Junior's Beer Tasting '09

We hope everyone can join us, please feel free to DM Pam or I if you have any questions.

I will be adding details to this as they emerge, for now hear is a partial beer list and some suggestions for selections you might want to bring along.

To Be Served:

Anchor - Our Special Ale 09
Deschutes - The Abyss
Hot Polish Voodoo (Mikey)
North Coast Brewing Co - Old Rasputin
Sierra Nevada - Celebration Ale 09 (Manya)
Stone Brewing - Mulitiple Selections
Widmer Brothers - Cherry Oak Doublebock

Suggestions:

Firestone - 13
Samuel Adams - Winter Lager
Sierra Nevada - Kellerweis

I am working on a cheese platter, I have some cranberry goat cheese, red wax gouda, smoked gouda, couple others I cannot recall off hand, also working on some spiced nuts and a few other snacks.

Blog World Expo 09 - Day Zero

Wow, ok no more whiny excuses about why I have not been blogging, forgetting buying my first home and moving, forget being sick, forget having a "real life" job, let's blog.

Kicked off #BWE09 with another great #Tweetup from the @LasVegasHilton, they do a great little gathering that is quickly becoming a Vegas favorite. Add Blog World to the mix and we get a ton of new folks, who were excited to meet the Vegas locals.

The best part for me was getting to befriend someone who I enjoy following on Twitter and introducing him to all the great local Vegas bloggers and social media folks.

I had to call it early tonight but it was a great start for the long weekend.

Friday Recap

Friday ended up being quite a busy and exciting day. Early in the day a friend passed along some tickets to the San Gennaro Feast, so we made plans to attend that evening.

A short time later while glancing at Twitter, I saw @ClickBooth announcing the winner of their @BlogWorld contest that I had entered here. I am usually 5-10 minutes behind on my Twitter feed, so I jumped to their timeline to find out I had won. Happy days, I was starting to think I was going to miss @BlogWorld completely.

After work we swung by San Gennaro and grabbed some subs and desert before calling it an early night. We are headed out to Lake Las Vegas today for the @BuckbeanBeer sponsored Village Craft Beer Fest. Hopefully I will have a few reports from their later and of course lots of Twitter updates.

Until then, arrrrr mateys.

Another Blog World Post

So I continue to try and find a way to gain entry to Blog World 09. Now from, XR.com, who request another posting.

So I thought I would just touch on a few more reasons, I really want to attend. If you check my posts from last year, you can see I attended New Media Expo. I did not get to attend the entire show, as I have a full time job. That job has nothing to do with blogging or social media.

My blogging is something I do for myself, and though I would love for it to become more than just a hobby... again my job gets in the way. So it is very frustrating when shows are expensive to attend. More so when they are in my backyard.

This year most of my trade show / convention schedule was shot down by the hopefully pending purchase of a house. It has put my life on hold for the past six months and left me with no room financially to attend much in the way of shows. Now that the house is almost a done, or not done deal I hope to get back on that horse.

Ideally I would love to start with Blog World / New Media Expo, but if it has to way until CES 2010, so be it. Anyhow, starting to ramble, thanks for your time.

Blog World 2009

So today I blog, without a thorough explanation as to my lack of blogging. It's safe to say this year has been a fail when it comes to attending the many trade shows and events I aspire to.

However, I now have the chance to redeem myself, in my own backyard, by gaining access to Blog World / New Media Expo 2009. How you may ask, why by blogging about it, or course.

BlogCatalog is giving away an full access pass and that is just what I need to get my blog jump started. So here is my post expressing my extreme desire to attend this year.

Hopefully I can win, so I can attend this year and have a lot to blog about in the near future.

Updates

So obviously I discontinued my weekly updates from Beer n Blog, and even though I have participated in several interesting events and one road trip, no updates have been forthcoming.

Basically I fail. While I am still debating whether or not to update on those events or not, I intend to keep blogging going forward. Including this week, Comic Con, the event that started this blog.

While I am unable to attend SDCC this year, I will be monitoring it and doing some blogging about the event. I am extremely upset at having to miss this year, but sometimes you have to make choices. Hopefully the choice I have made will be better for my family in the long run.

In the mean time I will also trying and knock out updates on the Whole Foods Beer Tasting we attended, the 4th of July Beer Bash at the NY NY Hotel we attended and our SoCal road trip to the beach. Also still hoping to squeak out Defcon in two weeks.

Bar Louie Night

Just a quick trip, need to add to it later... #BNBLV had a pretty damn good night at Bar Louie in Town Square. We had a few bumps, but very nice over all. We were happy with both the food and drink (prices). I think we will try it again.

Beer n Blog is underway

The latest Beer and Blog is underway with a bit of Red Hook IPA. The founders are here from Portland, Oregon, chatting now more later.

Just some post mortem additions, Justin brought along some cool buttons to share. Also a representative from the newly formed Indinapolis branch joined us. Good times and a good conversation as usual.

@nealmason It is on.

Long Time No Blog

Life moves fast, you better be ready to move with it, or something like that goes the quote from some movie. Dunno, my brain is on meltdown today. Such is the process of buying or I should say attempting to buy a house.

Last couple weeks Beer N Blog has happened, and I have attended but not blogged. No reason, just busy, and not pulling out the netbook much. But trying to avoid a third straight week of fail here.

Crowd is still working it's way in, a number of other events going on in Vegas tonight. So only expecting a moderate crowd, but we have about 15 at the moment. Drinking some Silver Bullet as I call them, Sapporo silver cans, the reserve variety.

May check back in later.

Another Round @ #BNBLV

Finally the first live post from the BNBLV, via the Lenovo. Many conversations going on across the stretch of tables, and a couple outside in the smoking area. Had a couple Shiner Bocks and now onto my second Bass. Then we will probably call it early tonight.

Talked to my Mom on the phone during the BNBLV tonight, outside of course. Tried to explain it to her and she asked me if I Twitter. Well that is half the battle, she is learning for someone who refused to use a computer up until a few years ago.

Have not really mentioned it before, but they play the weirdest movies on DVD here, right now it's The Man In The Iron Mask, but earlier it was something called Fido, weird zombie thingy.

So enough rambling, we are going to get out of here before crazy open mic stuff starts.

Another week of BNBLV

Ok, ok, so I still didn't post from the BNBLV this week, I was busy. Lots of folks to talk to and meet with, certainly I cannot be faulted for choosing to converse, rather than stare at my screen all night.

BNBLV continues to attract new folks each week thanks in large part to Twitter. We are also moving towards more orginization, it will arrive at some point.

Watching The Watchmen

Who watches The Watchmen? Quite a few people I imagine, this week, I know I did. For the most part I have tried to steer clear of the movie, choosing not to read a lot about it's development. Kept on the changes, the law suit, but kept trying to hold off so I could dig out my 23 year old comics and read them for the first time in, well 23 years.

Well I never did drag out the comics, but I plan to this weekend. Now that I have seen the film and read some other opinions today, I still can't quite put my to mind what exactly I thought of the film. But here goes with the attempt.

My Twitter sized review: Bloody yes, music some good and some bad, acting uneven, visually stunning, pacing solid.

As a film, I was entertained. All 2.5+ hours of it, I was never bored, I was happy with how the story was drawn out. Thinking about it after, I could only come up with a few places where I felt the film dragged.

Ala 300 the film was quite bloody with the slow motion pummeling of body parts, and a few other graphic sequences that were as gratuitous as the blue dong. Yes the blue dong was distracting, I kept thinking, really, really? You couldn't have Ken dolled Dr. Manhattan or something?

We saw the film in digital theatre, are they all this way now? Honestly, I don't go to the movies much any more, usually only go when it's for free. Sometimes, not even then. But visually the film was amazing, I imagine it is one you will be able to watch many times and always spot something new in many of the sequences.

I love the opening credits, they were interesting and I felt did a good job of setting up the film. Overall the music was either dead on or dead wrong, the lack no score was only apparent, to me, in the one sequence where they did actually have some.

So overall, it entertained. I was not blown away by the film, ready to declare it a masterpiece. But overall I think I enjoyed it, this one will require another viewing at another time to be sure. I think Zach Snyder did an amiable job, I did love 300, but I am a bit biased towards that film as we saw it in an incredible setting that lent itself the film.

Our Watchmen crowd was a bit tepid, only showing any kind of real emotion at Rorschach's prison mess hall sequence. I really can't say what the audience thought overall, maybe they like myself, are still digesting it.

Happy Hour @ Yard House

Oh Yard House, how many ways do I love thee. I first stumbled across the Yard House several years ago at their downtown San Diego location. It was love at first site, that huge wrap around bar with endless taps of beery goodness. The food was pretty damn good too.

So when the Yard House opened at Town Square last year, we needed to stop in and check it out. The evening we were their last year, I remember it being noisy and kinda on they hip side. We being the anti hip crowd, decided to avoid visiting it again on a Friday night.

Well we finally made it back last night, before our screening of Watchmen. Our timing was good as we made it for happy hour and with many lovely half price appetizers to be had, we went crazy. I started out with a Stone IPA and poured over the menu. We finally decided on a fine array of items, heavy on the seafood and for the most part very good.

My inner Gordon Ramsey prompted me to pick the Blue Crab Cakes first, they were good but a bit bland. They had a mango relish on the side, and very little filler in the cake itself. But still for the most part not a lot really good crab flavor. We had no problem eating them, none the less.

Next up we went for the other hot item of our quad, they Moo Shu Egg rolls. These were easily the highlight both for flavor and ease of eating. The applesauce ish dipping sauce on the side was a bit meh, but the egg rolls themselves were spicy of ginger, filled with lots of chicken. Very tasty.

Next up the crazy California Roll, this thing was a challenge. Set on a giant cake of rice, about 6 inches in diameter, it was tough to navigate but tasted great. A mix of cucumber and crab layered on the top of the rice and fish roe on top of that as well. Garnished with additional crab, avocado and pickled ginger, it was surrounded by a plating of oil and a wasabi, soy concoction.

Last we had the huge Poke stack, not sure why I chose this rather than the seared ahi. Storm was about done by then opting to polish off the California Roll. I went straight for the tuna and avoided the accompanying carrot bean sprout mixture that was in the middle.

I managed to polish off a couple more Stone IPA's along the way, too busy eating to look for another beer to drink. All in all very nice and another enjoyable meal at this establishment.

Another - hopefully my last post BNBLV blog!

What a crazy weird Beer N Blog we had the other day. With a lot of the regulars out of town, sick and / or busy, it opened up to a new cast of characters.

I was tired as hell from a 12 hour work day on Wednesday and wasn't anticipating staying too late. But as the evening wore on, the fun just continued. We had three or four waves of new folks that came in pairs and bunches, with a lot of humor and interest in the BNB.

Many snarky tweets aimed at the absentees and of course lots of beer. We all did our part to consume extra quantities to make up for our missing allies. I had some Shiner Bocks and Rogue Hazelnut, Stormy joined in with a few Guinness.

As to why this will hopefully be my last post I have to do after the fact and rely on memory, well that post comes next. Stay tuned as always...

Beer N Blog Postop

Not so much on the living blogging this week, brought along a groupie to join the crowd so had to keep an eye on her and not my play with my phones too much. Another fine turn out this week, a few new faces from what I could tell.

Drank some Brrr Ale and some Red Hook ESB. We showed off our new Beer N Blog badges that arrived in the mail that very day. So basically another evening of chatting and drinking, fun as always. We missed Jackie and Neal who were busy with real life and I am starting to ramble.

Next week will be the real challenge Todd, @VegasGeek will be at WordCamp Denver. I may need to be working late and I think @StormyIz is going on her KLAS tour with @CourVo. Hoping that if I have to work, I will at least get to pop by later in the evening.

All ur prizes belongs to us

Woot we won... yes prizes, with our procrastination... what can I say... we win. Waiting until last minute for buying raffle tix was for the win. We happily took home the top two giveaways.... Thank u Twestival.

Twetini's n Cheez

Enjoying some twitinis and cheese at the Las Vegas Twestival. Playing with the touch screens and just chilling so ... early yet. Storm likes the dj mix and just realized after party is at Jet.

OTW to Las Vegas Twestival

Sinus headache be damned... got out of work early. Headed home, got an early dinner and home again to change clothes...

Now we are on our way to the Las Vegas Twestival and also the displaced LV Beer N Blog. Should be fun, live blogging as time allows.

Blue Vino

Call them Blue Vino or Blue Balls... they still suck.

Alice Cooper in the House

Enjoying Elf Machine at the Freakin Frog open mic night after the #BNBLV .

#BNBLV Week Four

Things continue to expand at the Beer N Blog, they even saved all the tables for us this week. My drinking menu included Shiner Bock, Thunderhead IPA and Strongbow Cider.

So far no "Creepy Guy" but the night is young.

Pre #BNBLV Lunch

Can only hope the extra shot they threw in for free helps... because the thrill of the ACT upgrade and the Backup Exec maintenance does not.

Must find something exciting for last half of work... toner inventory, weekly report, new pc set up... not so much.

Pre #BNBLV Breakfast

Off to a long day already but starting out with a fabulous cinnamon sugar bagel and coffee from Einsteins.

Hoping this day passes quickly and I can move onto the Beer N Blog to chill and have some fun.

#BNBLV Week 3 - Still Growing

Strongbow Cider is the starting drink this evening, we filled up fast. Reserved three tables for us, they were full in about 45 minutes. Things are definitely growing around here, more laptops, more cameras, more people.

The owner of the Freakin Frog stopped in for a visit tonight, to say hello and check out the group. Also a representative from the Las Vegas Twestival, more info on that can be found here:

http://lasvegas.twestival.com/

Next up, Giddy Up Ale made with espresso, nice beer on the light side Belgium Ale, and dun dun dun the guy at the bar starts talking to me about it. He is drunk and annoying, the only thing I took from the conversation was a crack about "and I like to say from cocaine to Rogaine".

Later as the crowd at the BNB break into smaller groups, I wander up to get my second beer, trying to avoid the creepy drunk guy. Unfortunately he has another victim cornered who introduces herself to me in order to break off from him, and I am spotted. I get another 20 minute drunken tale, about what he did on New Years Eve.

After a long chat with @NealMason about World of Warcraft, it's time to head out to the Fail Kitchen to make some food for the work pot luck on Friday. But I cannot resist introducing drunk creepy guy to Neal and his friend Brian.

They thank me for this...

Needless to say, shenanigans ensued and I did not get out of their at my intended target time, but much later. Now officially named "The Creepy Guy", he set out on a barrage of victims and tirades that would make a sailor blush. But I will let the video evidence speak for itself, my poor quality cell phone vids can be found here on You Tube.

Monday Night Draft House

So, I cannot stand keeping my house keys on my car keys ring. Small car, short legs, the keys bump my leg when I drive. So I keep it light.

This however has led to me locking myself out of the house. We have to lock the door to the house, in the garage locked because my girl won't stop feeding the neighbors cats. Trust me all this randomness does collide into a point of commonality.

The neighbor cats think they live in our garage now, so girl also leaves the door cracked so they can go in and out as they please. Hence why the house door must be locked. Did I mention the pigeons?

So I have on occassion forgotten to throw my keys in my bag. Today was such a day. So with a couple of hours to kill I made my way to Big Dogs Draft House, our local watering hole.

Hey how can you say no to two for one burgers and cold micro brew. My favorite Red Hydrant Ale so not too bad a night for locking myself out of the house.

BNBLV Week Two

Another successful Beer N Blog in Vegas... details and editing later. It was another good showing and managed to meet some new folks tonight. Alas had to call it in a bit early.

We tried to gain some structure this week and plan for some constructive get togethers in the future. I am looking forward to seeing how the group progress and evolves. For now, we are definetly still growing and forming, the Tweets point to a number of people that still have yet to attend.

For now I will just sit back and watch it form, do my part as I can and enjoy the ride.

Escaped For Lunch

Exciting lunch at Starbucks, so I can run a test mobile post. Hopefully everything is working well so I can report from the Beer N Blog tonight! Move along nothing to see here, just getting out of the office for half hour to enjoy the weather.

Beer N Blog - Las Vegas Edition

So, I really should learn not to flash my phone rom before I head out to a social networking event. It makes it difficult for me to mobile blog when my phone will not send the message out properly, add alcohol to the mix and well you get the idea.

At any rate, the first Beer and Blog in Las Vegas was a huge hit last night. Expectations varied but with over 30 people attending, it's safe to say that a second event will be in order. Apparently Twitter really is an effective social media tool, because it propagated quite a bit through the Interwebs.

I certainly did not have the opportunity to meet many of the attendees, but did chat at length with several of them. Definitely looking forward to meeting some other folks in
the future.

But really, on to the fun stuff. As #bnblv crowd thinned out, the college crowd began to fill in, and to our "delight" we found ourselves amid open mic night. There was quite a cast of celebrities, especially if you are a fan of nineties alternative music. We had Lisa Loeb, the lead singer of Midnight Oil and the late, great (op‌ions may vary) Kurt Cobain in attendance. Oh and some guy with a Mac singing about Star Wars, looked so bored with himself, I thought he was gonna go all narcoleptic in his chair.

While I am known in my circles as a ham in Rock Band, especially when I sing and play guitar at the same time. However, I generally tend to keep that to the privacy of my living room. Well except for that time last week at Harrah's, but we won't talk about that. Still it was great fun mocking the youngsters with references they really didn't understand.

Lots of good beer, some tasty fried food, not a bad little joint, the Freakin' Frog, btw, helps to mention the place you are talking about. Big shout out to everyone that attended, hope you all had as much fun as I did.

CES09 - Day Four Wrap Up

After the fail of Saturday, I needed to get off to an early start on Sunday. Although the scary folks, in line in their pajamas at Starbucks had other ideas. I managed to get down to the convention center just after nine.

Sunday was pretty quiet, but I had a lot of ground to cover. I worked from the North to South halls before deciding to head over to the Sands. A quick bus trip over there and the crowd was a bit heavier thanks to the Adult Entertainment Expo.

Normally I really enjoy the Sands portion of the show, but this year, not so much. I grew bored pretty quickly as my mind and stomach became more interested in lunch. The next big decision of the day, Gordon Biersch which would be taxi or on foot or shuttle back to the CC and a hike to the Hilton.

I opted for football and the Hilton, made my way over to the theatre for $1 hot dogs and $2 beers. Watched the end of the Giants / Eagles game and the start of the Chargers / Steelers. That was a nice break that gave me the energy to make another pass through the convention center.

Admittedly I got caught up in the last minute swag opportunities at the show. I got some of my best stuff in the last hour, lots of Micro SD cards, card holders, hats, shirts and orange pens. Why so many damn orange pens? Well I take those to work at any rate.

Surprisingly I stayed until the show closed at 4 before getting in my car and finding myself home by 430 to watch the end of the game. I definitely did not cover the show as much as I had intended, but I did have a good time. In the end, that's all that matters.

CES09 - Day Three Fail Blog

Fail so hard it gets posted on Sunday...

So a long night Friday, shopping and real life Saturday morning. Follow that up with two power naps and a craving for steak... and you end up with failing to attend CES on Saturday.

But that is pergoative you can have when you attend on your own dime and time and live in Vegtas. Had a nice day at home, watched football, had a good steak dinner.

Back in action today @CES09, working my way through everything. Stay Tuned.

CES09 - Day Two Firefly

Finally landed at Firefly Tapas Bar, having some mojitos and sangria and tapas. Good stuff. We sampled the watermelon and blood orange mojitos, the watermelon won.

Now we have to decide on the tapas, everything looks excellent. This may take a while... no rush the parties don't start until five.

CES09 - Day Two Lunch

So a couple disappointments starting with the often legen...wait for it...dary Gibson tent. Looks like no concerts or happy hours this year.

We toured the booth and got to check out the Marcus Henderson guitar, but no sign of the Joan Jett. We will try again later.

We then moved over to the food court behind the tents. Not much selection and pretty crap food. This in no way is anything on par with my pulled pork.
Anyway, time to head back to the floor.

CES09 - Day Two @ Microsoft

Working our way around, many interesting things so far. Just stopped in at Microsoft for a number of reasons.

First checking on the after market availability of Sync. Playing with the touch screen interface of Windows 7. Off to gaming next and hopefully a normal W7 demo.

CES09 - Day Two

Finally arrived @ CES09! Things going smoothly so far, we got great parking, whisked through the badge holder pick up, grabbed breakfast. Now just waiting for the magic 9am hour to hit the show room floor.

We have about six hours today before heading over to Firefly tapas bar for an early dinner. Plans to hit the It Won't Stay In Vegas party. Also hoping Gibson will have it's usual great events planned.

More to come, so stayed tuned.

CES09 - Day One

Day one, spent oh so close yet so far away. I work just a few miles from the Convention Center, but I never got to lunch today, little lone a drive by on CES. I got some early glances at Twitter, following up on some party invites and wishing I was there.

At any rate, it was a busy day not at CES, now I have my gadgets packed and am ready to get an early start in the morning. Except for the fact I left my extra phone battery at work, so an early stop by work is now on the books for Friday.

No parties for me tonight, no CES love, just some love through the tweet lines and some tv coverage on G4. All is well, the weekend is here and the next three days I can enjoy, can't wait!

Also a few of us are going to happy hour at Firefly tomorrow 3pm.

CES09 - Media Day

One of the most frustrating parts of being in town, is that when the pre convention stuff starts, I am stuck at that 40 a week grind that pays the bills. So I followed the Tweets and Feeds and such as I could today from a far. I have yet to pay my dues enough to garner a blogger or press type badge. Also bowing out of day one until after the 5pm bell rings out the end of my work week.

Still getting excited for the event, updating my phone and my blog and my many online hang outs in preperation of a long weekend of texting, blogging and taking pics of coold stuff. Going to try and keep the updates brief for the most part, be sure and follow the Twitter updates as well.

Off to watch the Ballmer keynote online.

New Year

The opportunities to blog on the go have been few and far between these winter months. But what better way to start out the new year then lots of posts from CES. The annual invasion of Las Vegas by the tech industry begins this week.

The posts should be plentiful over the next few days, stay tuned.