a kick out of the mini-genre that was the rap love song. You know what I'm talking about - when the rapper "slows it down" and sends one out to the ladies. I've been trying to rack my brain for a few more examples. LL Cool J's "Around the Way Girl" might have been the most mainstream example ("bamboo earings, at least two pair"). But there have been others through the years - "I'd Rather F*** With You" by NWA; "Song Cry" by Jay-Z; "Dear Mama" and "Brenda's Got a Baby" by Tupac; "I Need Love" by LL Cool J, "Do 4 U" by Father MC (and Mary J. Blige) and many others. It's always amusing to me to hear the respect these rappers have for the ladies - me thinks it's a tad transparent. Did they really need more reasons to attract the rap groupies, I mean the sentimental ladies? I guess one good rap love song can overpower album's worth of bitches and hoes.

This lovely duet with the DJ from Salt N Pepa had some really solid lyrics. Just a few favorites - "since they say love is blind, I'm the Ray Charles of rap", "you're always on my mind, even more than my own skull", and "those tropicana drinks don't blend as good as us". I mean, those were clearly classic lyrics that must have taken literally minutes to compose. Rhyming ain't easy! Just taking it slow and giving us something a little different than the normal rap song.

Lastly on this somewhat related post - I really don't get the IPod shuffle at all. It clearly shuffles within a segment of albums, not the entire collection. Why can't they invent a shuffle that truly shuffles across the whole IPod? I understand the concept of the word random - I'm not sure Mr. Shuffle does though. How often do you hear multiple songs from the same artist or even the same album back to back? If it is an indication of my luck, I guess I need to play the lottery some more. Please Apple geniuses, get to work on this. It would make my life a little better.