Spring Break '010 USA!!!!

Spring Break elicits a certain silly joy in me. Thinking about it makes me giddy - actually giddy. I think part of that is because of what it is not. Spring Break is not the school or work that harshly demarcate its boundaries. It is not the claustrophobia of winter nor spontaneity's summer. It is not a given, and I will not let 'em take it away.

Drinking Bicardi Raz and watching Finding Nemo on the big screen is not the same as being at the beach.

Drinking a cup of Metropolis's coffee as big as your head and chasing it with a vegan scone does not make you a savvy, self-deprecating intellectual. (though you will think very very fast.)

Drinking a shot of whiskey followed by a shot of pickle juice does not make you vomit.

What was not was amazing. Unlikely and likely combinations erupt in a thousand little bubbles of joy.

i probably should have known about this earlier

Chicago Bar Project. I should probably be a stringer for this.

i can sympathize

Walking to class today (in the second-to-last week of my second-to-last quarter), I saw the remnants of someone's private moment. On the sidewalk side-by-side sat a 22 of Old English and a pint of Ben and Jerry's chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. Clearly, this raises a number of questions. Ruminate accordingly.

kindred

Two sets of dear friends visited in January. Visited Chicago in January. Clearly, I am loved.

Eben and I are truly at our best together on a porch, beers in hand, music playing, and time stopped or spread. Alas, the Adirondack chairs are yet to be purchased and snow's all that sittin on the porch. So when Eben and Anna visited, I had to plan some indoor activities. Many of them involved beer including a tour of Half Acre Brewery.

Half Acre's brewery tour was free yet they still pumped us full of free beer. Amazing, tasty, complex free beers. The kind of beers that you wouldn't want to have as an everyday beer but you would because the Half Acre folks are so knowledgeable and charming. The beautiful foamy head on this hoppy afternoon was that Half Acre doesn't want to expand. They don't want to get big. They don't want you to drink their beer everyday. Hallelujah.

Eryn lost her scarf, but we still found fun

Just a day into the oh-ten new year, I had the good fortune and good company to sample a new drink. Glogg! A drink made all the more exciting by the fact that there's an umlaut in it. (I don't know how to type an umlaut.)

Glogg is a Swedish mulled wine. Of course, I've had mulled wine before, but the familiarity of this drink is part of what makes it so special. It was slightly sweeter than similar drinks I've had and was finished with raisins and almonds that wait as tiny alcohol-soaked treats at the bottom of your mug. It didn't suprise me but enabled me to appreciate nuances of a drink I've had, but haven't had, every winter.

I want to recline in the moments and tastes and spaces where familiar and new meet. Here we have experience yet fresh perspective. Like having a dear friend in your new(ish?) city. I was reminded about why I love my neighborhood bar. We went places I've never been, but they seemed intimate and comfortable. And I was able to softly detect the ways she's changed yet remains true.

we'll take a cup o' kindness yet

was '09 the year to grow up? the unexpected death of extended adolescence? the slow birth of adulthood? hello, oh-ten. bring a new and curious infancy.

and, of course, delicious drinks i have never tried like the classic jack rose cocktail.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sebfwBVEVKE

the first supper

I managed to make it through another set of finals. This is a privileged triumph following a few weeks rife with privileged complaining.

In the days leading up to the end, it helped me get through to think about what I would do when I had free time again. Laundry! Books for fun! Cooking a real, healthy meal! I even bought ingredients to make a dinner that had distinct elements that sat apart from each other on the plate and complimented each other. Nothing special but it sounded exquisite - fish, collard greens, and scalloped taters spiked with some fancy cheese finished with fresh baked banana bread ice cream sammiches.

But when it came time for the first supper of freedom, all I wanted was a buffet of finger foods and a bottle of a hearty, cheap, red wine. I needed to nibble and sip for hours. I popped olives in my mouth, plucked pomegranate seeds from the fruit, and traced patterns in the hummus with crackers.

After a few weeks of big bites and big tasks, it needed to be small. Well, except for the wine.