8 posts tagged “kentucky”
Birthday consumption.
Papa Murphy's take-n-bake stuffed pizza (creamy garlic chicken and bacon.)
Booker's small-batch bourbon.
126.4 proof, 6.7 years
Straight from the barrel, uncut, unfiltered.
Recipe from Booker Noe, grandson of Jim Beam.
Nose of raisins and cinnamon (and fire).
Ahhhhhhh.
The wife and I open the door with the little jingly bell on it, hop over the raised doorway lip (truely wicked) and stroll into the local boozeria.
She is quickly dazzled by naughty labeled wines and lost to the brightly neon corner of the shop to giggle.
I press on, to the furthest darkest back corner.
Man-country, where they keep the whiskeys and bourbon.
Old Charter is a new addition for this shop. (I've read it's part of the Buffalo Trace Distillery, Lexington, KY.)
They have a puzzling variety of vintage; 1 year, 3 year, 5 year, 8 year, 10 year and 12 year.
Not to be overcome with indecision, I grasp the 12 year (90 proof) and emerge back to the fluorescent light of the cash register.
On the way, I do the wife a favor and grab a big ol' tear-drop bottle of Rain vodka. Lovely container, organic contents.
The kind of vodka that doesn't need to hide behind flavorings, mixers, or additives.
The wife won't buy it for herself, because it makes her feel guilty to buy anything but Popov.
On the other hand, I have every incentive to buy her good vodka because well...
The old man behind the counter is restocking the hip/boot size bottles and doesn't notice my arrival.
I clear my throat.
Nothing.
I set the bottles down again, jingling them together a bit. Clink, clink, nothing.
Right about here, lizard-brain is telling me to just side-step back on out through the door to the car with my prizes.
The wife walks up.
Just then, old man turns around and jumps with a start, "Will that be all then?"
Yeah, she was wearing one of her boobie shirts.
Old man's still got the radar.
Wife looks at the receipt in the car, "Did you really need the 12 year?"
"Well yeah. I've never had Old Charter before."
"So?" she says
"Here's the thing, if I started off by trying the younger stuff, each bottle would have been cheaper, true, but might have been more expensive overall."
"Huh?" she says.
"Look, if I try the one year, and it sucks, I would think, well, maybe the three year would be better, so then I buy that, and if it sucks, I might think, well maybe the five year is better and so on, until I end up buying the twelve year old anyway. So, this way, I start off with the twelve year old. If it sucks, I don't need to try any of the others because this is as good as it's going to get. If I do like it, I can always downgrade until I find the one that's too young, then go back up just one notch from then on."
"You way over-analyze your booze, but thanks for the vodka."
"Anytime. Anytime."
The latest case for the "I-Shit-You-Not" Files.
I saw this at the store today and picked up a jar as a novelty for our Thanksgiving celebration with friends.
Or at least my credit card company thinks so.
Some background.
As the regular readers know, and are sick of hearing by now, we just moved.
My credit card company knew this too.
I called them the week before we moved with the new address.
Which is why it galls me that I caused a major backup at the local Target store here.
See, the credit card company fraud early detection unit had been monitoring my account.
The $200 plus I attempted to spend at Target was more than their nerves could take and they put a halt to my fraudulent ways.
The cashier was confused. The lane manager was summoned. Who summoned the shift manager.
All while the line grew to Star Wars Episode One opening week proportions.
The red phone was used. All of us waited on hold. The cashier interrogated me, by proxy, for the credit company.
The other two managers saw this as a training opportunity for him.
He saw it as an unnecessary delay in his lunch break.
Forms of ID were passed all around the group.
More questions were asked and answered.
Finally, I was handed back all my kit and told it was my turn to actually use the red phone.
I was immediately put on hold.
It was AC/DC, so you know, I was cool with it.
Much to the ire of the assembled tribes of Israel behind me in line, seeking exodus from the land of red and khaki retail oppression.
Then I was, very politely, interrogated as to what I had been doing and buying and staying, and traveling to, and gassing up and eating.
You see, all of these purchases for the last week were outside of my NORMAL spending zone and were not the types of purchases normally made.
There were lots of service station gas and food charges, and fast food restaurants, and motels, all within a short period of time and in a straight line away from my NORMAL spending zone.
It was almost exactly like the charges were following Interstate 75 down from Detroit to Cincinnati, with a layover in the night at Dayton, from there to I-71, around Louisville, then I-265 and 65, around and South, straight into Nashville, where there were more hotel and restaurant and gas charges.
And then, THEN, I had the nerve to go to Target and buy $200 plus of furnishings.
I was almost EXACTLY like I had moved from Detroit to Nashville, and taken two days to drive down, my wife in one car with the kids, and me in the truck with the two dogs, stopping for the night in Dayton, which is almost exactly the halfway point (just a little shy actually because we got a late start on day one with the movers). And then spending another night in hotel in Nashville waiting for the movers to arrive, unload, and having gotten all that done, gone shopping for all the little things you don't move with you to your new house, when you're going to rent out your old house.
I got to explain all of this, in three-part harmony (with apology to Arlo Guthrie but the kids were getting vocal by this point), to the early fraud detection unit.
I also reminded them, that I had called them the previous week, to notify them that I was moving.
They had my old address, my new address, and they had the recent change on file as my last contact with them.
And yet, they needed me to connect the dots for them.
Hmm, all the bililng charges run in a straight line along the interstates from the old address to the new address, and then the day after they get there, they go shopping at the Target 2 miles from their new address.
Yeah, it all sounds really fishy to me, couldn't possibly make any sense of it. We better freeze the account to make sure.
And yet I think of all the times that I've flown somewhere really random without telling the credit company, rung up really absurd and suspicious, even to me charges, and haven't heard a peep from them.
This one, this one actually made sense given that they knew I was moving. I'm the one that told them.
Crisis resolved I was allowed to make my purchase and escape before the mob began line-dancing to the Achy-breaky.
Geesh.
My eldest wanted to do something special for her mommy yesterday, Mother's Day of course.
I think it had something to do with the Dora episode where she collects ingredients for a cake to bake for her mom.
Which placed me squarely, on a groggy Sunday morning, in the kitchen with her at 6 AM.
My brain can be an unfriendly environment for thought under those conditions.
{George Dickel, the local whisky bottled at 90 Proof, distilled at Cascade Hollow in Tullahoma, is fantastic by the way.
We're directly south of Kentucky Bourbon country, but across that state line it's officially "whiskey" not "bourbon".
Article on "whisky vs whiskey" here
Curiously, though American, George Dickel uses the "whisky" spelling on their label.}
Solution, stare blankly at pantry, while yawning and scratching.
Eyes focused, then not, then focused again on the little cardboard box with cartoon berries on front.
Jello.
My savior.
Hallowed be thy wiggle and jiggle.
Next a successful hunt for a round pie dish under the cabinet.
Graham cracker crumb crust poured into dish and spread evenly, with my eager assistant.
I handled boiling the water for the Jello, but my helper poured in the mix and the cool water to firm it.
Gently poured onto graham cracker crust inside pie dish and into the freezer for a quick set.
Then I chopped bananas and readied the multi-color sprinkles.
Once the goo had begun to congeal, she arranged the bananas on top and scattered the sprinkles across.
(OK I helped guide that a bit.)
Then back into the fridge until the wife woke up for breakfast.
Surprise!
Happy Mother's Day from the 3 year old.
Doesn't taste half bad either.
I even took a picture of the finished product, but wouldn't you know that the cable from the camera to the PC has gone missing during the move.
There was a sighting on day one, but none of us remembers exactly where.
So,
just to make sure that I'm not in need of certain things
,every so often,
I go off them for a while to check, to test myself, to ensure that there are no cravings getting a tad too loud in my head.
If everything is copacetic for a few days, I give myself the all clear to indulge again, you know, the next time it's convenient.
Here's the conflict:
Does a positive result from the cessation check test mean I'm in control?
Or doest the fact that I have to check every so often tell on me?
Anyway, I've made the box of Fruity Pebbles in the pantry last for over two weeks now.
Without getting the shakes at that.
This post brought to you by:
Bulleit Bourbon Kentucky Straight Frontier Whiskey, 90 proof, Lawrenceburg, Kentucky.
Review of Bulleit Bourbon found here
Sonic Youth's "dirty" effort
coupled with
Not the year.
The hooch.
Ridgemont Reserve Small Batch Barrel Select Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey.
Aged 8 years to 93.7 Proof, or 46.85% alc/vol.
A perfect pairing before bed on the night before the wife comes home from the latest all-week business trip.
I didn't even mope at all this time, except for, like, those 30 or so times.
And the kids, the girls, are getting sophisticated.
Eldest, upon my asking if she would like a hot dog for dinner says, "well, I still have three slices of cheese left, and when I finish them I'll be full, so no thank you."
She's three at the end of the month.
A big round of applause for the sponsors that made today possible for me.
My morning was presented by:
Krups home espresso machine
in conjunction with:
Eight O'Clock Coffee Company original blend ground arabica beans.
My afternoon was supported by:
Books On Tape
the reading of the novel "Dead Souls" written by Ian Rankin
A Detective John Rebus mystery
as read by Geoffrey Howard
The remainder of the day has been/will be brought to me by:
Labrot & Graham
Woodford Reserve
Distiller's Select
Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey
90.4 Proof, or 45.2% alc./vol.
Official bourbon of the Kentucky Derby.
Soundtrack for today provided by SST Records and specifically Black Flag,
excepting the hours provided in the afternoon by Books On Tape.
All rights for the distribution of my day subject to specific prior approval of Kerside Productions
in association with The Groove is Neutered worldwide.
