House Warming in Worcester

Chris popped over on Friday night for some German beer and a natter. We also gave the bottle of W L Weller bourbon a hammering along with some other whiskeys including a 38 year old grain and a splendid 35 year old blend. We also had some very moderate fish and chips with Clare and it was lucky she woke me on the Saturday.

work on the Saturday was to take me to central London for a most enjoyable stint with Clare at the Blind Piano Tuners association annual conference.

After a busy and hectic few hours we jumped in a cab and drove over to Paddington and then on to Worcester and Dave’s newly purchased property.

The party was busy to say the least with around 17 people in his one bedroom flat. Around 50 cans of Guinness were demolished along with over 3 bottles of wine and many cans of Carlsberg export and some bottles of Cobra. It was really good catching up with old friends and everyone appeared to have a good time. I was up for whisky at the end of the night but mine host was slumbering on the floor so this really didn’t appear such a workable plan such was the noise of snoring reverberating the room from other sprawled out carcases.

Everyone rose on Sunday remarkably well and though one of our number had vanished in to the night Dell Dave Clare and I made our way to the Plough for Sunday dinner and a pint or two. It was lovely with the cathedral bells wringing and the food was splendid. The pudding really topped it all off as it was homemade and swimming in custard.

Dell departed and then the afternoon took a decidedly European flavour as we strolled along to Worcester racecourse to enjoy the beer and hotdogs at the German festival taking place over that weekend. Apparently most of the people behind the counters were Greek, the band Indian and the bar staff from Liverpool but never the less we drank ate and revelled in the music for a good two hours or more. The same fest will visit Northampton this weekend and it would kill a good bit of Saturday or Sunday so it could be one to try.

My apatite for European beer not yet satiated we went via McDonalds to the Austrian pub in Worcester. I enjoyed a pilsner and a dunkle beer and then we walked home.

I have work in Worcester today and then its London on Tuesday.

More "Systematic Chaos" info

The new Dream Theater album will be available in two versions on release. The standard version and another with an LTD DVD featuring the album in 5.1 and a 90 minute documentary about the making of Systematic Chaos.

A quicktime electronic press kit for the album can be downloaded at
http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/shared/downloads/DreamTheater/Dream_Theater_EPK.mov

You can also download a full track from the new album called "Constant Motion", at.
http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/dreamtheater/
I’m of to grab both now.

And don't forget that Dream Theater will be Bruce Dickinson
's guests on Saturday, May 26 during
Bruce's weekly BBC 6 Music radio show, aptly named "Rock Show"
. Listen to the program live via the Internet between 9:00 p.m. and 12:00 a.m. (midnight)
U.K. time (between 3:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. EST)

Cover shots from the Systematic chaos album can be found at these locations.

http://www.mikeportnoy.com/forum/upfiles.aspx/615/E1C2B911D89D437FB8B0E4F6848F73A2.jpg
http://www.mikeportnoy.com/forum/upfiles.aspx/615/6EEA4B38895B486485AAD13C013A71F2.jpg

QuickUpdate

Its a long story but a new pair of shews buggered up my right foot last Tuesday to the extent that lots of skin is missing from the back of the foot and I can’t walk in shoos for any distance. In fact I’ve had to take a day off work such was the soreness of walking. It appears as though I was sold two different shoos, one wide fitting and one normal with the result that the wide fitting one rubbed on my heal. The problem was that I didn’t have anymore shoos since Malone wrecked the pair I was using and I chucked my old Kickers away last week.

With the UK pound so strong against the US dollar I purchased the full Monty Python 16 dvd box set of Flying Circus including the live DVD of Hollywood bole along with a string quartet tribute to Dream Theatre for only £44 including shipping. I may get charged customs on that but even so its still an amazing bargain. from Amazon for

My parents came over for the weekend and the usual orgy of food and ale was inevitable. I demolished 10L of warsteiner beer with my dad over two nights and was feeling it on Monday as I set off to Hammersmith for some Trekker training.

The job completed Clare and I headed off to the Dove for the St George’s day party.

On a distressing note a close friend of Clare’s passed away yesterday which is immensely sad. Hey mate, at least the pane is gone now and we had a JD for ya. RIP.

I’m on my way to Nottingham at the moment for a demo and then staying over in Worcester tonight as I’ve work in the city tomorrow.

Penderyn Welsh Whisky - 46%

Gwalia distillery was built in the village of Penderyn and is the only welsh distillery at the moment. The single malt is matured in bourbon barrels and then transferred to Madera drums for a period of finishing.

Brains brewery in Cardiff ferment the wash or beer from which this whisky is distilled.

pallet: lively bourbon and port interweave. ok so it's not a port cask but they're my notes ok? one can still taste the new make spirit a little but its mature for a 5 year old whisky. Don't add water as it brings out a funky chemicals note for me.

Finnish: long and a little biter, like a hoppy beer.

Comments: not bad at all. I'd love to try a 10 year old version of this matured just in bourbon barrels.

Score: 74%

Window-Eyes 6.1 now Available

Everyone knows now but GW Micro have released Window-Eyes 6.1 full for free download as long as you’re a v6 user. Go grab even if you don’t use Vista or office 2007.

Jaidy Lady

Andrew Gower from GDBA came to talk to me today about getting another dog. Yep, Jaid’s retiring this year and I should have another wuffer before Christmas. Sad I know but life moves on and I know Jaid will have a smashing retirement. I just don’t want her to go through another working winter.

I took two and a half days off this week to prolong the bank holiday which has been unproductive but enjoyable. Next week looks to be busy with dems either booked in for each day or on the cards.

We have no plans for the weekend so I’ll stop drivelling and get stuck in to this pint of Banks’s Original.

Second Album for Allen Lande Project

The magnificent Allen Lande project releases a new album soon and with this second chapter called the Revenge a myspace page blobbles online. Anyway, check out some tracks from the new album and listen to two of the finest vocalists in metal.

Hal/Supernova version 7.03 swims on to the net

The bofins at Dolphin have been working away and made some useful improvements on the web side of things at last. They also now support grade II Braille input with the Humanware Braille Connect range of displays. Its free, so grab your update if you're a v7 user. Pen customers will have to wait a little longer for the update.

Beef in Bishops Finger Ale

Clare and I found a few Recipes for similar dishes on the web but adapted this for what we had in the cupboard. Worked lovely too.

Though we used the slow cooker it would be possible to oven stew this. three hours fifteen minutes aprox gas mark two, 300 deg F 150 deg C.

Please, if you’re cooking in oven substitute cooker with casarole dish or what ever you’re using. This should satisfy 4 people.

1 lb lean stewing steak or 1 and a half lb if you’re hungry
1 500 ML bottle of bishop’s finger or other good ale. Probably best not to be too sweet a beer.
2 large carrots chopped.
Two sticks celery chopped.
1 small pack fresh button mushrooms.
1 small onion diced.
10 whole Shallots.
3 cloves garlic crushed.
1 tablespoon English mustard (if no mustard substitute with a good splash of mild Tabasco)
A good splash of Worcester sauce.
Plenty of fresh ground black pepper.
One beef oxo cube.
1 third mug of thick beef gravy. (we used 3 to 4 teaspoonds of bisto for this)
2OZ flower.
A little oil for the browning (We used garlic oil)

1: ad a little oil to a pan. Cover each piece of meat in flower then brown in the oil bung meat in the cooker.

2: brown onions Shallots and crushed garlic in a little oil

3: add gravy ale mustard Worcester sauce pepper and oxo in a jug and mix well

4: chuck garlic, onions Shallots in to the slow cooker

5: add mushrooms celery and carrots to the cooker, tip the mixed up ale and gravy mixture on top.

6: just eat when it’s ready. If you cook with a slow cooker you should know. If its just on low this should cook in around 7 to 8 hours.

7: go back to bed after eating bagel and drinking a brew.

bank holiday

Clare and I are off to meet up with Chris this afternoon at the railway station and then walk in to town. The plan is to hit the Greyhound for lunch, pass by the dove for a swift one and then go to the garden at the back of the fat cat for a few ales.

I’m in a top mood today. Life’s good.

Happy Easter

We’ve had a restful day. For some reason we couldn’t sleep so both up early and prepped a beautiful dish with beef and ale. It was cooked in the slow cooker so after the preparations were complete we had a bagel, Clare’s speciality and for me a cup of tea and then went up to bed to pass the time until the food was cooked. The Easter bunny visited us both which was nice and then we both had a kip.

Later we opened a bottle of amontillado sherry as a pre dinner drink and then had the food with a bottle of Australian bubbles. I’ll post our recipe tomorrow in case anyone’s interested. Still plenty of sherry left though so it should go down nice with some cheese on Monday.

The late afternoon was lazily spent with us both on the couch listening to music before the dogs were fed and I grabbed a dram of redbreast whiskey.

What a relaxing day.

De Koningshoeven La Trappe Dubbel

The brewing process for the Trappist ales is controlled by The Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance (Trappists), and takes place in 7 different breweries, 6 in Belgium and one in Tilburg the Netherlands. La Trappe Dubbel is one of the Dutch efforts from The De Koningshoeven brewery. All profits from these beers that the brewer earns goes back to fund the aims of the monks.

The 7 percent brew glugged from its corked have litre stone crock in to my large cognac glass with a reasonable head.

a dark red in colour according to the missus.

The nose offers milky yeastiness and spice, rather sweet.

The pallet is all white chocolate and malt with citrus livening things up a bit. Creamy.

The finish is a little bitter considering how sweet the ale is.

Not bad at all and a high-quality introduction to Trappist ales. £2.50ish from tesco. Its fine beer in a lovely package because of the old style stone bottle and cork. A first class introduction to this style and possibly a fine gift.

More of the same

It appears as though my blog has mutated in to a bunch of weekly katchups that are a little samey, but hell its my life if you know what I mean.

Last Friday I arrived in before 9 and had a drink or two in the dove before returning home and watching the Lennon documentary with Clare. Rather interesting I thought but I don’t know what he saw in Yoko.

Emma Dale and Holly came around on Saturday afternoon and we spent a pleasant hour and a half chatting before they gave me a lift to tesco to pickup one or two bits for the night ahead. Chris wersal and glennis came over and Clare cooked a proper mean Chili and garlic bread. Everyone brought ales and wine so we had such a selection to go through and though we all partook of way too much I still have rather a lot left. What did for me though was the Western’s Organic Cider. Purchased from tesco this is in a wine box and tastes more like real cider than anything I’ve ever had from a shop before.

After a quiet Sunday we went out on Monday evening to a pub quiz in the Woolpack which was enjoyable and we put up a reasonable showing. Our aim was to eat a nice meal in town but because of all the chatter we didn’t leave until late so were left with the unfortunate proposition of Bobs burger van. Absolutely horrible. Never risk it. Honestly, I don’t like to tell you what it did to us but we’ll be returning no more.

The cab driver kindly explained to us on the way home that we should have gone to Perry’s van on Tower Street but we weren’t to know.

I went over to Worcester on Wednesday afternoon as I had work in Hereford the next day and my train from Ipswich wouldn’t have allowed me to get in to the city on time for the start of work. Suffice to say that Dave and I went out for a few drinks and then ended up in a curry house. The Plough has turned into a real gem with smashing staff food and a good selection of ales. Its just so friendly. The Dragon on the other hand appears to have slid a little bit now that Richard and G have moved over to Richards new pub in Sheffield. Its still by any standards a corking pub but not the same though Steff keeps things on a good kilter.

Wednesday’s training went well and I visited my two favorite brewery owned pubs in the city and picked up a rake of bottled stout in the Barrels which I delivered back to Williams villa.

Once more the sun was out to greet us on Thursday and we spent most of the day outdoors with Trekker and really had a lovely day. I then returned to Worcester and popped in to the plough and the dragon before making my way back to Dave’s. we supped brews and ordered the best takeaway curry I’ve ever ad. Ok, I did have a tandori mixed grill but the snap was done to a turn and presentation impeccable. Mints, hot towels, napkins plastic plates and even a rose which I should have brought back for Clare. It sounds a bit tacky but it was like bringing the restaurant home with that quality of food and my own drink, even though it was tea.

It took over 5 hours traveling on Friday but I arrived home and slept after eating the traditional good Friday fish and chips.

I treated myself to a Western Digital 160GB Passport hard drive. These just plug in to the usb port and are powered from the same. They’re also tiny. This will be fantastic for transporting large amounts of data with me. Also grabbed my parents a good kettle something they’ve been lacking for years.

I have to pop in to town now so will shoot off.