Tag Archives: Philadelphia

Memphis Taproom Thirstoberfest!

It was amaz­ing! Beau­ti­ful weath­er goes per­fect­ly with great beer and peo­ple. Had a lot of fun.

What did I drink? (Looks at list.) Keep in mind they were 6 oz. cups. Oth­er­wise I’d prob­a­bly still be lay­ing in the biergarten.

List­ed in no par­tic­u­lar order:

  • Alla­gash Confluence
  • Cig­ar City Maduro Brown Ale
  • Dog­fish Head Bitch­es Brew
  • Dog­fish Head Sai­son du Buff
  • Green Flask Le Freak
  • Har­poon Wet Hop
  • Ommegang Cup o’ Kyndnes
  • Sly Fox Keller Helles
  • Vic­to­ry Sai­son du Buff

Jesse cooked up some mar­velous food, too. I wolfed down his chou­croute gar­nie. What’s that. Think meat plate. It was Boudin blanc, ribs, pork bel­ly, kiel­basy, pota­toes and kraut. Hearty. Just what the doc­tor ordered.

Phillies Win NLDS Game 2

I’ve reached a new zen state when it comes to Phillies games, even play­off ones, it seems. Once upon a time last night’s game would’ve been a fright­ful affair, the enjoy­ment sucked out by the anx­i­ety of anoth­er poten­tial Game 2 loss. My fam­i­ly has attend­ed a bunch of Games 2, so we know the feel­ing of a series slip­ping through our fin­gers, only to watch the Phils dom­i­nate as the away team. It’s their thing, it seems.

I real­ly thought the wheels had come off when they turned to J.C. Romero after 5 ago­niz­ing innings from the usu­al­ly reli­able Roy Oswalt. They had, but not for the Phillies. Watch­ing the Reds’ com­e­dy of errors was the stuff base­ball night­mares are made of. As they unrav­eled last night I could­n’t help but think how much bet­ter they’ll be next year once they get some expe­ri­ence and maybe a top of the rota­tion starter, but that’s for anoth­er time. The Phillies took advan­tage of every mis­cue and hit bats­men to win 7–4.

The ball­park was typ­i­cal­ly nuts. We sat in Sec­tion 307. The sta­di­um shook when Utley plat­ed two runs to make it a game. When Chooch and Ben Fran­cis­co were hit by a pitch­es, the crowd’s anger bub­bled over and CBP became that hos­tile envi­ron­ment teams must hate so much. We even cheered when Jay Bruce caught a fly ball. It was deli­cious­ly vicious, but play­ful at the same time, a far cry from the tense atmos­phere of last year where the entire sta­di­um fell silent when Brad Lidge entered the game.

The Phillies extin­guished any hope the Reds had of win­ning the series last night. We fans know that expe­ri­ence, plus a retooled rota­tion and a revived bullpen made last night’s win a done deal once the Phils took the lead. We weren’t wrong.

I’m Going to See Pavement

I guess the only way for me to stom­ach the Mann Music Cen­ter’s out­ra­geous ser­vice charges is to buy a tick­et from a friend.

I don’t get out to shows much these days, but this should feel like jump­ing into a hot tub time machine back to my Philly music scene hey­day, cir­ca 2003. Expect to see famil­iar faces!

The Fishtown Coffee Problem

When Helen and I moved to Port Fish­ing­ton, or Flat Iron as it’s prop­er­ly known, from the hus­tle and bus­tle of Two Street, we were in for a rude awak­en­ing. There was prac­ti­cal­ly noth­ing here! Want a bite to eat? Our neigh­bors rec­om­mend­ed Apple­bees! Good piz­za? Key Foods!

Yuck. Stranger, there was just one cof­fee option for the bulk of Fish­town: the dread­ed Rock­et Cat. Now, Rock­et Cat brought cof­fee right into the heart of Fish­town, locat­ed at the cor­ners of Frank­ford and Nor­ris, which is about as great a loca­tion as you can have in this neck of the woods. It’s a shame they serve bad cof­fee at pre­mi­um prices with ser­vice that will ruin your day. Top it off with the shop’s west Philly vibe and you’ve got the tri­fec­ta of awful.

Last year we wel­comed Milkcrate Cafe to Fish­town. It’s been out go-to spot when con­ve­nient. They serve La Colombe cof­fee, which is the gold stan­dard of Philly cof­fee. Major upgrade over Rock­et Cat, although they claim to have fol­lowed suit as cus­tomers reject­ed their watery organ­ic blend. Bonus, right? It is, but Milkcrate is quite a hike, unless I’m head­ed to Penn Treaty Park with Char­lie on a Sun­day morn­ing. The cof­fee’s good, the price is right and the ser­vice is won­der­ful, but I just don’t get over their often enough for it to be my reg­u­lar spot. Would­n’t hurt if they did some­thing about the seat­ing, too.

Enter the Lola Bean, which opened Sat­ur­day, right on Frank­ford just a block from John­ny Bren­da’s. I’ve already been twice! The cof­fee’s great and the ser­vice is love­ly. It’s a great addi­tion in the heart of what will soon be a bur­geon­ing strip of new busi­ness­es. I’m real­ly excit­ed to see what hap­pens next!

Best part about the Fish­town cof­fee “prob­lem?” We have options! It’s a lux­u­ry we did­n’t have just three years ago. Love local folks invest­ing in the neighborhood!