Still trying to play catch-up with Rich O's Saturnalia list, I actually had two different beers after work today. The first was a Bells Third Coast Old Ale. Here's what I thought.

(draft) Cloudy brown, with a nice long-lasting head. The taste was malty and nutty, with a fairly bitter finish that became more tolerable as the glass became emptier.

Next I had a De Ranke Pere Noel. I actually thought I'd had this a couple of weekends ago but I was wrong.

(draft) A nice cloudy copper color that was quite intriguing. Nothing particularly special about the taste - actually this beer seemed a little too well-balanced. All of the flavors seemed to cancel each other out.

Tomorrow is virtual Friday (the next two days are holidays for us) so I was tempted to stay for a third beer and continue my conversation with ExBartender but, in the end, I figured that three strong beers on a stomach that'd only had a Twix bar in it all day would not be the best move I'd ever made.

People at work give me a hard time about my Post-Its.

They're all important though. Really.

One of the most boring things I ever get to read in peoples' 'blogs are the entries about their dreams. Thankfully most 'bloggers know how boring these entries are so they don't ever waste their readers' time with dream entries. If only all 'bloggers were so aware.

Anyway, I had a pretty interesting dream tonight.

I was messing around with my new girlfriend at my grandmother's old house. We'd gone there looking for some privacy, but people started showing up. And my people I mean relatives. My grandmother came home from somewhere and before too long almost everyone on my mom's side of the family was there having some kind of family dinner or something.

So I got to take my girlfriend around and introduce her to everyone.

The interesting part was that when I introduced her to my grandmother I referred to her as my dead grandmother. Just like dead relatives show up for dinner every day.

Then, when I introduced my girlfriend to my cousin Chris she was like, "I think I've met you before. You're dead too, right?" Chris answered, "Yes, I'm afraid so."

Then, I got frustrated because my parents weren't at the dinner, and I really wanted them to meet my girlfriend. We decided to walk down to my parents' house but I woke up before we got there.

I continue to be astounded by the amount of traffic I'm getting here.

Looking through my weblogs, I see of course the traffic sent my way via google and the like, but I'm also seeing a big increase in traffic that seems to have no referrer at all.

It's what I'd see if you just had me in your favorites list, or if you just had my site name memorized.

Yesterday 213 of you came to my home page. And 182 never went any deeper into the site. I like to think that you're just checking for my latest 'blog entries and then moving on.

I know who some of you are. You're my sisters, my coworkers, my friends from wherever. People from the bar. At least one of you may be obsessed with me as I continue to see that same ISP hitting me several times each day.

My enemies. I don't know that any of you even exist, but if you do - you're checking my 'blog too.

Who the rest of you are, I have no idea. I like to think that you stumbled your way here via some obscure search, and that you liked what you read anough to become a regular reader/fan/enemy/stalker.

Many of you, I'm sure, go away disappointed. My new entries bore you, or they're not what you're looking for. But, often enough, you come back anyway.

Hey, I wonder what that Dave dipshit's brain has vomited onto the Internet today. I wonder what kind of mood he's in. I wonder if he's ever been laid in his life. I wonder what he looks like naked.

If you keep coming back, you're looking for something. So just let me know. Use the little Say Something, Dammit! form and let me know who you are and what you're looking for.

Maybe I'll try to oblige.

Today, Rich O's was finally open again, so I stopped by after work and sampled a Three Floyds Alpha Klaus Christmas Porter. Here's my ratebeer.com review:

(draft) Of all the beers at Rich O's, this one is perhaps the one that's been recommended to me most often. Frankly, I don't understand all the hype. It is a good beer, but not a great one. I think my main problem was the gritty feeling I got in my mouth while drinking it. It almost seemed like there was something that hadn't quite dissolved all the way. By the end of the glass it was better. Other than the gritty mouthfeel, this beer smelled and looked fantastic, and it had a really good flavor - one that wasn't nearly as sweet as I was expecting. A very drinkable beer, but any place that has this probably has something better as well.

While at the bar, I spent a little time talking with the owner about 'blogging, and I got an idea for a post in my head. The title for the post would be If you don't like it, stop reading it and it would contain an awful lot of venting.

We also talked about something that's been on my mind for a while - the importing of old (in my case paper) journals into 'blog form. Roger's concern seemed mainly about how to deal with grammar and euphuism, while my main concern would be whether to import the things at all.

Anyway, I guess that's it. I had a nice end to a very boring day at work.

I think VigilanteGirl is psychic or something.

I hadn't got two feet inside the door before she was all "What's wrong with you? You're such a grouch."

I never thought of myself as a person that wears their mood on their sleeve. I used to be told that my eyes would change color depending on my current state of anger, arousal, boredom, or whatever, but I was nowhere near close enough for anyone to tell me what color my eyes were.

So she must be psychic, because she was absolutely right.

I'm in a crappy mood.

There's no particular reason. I guess the bullshit's just been piling up, sort of like the snow, and it doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon, sort of like the snow.

I can feel that I'm closing myself off again, and I don't particularly like it, but I do understand it. I reach out and find nothing, so I stop reaching out. The next logical step is to prevent people from reaching out to me, so I start rebuilding the castle walls.

And if that doesn't work maybe I'll put in a sniper tower or something.

Or maybe I just need a real vacation where I'm not stuck at home listening to the snow pulling my gutters loose.

The weather did its best to wreak havoc on my family's holday plans, but only suceeded in shuffling things around.

Instead of my sisters and I meeting and Dina's house, we went to Neisha's and trudged through their unplowed driveway.

Instead of having my grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins to my house for Christmas Eve, we all ended up at my grandmothers house. The official reasoning for that was to make it so my grandmother wouldn't have to go out in the cold, but I think the unofficial reason was that Christmas Eve has been at my grandmother's house for the last million years - except for last year when it was at my house - and it just somehow feels right to be at her house on that night.

Afterwards, my cousin Mike and I played pool until nearly 4:00 AM, and I'm feeling pretty sluggish from my halfassed attempt to get a decent amount of sleep.

Right now I'm sitting here pretty bored. I want to go out and do something tonight, but I'm not sure what. Rich O's is closed (for the holiday, not because of the street conditions). VigilanteGirl is working. Maybe I'll make the trek to Jeffersonville in search of Newcastle at Hooters.

Oh yeah. Mike and I split a bottle of Delirium Noel last night. A very good beer for such a cold night. After that I had my last bottle of Mad Bitch and Mike tempted fate by drinking some canned Guinness that'd been in my fridge for either months or years.

It's supposed to get fucking cold tonight. Of course that's not exactly what the weatherguy said, but I'm sure that's what he was thinking.

Because of the fucking cold and the even more fucking cold (fuckinger?) forecast for tomorrow night, I've made a little bed/house/fort for this stray cat that lives under my deck.

She's just the sweetest thing, but I cannot allow her into the house as I'm afraid that she'll get my cats sick.

Normally I don't worry too much about her, but it's supposed to be so fucking cold for the next two nights that I just had to do something.

I took my cat carrier, stuffed a pillow into it, wrapped it in a beach towel, and put it in my garage. My back garage door I propped open about six inches so Spook (the cat) could enter and leave the garage as she saw fit.

So now Spook is laying in her new little shelter, just purring like crazy when I went to check on her. She's just such a good cat. I wish I could find a home for her.

(This entry brought to you by Delirium Tremens.)

It's been said, mostly by me in this 'blog, that I cannot take a hint.

Or, to be more specific I guess, I do not recognize hints, and when I (rarely) do, I do not take whatever action the hint is urging me toward.

Tonight I recognized a hint. Hell, astronauts in the space station, were they to have trained their spy scopes on Southern Indiana tonight, would have recognized the damn hint.

Well I saw it, and I recognized it. I just thought it was a really bad idea, so I pretended I didn't see it.

I pretended I was incredibly, absurdly dense.

And you know, it really wasn't that tough. I had a really good role model to look to for inspiration. And for justification I suppose.

Well we all ended up driving to my completely snowed-in sister's house for gift exchanges.

Down the road from my house there's this overturned snowplow. Not the best omen.

This is my sister Neisha's road. Actually this is the good part of the road. What doesn't really show up in the picture is that the "plowed" part of the road is still over a foot deep.

An added bonus in this picture is a part of my finger.