But never you fear about the delay, because we will now hear from a brand-new SPECIAL GUEST BLOGGER, my youngest brother William. William is 21 years old, though he has been drinking like a 21-year-old for years and years. He's a student at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC, which apparently has quite the football team. He enjoys barbeque, country music and long walks on the beach. Here is a picture of the two of us at Brewgrass:
Let's hear his version of the events that transpired on September 20, 2008, shall we?
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Molly has invited me to be a guest blogger alongside George to share my experience at the 12th Annual Great Smokies Craft Brewers Brewgrass Festival at MLK Park in Asheville, NC. The experience started much like that of any major holiday at the plantation. In this case Molly very enthusiastically came in to my bedroom, jumped on my back and asked me “Guess what day it is?” I straggled out of bed and took my position on the top stair so dad could take our picture, a holiday tradition. I sat there for a minute and realized today is not the day for celebrating the birth of Christ. Today is the day we celebrate the birth of delicious nectar we all enjoy… BEER!
Going into the day we realized substance was a very important factor in the festivities that would be taking place. So keeping with family traditions we took the Blue Ridge Parkway to our favorite Saturday lunch spot, Chick-Fil- A. A quick 8 pack of nuggets and some fries would be my only meal going into a 7 hour “beer tasting.”
While dining, George and I realized some last minute necessities were needed to make it through the festival. We traveled up to the Big K-mart in search of sunscreen and sunglasses. Protection from the sun while drinking can make the act of consuming beverages a much more pleasurable experience. Being almost fall, it was difficult to find spf 30 to protect the nose and neck from the heat of the day. Now, I don’t know if many of you are aware that I spent a summer unloading 18-wheelers and stocking shelves at the big red K, but this was about 2 years ago this past summer. We walked into Kmart with mom, we being 3 of only 12 people in the store including employees. I happened to run into an employee who worked at this particular store that I had worked with at another store. After saying hello, I asked her where the items we needed to make our beer festival a better experience might be. She looked at me with a disappointing look almost expecting me to know where I had stocked something 2 years ago. Like they never change store layouts at the worst retail store on the planet. A quick purchase and we were on our way to MLK Park to enjoy beers from 40 brewers around the area.
Now growing up we always had to rush home from whatever trip we may have been on in order for George to heed the call of nature. George can only heed the call of nature in bathrooms that he’s familiar and comfortable with. So it should have been no surprise that ON THE WAY to the event nature would call George’s name. So to deter our trip even more we had to beeline it to our church, which was in the vicinity, in order for George to make room for beer. After this pit stop we were officially on our way to the festival.
Tickets in hand we were dropped off at the side entrance to the field. We snapped a quick pic and made our way to the line of fellow beer aficionados. Our tickets were scanned, a glass was grabbed and eyes went wide. Imagine Charlie getting that golden ticket to the factory, that’s how I felt but my ticket was a glass and the factory was a field full of breweries.
I know there has been a lot of anticipation leading up to my account of the actual festival, but I’m not going to go into all 40 beers I tried. Now our glass could only hold 4 ounces so I didn’t consume 40 beers, however, medical staff was on standby. I would probably be in some sort of made up Olympic event Molly likes to sponsor like “interesting names for presidents.” You would be very surprised how drunk a bunch of little beers can get you in a 6 hour period. We started in left field and worked our way all the way around the perimeter of the field to home plate. We worked our way farther and farther away from any food to compensate the amount of alcohol we had consumed. Finally we decided it would be a good idea to get some food. As a group we settled on kettle corn. Kettle corn was probably not the best idea but it had the shortest line. Other than randomly opening up our bag of corn we spent most of our time waiting in line to get a beer only to wait in line again. We enjoyed getting different beers at each brewery and sharing both what we had and how we felt about it.
I’ve decided to share my top five favorite beers with the fans of “I Wiggle it just a little bit.” I recommend these beers if you can find them at your local beer supplier.
1. Pisgah Brewing (NC)- Endless Summer
2. Asheville Brewing (NC)- Shiva IPA
3. Depot Street Brewing (TN)-Whistlestop Wit
4. Ham’s Brewhaus (NC)- Tiki’s California Gold
5. Natty Greene’s Brewing (NC) Southern Ale
The Brewgrass festival was a great experience and I could not have asked for a better time or better company. This is my first blogging experience so I hope it was up to par for Molly. I guess if I make the cut, I will feel I have accomplished something more than what I could have out on that field full of beer drinkers and their one true passion.
Special thanks to:
Whoever made our Kettle Corn?
Johnny on the Spot
Mom and Dad
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