Archive for the ‘Alcohol’ Category
1914 PBF revolver
Picked up a strange revolver today – 4.5 shots (?!)
They had a 4.5 shot 1911, too, so why not?
My hero
The Punisher hits cars that cut him off.
As rum is something I wish to sell
I’ve been watching rum marketing, which is to say, youtubing rum ads. I still love Bundaberg’s “top shelf thinking” campaign; it’s hard to differentiate your brand, but blowing up animals is one way to do so.
Tour continued
Went to two distilleries today, Woodinville Whiskey Company and Sound Spirits; what a contrast! WWC looks to be the type of outfit I would aspire to own: technical, controlled, everything locked down. It helps that the associate distiller is a High Power competitor (this is what bill boarding for high-end firearms products gets you; I’m sure a Lorcin hat would attract attention, but a LaRue or Gemtech hat attracts better attention), as well as highly knowledgeable about distilling. They’re vertically integrated and produce high-quality spirits.
Sound Spirits is a much lower volume place; they produce gin and aquavit, as well as some liqueurs and vodka. It’s also way more laid-back, and is probably the type of place I’d enjoy working for. It’s nice to have a distillery cat to keep the rodentia down (being near the water does have downsides), but I don’t know if telling people on a tour that’s the cat’s job is wise. That said, it’s also the type of operation I could probably fund. Small, batch process.
I will point out that I picked up a couple bottles from Sound Spirits, and I skipped WWC. None of the spirits from WWC appealed to me, even if the miles of polished copper tubing did.
In a strange coincidence
Barron visited the Dry Fly Distillery in Spokane; last weekend, by chance, I visited Eastside Distilling in Portland. Nial invited us to dinner & drinks with Lenny Gotter (owner, Eastside Distilling) so we got to talk shop for a few hours of Tiki lifestyle (did you know it’s a lifestyle? I didn’t.) Sampling spirit-to-be right from the still (in about 1 milliliter samples), watching the Coffee Rum being made (I picked up two bottles, and it’s quite good), sampling the soon-to-be-released yet-unknown-to-the-world spirits (I promised not to tell, sorry, but it’s quite nice) put some strange ideas in my mind. Fortunately, nobody I know has tried to talk me out of such silliness, so it’s full boil ahead. Full steam ahead. Whatever. Busy planning distillery tours.
Coffee Rum from Eastside Distilling
Get with the program
Went to a federal government website to apply for a permit. Webpage was totally useless in Chrome and Firefox. Sort-of works in IE9. Loaded a VM and it works fine in IE7. Yarrr
It was hops
Sam Adams had all the hops futures. The did two lotteries in 2008 to help with the failed crop. Dammit.
In which experts fail to deliver
Stories like this make the yogurt-seeking bacteria in my colon happy: people are happier with a cheap wine than a spendy one, unless they know which is which, in which case the more expensive bottle with the nice label is better.
I often suspect the reviews of cigars in which the smoker has a calibrated tongue: if you’re telling me, centimeter by centimeter, how a cigar tastes, I no longer trust your reviews. Beyond regularity in construction and customer service, expensive cigars are just that, expensive. I’ve yet to try a $20 stick that I thought was worth 4 $5 sticks; I’m not ready to say tobacco is tobacco, but I suspect that’s the case. George Burns could have purchased any cigar, but he smoked machine rolled cheapies.
The movement continues apace
Took John to Best Buy to look at Android tablets. After scrolling around, he left with a VZW iPad 3. Xcode being free and full-featured was the reason. Once I convert Joe, my work is done.
