Less Hustle More Coffee

Well, George and I had a fabulous day yesterday. We’ve looked forward to the day for a while. I wasn’t convinced that I could endure the “number” of breweries we visited yesterday but I knew I’d enjoy the journey of it – as we were going by trolley with the Music City Brewhop! If I counted right, I believe we managed to hit five of them. :-/. Katy had given this to George for Christmas.

Well, so, what was my strategy? For me to enjoy this length of a day and get to experience each one, I only had 1/2 pints. And honestly I think that will be my strategy for any visit in the future as it worked well. We were at each place for about an hour. We started out at Tailgate East where we actually parked at a nearby Kroger, as had been suggested as we started our tour there. While waiting for the trolley we had our first beer of the day.

Our trolley tour line up included:

• Tailgate East
• Monday Night
• Crazy Gnome
• East Nashville Beer Works
• Barrique Brew

Here were the choices but we didn’t hit all of them.

My favorite was “Monday Night”. I’ve never seen anything like it. The charm of it’s half torn down former meat packing plant – now open – in the state it was for a brewery. As we got closer to it, it seemed like we were in a live computer game. I know some of you are not into video, but you’ll see what I mean below.

It also had amazing views of the Cumberland River.

Monday night had tons of room. And a very unique place. Above are some inside photos we took.

The Crazy Gnome

We also went to one called the Crazy Gnome. I didn’t take pics at all places though. The crazy gnome was fun. Both inside and outside seating. Our day started off completely sunny and mostly without clouds. But as the day wore on layers of cloud cover developed and it never rained on us but we wondered if we would.

George got the sampler flight here. And then we were getting hungry. We ate a pizza at East Nashville Beer Works. I love the breweries that serve food too, even if it is just appetizers. But we went for the pizza and it was perfect! It was kindof between a small and medium size pizza. It was perfect. I forgot to take a picture of it as we inhaled it upon arrival. lol

East Nashville Beer Works had the Pizza!

So I have to explain going into the video below….I am laughing because right before I shot this, I had to wait until George finished “adjusting himself”. This is normally not something I would share, obviously. But being that I interrupted this activity and said “when you get through diggin’ in your britches, I wanna do a video”. So we are laughing here and then George makes this statement at the end…..well, I’ll let you watch the clip. All these clips are short so no worries on time. If you got time to read, you got time to see them and you don’t want to miss this. So I had to explain what was going on otherwise you’d think us to be nuts. We are anyway but…..you’ll see why I had to explain.

Barrique

So we also went to Barrique, which was our last stop. It was in Little Harpeth Brewing’s old building. Little Harpeth moved to “the Nations” part of Nashville where several other breweries are. We think we may do our own little tour over there in the Nations at some point. I was disappointed that the view out the back was covered up so you couldn’t see. That had been the perk of Little Harpeth – seeing the trains and the Nashville Skyline out the back warehouse door. Barrique is losing some charm by not allowing that view as a part of their setting. I tried to capture it in the video above! I was ready for a munchie here and all they had were pretzels. I could have used some carrots and hummus, lol. But no, expect no prepared food at Barrique.

Barrique is unique as it has more sours than anything. Matter of fact. I got water there which was nice that the gentleman actually gave to me at no charge. It was time for water as I’d not had much water. I’m not into the sours but I will say I have not given it much of a chance either. But yesterday was not my chance as it was our last stop and I was done for the day. I tried a sip of George’s and realized it was pretty good. So there is hope for me yet on liking the sours. And I’ll give Barrique another chance.

While my strategy worked for me yesterday of just 1/2 pint or 1/2 pour at each – it’s still important to stay hydrated and alcohol can be very much the opposite so I’d recommend having a water bottle or container with you for sips here and there. They didn’t seem to mind us having water on the trolley as long as we removed the trash.

At that rate, I was also going to be fine to drive. As was George b/c it was usually over an hour before each beer and you lose them at one per hour. So no intoxication in case you wondered. But we didn’t have to drive until the end of day. We looked into hotels and the prices drew us away. Too unreasonable!

We (the trolley) also dropped some visitors off in downtown Nashville and that was fun being on the trolley. There was a Garth Brooks concert only two hours from that point and the roads were starting to be filled with police set ups, road closures, and various traffic set ups for that. But we got in and out quickly.

Before heading home, George and I went out to eat in Mount Juliet for a proper meal at Chada Thai Restaurant as the pizza had mainly kind of been an appetizer as it was small and we were ready for dinner as it was wearing off. We chose Asian for a hot meal. And we both enjoyed hot green tea as well which was very good.

I got the Bento Box as it had a lot of everything. But it was too much for me to eat. I loved the salad and the chicken dish and the sushi and the sweet potato tempura. The rice was a bit too dry and the egg roll was more like tempura’d instead of the egg rolls I am used to. I was not a fan. The crab sticks tasted really fishy as did the seaweed of course. But it was fun to try it all and I had plenty of it to eat. And of course as you see below, nothing would be wasted.

Overall, it was a great day. I failed to mention we started our day at Chic Filet so we’d have something on our tummies and I think that was important as not all the breweries had food. I think some type of food is expected and appropriate. But we are foodies as much as we love a good brewery. I think their beer sales increase also when you can get some food in you and stay longer. Sometimes we’ve opted out on restaurants because we ate the brew food instead. There’s just my plug for more food at breweries – not a complete menu lineup but a few things at least – salsa and chips go a long way as does hummus and carrots. There are a lot they could without having to cook a thing. Pimento and cheese and celery and pita chips. No stoves necessary. Come on. Just do it breweries! 😉

Weekend Outlook and Easter Meal

So, today is Saturday and our Brew Hop is over and I’m the one cooking the easter meal for tomorrow. George is cooking the ham. I’m fixing the rest. I am happy to say that it gives me great joy to be able to fix the meal for my family. For some reason George has not seemed invested in the meal like he normally is and that is ok, because it gives me a chance to cook and claim back some kitchen time. Here’s what we are having:

• Honey Spiraled Ham
• Macaroni Salad
• Green Beans mixed with Speckled Butter Beans
• Corn
• Dressed Eggs
• Sister Schubert Rolls
• Lemon Ice Box Pie
• Half Sweet Iced Tea with Lemon

Then we will have leftovers. So I’m fixing what I can today – macaroni salad, dressed eggs, dessert and tea. Then the other can be heated up tomorrow for dinner tomorrow night. I have to see what we are doing for lunch though because we’ll be hungry for something after church. Since George wants the Easter meal to be at night instead of lunch we’ll have to do subway or something. I wonder if anything will be open. I may need to run to the store again and get sandwiches to hold us over. If it had been up to me I’d do the Easter meal as soon as we got home and got it all heated up. But he wanted to do dinner I think so he could do yard work. So I will try to comply. ::sigh::

Anyway I have a lot to do today so I’m getting started. I will need to set the table decor for Easter and also want to finish cleaning up the sun room for sitting in there for the next six weeks or so before it gets so hot you can’t stand it.

Things I’m Looking Forward To

Enjoy it because I’ve not looked forward to much of late.

• I’m going to enjoy attacking the hell out of quarter end, lol – believe it or not. I’m ready to get it done and over with. And not much time left.
• I’m looking forward to George getting my office file cabinet put together and it’s on his list, but then I can get my office back together for the first time in about a year. Everything will be accessible then and I can function and I plan on doing a lot of writing and creating after a bit of an organizational period.
• I’m looking forward to having some reading time at some point
• Working the puzzle from Christmas that I can finally begin to work on. Some of these things may not happen til May as I’ll be losing some personal time due to working more because of quarter end.
• Working on a list of things I want to happen to manifest (bring to fruition)
• Work on the Bucket List for Summer
• Put out my summer wardrobe
• Buy some new sandals
• Watch some hair styling videos
• Buy a new shirt or two for summer
• Work on my new way of doing videos
• Start my new video
• Do some writing I’ve been wanting to do
• Analyze a few things (good things no worries, lol)
• Plan some things – we have a few things to get on the calendar for May and June – May is filling up fast and about to spillover into June now. (Company coming, Mom has some things she needs us for and then we have an excursion or two).

So as I long as I don’t get frustrated over the time pieces – we are good, but I’m trying to learn how to do more with less time and getting the office reorganized will help me with a few things. I’m tired of sticky notes and index cards laying everywhere! I’m ready to get back to being me and being functional with the little bits of time we can find!

Ok I better get on with my busy day. What are you having for an easter meal? And let me know if you made it this far in the post! 😉