Busy Nothings

It’s about beer and you can read it here.

My parents hosted the Mother’s Day celebration today.  Here’s some pictures:

More pictures can be found here. 

A few more pics can be found here. 

Well, it had felt like spring but my grill seems to have been covered in snow today!

Paul Carns was kind enough to show me one his new toys.  It’s called a Lagerhead Black and Tan Turtle.  As you can no doubt guess from the name, this handy little tool is used to create a homemade version of a Black and Tan.  In the United States, a Black and Tan is a mixture of two beers: Guinness and and either Harp Lager or Bass.  It is a layered drink that, as Wikipedia explains:

“taking advantage of the fact that Guinness is “carbonated” (nitrogenated) with a nitrogen and carbon dioxide mixture that is less dense than pure carbon dioxide. The density of nitrogen gas (N₂) at STP is 28g/mole but is 44g/mole for carbon dioxide (CO₂).”

In other words, the Guinness is lighter than the lighter colored beer and will hence sit atop it.  However, to get this effect, you have to be a wee bit careful how you pour in the Guinness.  (Obviously, you start making the drink by pouring in the Bass or Harp first.)  Pour too fast and the beers will mix thus ending any hope you might have of creating a layered drink.  The solution is to add the Guinness slowly and that is what the Lagerhead Black and Tan Turtle does.  You pour the Guinness on top of turtle which then gently and evenly pours the Guinness into the glass.  Here’s what Paul did with the turtle:

And here’s the end result:

I went to the Monday Night Football game a few nights ago.  It featured my favorite NFL team, the Minnesota Vikings, battling the much-maligned Chicago Bears.  Of course, when I bought the tickets for the game, I very much expected that the Bears would be the superior team and the Vikings would have had, at most, 3 wins.  Needless to say, I had a very pessimistic view the Vikings prior to and during most of this season. 

Despite my lack of faith, however, the Vikings have won five games in a row.  I find this to be the second most amazing fact about this NFL season (the first is that the Patriots are 14-0, only the second team in NFL history to have such a record).  After considering the facts that they cannot stop the pass, rush the quarterback, or field a seasoned NFL quarterback, it is quite an accomplishment that the Vikings have managed to win five straight.  Sure they can run the ball and stop the run but that is no guarantor of NFL success.  Just look at the Vikings last year.  But with the woefully green Tarvaris Jackson at quarterback, there was absolutely no expectation of success. 

Somehow, however, Jackson has managed to turn himself into an average NFL quarterback.  Of course, that is quite an improvement from the “deer in the headlights” quarterback that he was for much of this season.  And with the improved quarterback play, the Vikings won the four previous games before playing the Bears on Monday night. 

Then, while playing the Bears, Jackson reverted to deerlike form and threw three interceptions.  I can only take heart that the Vikings still managed to win the game through some very stout defense (even if it was against Kyle Orton, who probably hadn’t played an NFL snap since the preseason).  Perhaps I can have just a bit of hope in the Vikings after all.  Here’s some pictures from the game:

I spent Thanksgiving at my parent’s house as I have done almost uniformly for the entirety of my life. Even more impressively, I think, is the fact that my family has done the celebrating at the same house for that entire time.  I feel quite lucky to have that sense of continuity in my life; it gives me a sense of permanency and connectedness.  But on to the food.  Here’s our Thanksgiving spread for 21 guests:

The menu was classic Thanksgiving fare: turkey, dressing, gravy, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, and cranberry sauce.  But with such a big crowd, some other dishes made an appearance: Ham, a ramen noodle salad, buns, corn, and a separate dressing.  It turned out to be a lot of food.  I made a ham and the sweet potatoes.  I’ll post those in separate posts. 

More Thanksgiving pictures can be found here.  My favorites from that web album are the following pictures.  The first is a foster child my sister is looking after:

The next is my sister Jessy sampling the Ramen Noodle salad:

This one is just a happy nephew:

And finally, my nephew is helped by my sister Jessy in singing karaoke:

This is an interesting list. 

I’ve decided to do a facelift on the blog.  I wanted a cleaner look.  I hope it’s as pleasing to you as it is to me.