2021-03-08

Good Monday to you friends. I had an action-packed, okay that might be taking it too far, a fun-filled weekend.

On Friday evening Bonnie and I got together at the ITP Estate for a lovely evening parked around a fire pit. We were a little concerned about the wind gusts, which made putting dried Christmas tree branches verboten, but by night’s end the winds had died down and some branches were set ablaze! We also used Bonnie’s Uber Eats coupon to have delicious Thai food from the nearby restaurant Spoon delivered. Yum!

On Saturday morning I took my weekend walk with Betsy and her dog Bella in what seemed to be winter weather. It was gray and chilly, with more winds cutting through my bad choice of clothing. After the walk I coordinated with Bonnie for our day-long journey for Georgia Beer Day. As an added bonus one of my German class buddies joined us. Bonnie and I started the day at the newly-opened Round Trip brewing. Disappointedly by 1pm they had already sold out of commemorative glassware. Undaunted, we had a beer there anyway as we huddled, as much as one can huddle during these days, around an outmatched space heater. From Round Trip we went to one of Atlanta’s oldest breweries, Atlanta Brewing. Old-timers will remember when it used to be located on the Connector near 14th Street. Imagine how much money that land would fetch these days… At Atlanta Brewing we scored our commemorative glassware, and had a beer. From there we went to Dr Scofflaw’s, the newest branch of Scofflaw Brewing, located in the newly-constructed mixed-use(?) development called The Works, on Chattahoochee Avenue. It was there that Shelby (my German class buddy) finally caught up to us, and it was there that the weather became amazingly beautiful when the sun chased away the clouds and warmed us abundantly. At this point it was deemed that the driver should not have any more beer, unless of course it was done within walking distance of the ITP Estate, so we three finished the evening off at Midway Pub. Ooof, that was the most beer I have consumed in one day for awhile.

To give you a sense of how drastically Atlanta’s brewery situation has changed, consider this list of breweries:

1. Atlanta Brewing
2. Monday Night
3. Second Self
4. Scofflaw
5. Dr Scofflaw
6. Steady Hand
7. Bold Monk
8. Fire Maker
9. Round Trip

All of these breweries exist in about a three-mile area in Atlanta’s “Upper Westside”. 🤯

Yesterday I put in a couple hours of digging and root pulling in Wee’s Little Farm (this seems to be the name winning out). I’ve dug what I am calling “Potato Trench #1”, mostly in an effort to move that red clay over to the Formal Garden Plot so it can be leveled and finished. Warm weather arrives this week! We will probably get at least one more hit of cold before summer, but warmth is imminent at this point. The “potato trench(es)” will be where I line up my grow bags filled with potato plants.

After my yard work Bonnie and I met up for a little tooling around on bicycle. I’m glad to report that, though a little tender this morning, my knee seems to be okay with bike riding. I can’t wait until I can say the same for hashing! Anyway, she and I rode the Southside Beltline to the Westside Beltline. At the terminus of the Westside Beltline we rode through some slightly scary neighborhoods to get to Bankhead Marta station. We scouted around a bit to see if it was possible to get from the Proctor Creek Trail to the yet-to-be-completed Westside Connector Trail. Legally, the answer is “No”. At that point she and I rode the unfinished Westside Connector, were slightly thwarted with the current detour, got back on, were slightly thwarted with what appeared to be a NBA All Star Game related traffic snafu which included some assholes riding dirt bikes and four wheelers on the Trail, rode through some of the HBCU area, before figuring out how to connect back with the Southside Beltline at Lee+White. We rode the Southside Trail to Boulevard, where the gravitational pull of Red’s Beer Garden was too great, and we stopped in for a veggie dog and a couple of beers. At Red’s we ran into a handful of hashers who were also there imbibing. As the sun set and the temperature started to drop Bonnie and I mounted our respective bikes and rode back toward out respective neighborhoods and houses.

It goes without saying, but the amount of exhaustion I caused myself this weekend helped my sleep pretty well. 🙂

Tonight? Dunno. I may need to get out some of the frustrations caused by this “XYZ Corp” assignment…

Hope that you had a wonderful and healthy weekend.