40 Oz. To Freedom

It's the last full weekend in July which can only mean one thing...Oregon Brewer's Festival!

The festival commenced along the Waterfront on Wednesday and taps close tomorrow.  According to their website, there are over 88 craft beers from around the country with another 100 in the "specialty tent."  This was the event's 27th year.

Basically how it works is you get in for free but buy a glass which counts for your admission fee.  To fill said glass, you buy tokens and give them to the lovely people pouring the beers.  1 token gets you a 3 ounce sample (unless you're extra nice to the pourer) whereas 4 get you a full glass.  I'm pretty sure 3 samples would fill a glass so that seems to be a little bit of a scam.

Last year I went on a Friday which was a mistake due to the amount of people.  This time I headed down on Thursday.  There were still a fair crowd but it was a lot more manageable.

My favorite of the day was a chocolate porter from the Boulder Beer Company called Shake.  It smelled exactly like a chocolate milkshake and the taste was not far off.  Delicious!

I ran into one of my friends from middle school who I don't think I'd seen since which was a bit of a trip.

This was kind of sparse.  I've got what I'm expecting to be an adventurous post coming up in two weeks so be excited.
 
That's all for now.  Bye.

Margaritaville

During my senior year while in Fort Collins, I frequented this Mexican place called Fuzzy's Taco Shop.  Although it is a chain which is fairly atypical of Fort Collins, their margaritas were absolutely delicious!  They specialized in frozen margaritas accompanied with an upside down beer, dubbed a "beerita."  The closest Fuzzy's from Portland happens to be the one in Fort Collins which means I am left without one of my favorite adult drinks.  

This week, I decided to try and recreate one of the margaritas for some friends.  None of us had tequila (which I hate anyways) so I technically made daiquiris with rum as the substitute.  

Fair warning, these are fairly strong so adjust accordingly and, of course, if you're in the US, only if you're 21+.

  

Ingredients (makes roughly 4 servings):

• About 8 oz of Strawberries

• 4 shots of Tequila (or light rum if you don't like/have tequila)

• 1-2 shots of Triple Sec

• 4 oz of Limeade Concentrate

• Fruit flavored beer (Mike's Mango or a naturally flavored blueberry beer would be best)

• Sugar

• Blender

• Ice 

• Large goblet/glass to serve

1) Wash and cut the fresh strawberries

2) Sprinkle the strawberries with sugar and let them sit

3) Combine the tequila/rum, triple sec, limeade concentrate, strawberries, and ice in the blender

4) Blend until smooth

5) Rim the serving glass with sugar or salt 

6) Fill the serving glass about 3/4 of the way

Or accidentally all the way

7) Open the beer and quickly flip it into the margarita. If done right, the beer should just start to leak into the glass.

8) Enjoy!

These are absolutely delicious!  Next time I think I might make two batches, one with blueberries and one with strawberries and then mix them together in the serving glass.  

If anyone has any suggestions for ways to make these even better, let me know.  Cheers!

That's all for now.  Bye.

I'm On A Boat

Nothing terribly exciting this week. 

On Monday, the fam took the boat out for the first time this summer.  We drove down to Newberg and skied in the not gross part of the Willamette River.  Towards the beginning, we were one of only a few boats out which meant the water was smooth but as time went on, the water got pretty bumpy as more people launched.  

There goes mother

Last summer, I started slalom skiing.  I've got it down pretty well but I'm still getting up on two skis and dropping one when I get up.  I'm hoping to be able to get up on one by the end of the summer (haven't actually tried it yet). 

One of my good friends and former boss, Laura, is back in town for a few days visiting from Texas.  I'm headed out in a few hours to go meet up with her and someone who was on my climbing team and am excited to catch up!  Last time I saw her was August when I visited Austin so it's been almost a year!

Oh yeah.  This finally came in the mail.  Yay!

Stolen from Instagram 'cough' 'cough' @davidzsnell

I've been especially missing my college friends a lot the last few days so if any of you read this and have time to chat, it would be much appreciated!

That's all for now.  Bye.

Born To Run in the USA

Look at that, you get 2 song titles cleverly mashed together into one this week!

On Thursday, I headed to NW Portland with some friends to participate in Fit Right Northwest's Urban Adventure Run.  For those of you new to the Portland scene, the city has a lot of first/last day events each month.  My friend Ariel found this one where you look at a map and run around NW Portland going to different points and collecting raffle tickets.  The more places you go to, the more tickets you get.  At the end of an hour, you take the tickets back to the start and put them in the two giant bins.  Then, in my case, you wait to not hear your ticket number called to not win a prize.  There are also a bunch of local food booths set up giving out free samples (which were all delicious) and even a 10 Barrel stand giving out free festive beverages to the 21+ crowd.

 
Along with my friends, I've only been to NW Portland a handful of times which made for an entertaining time running aimlessly around the streets trying to figure out where to go.  We eventually got our bearings and ended up making it to a fair amount of the checkpoints so good for us!  None of us won anything in the raffle but it was still a fun time on a perfect weather running day.  I'm hoping to do it again next month.

I Spy a New Belgium shirt!

We Workout

Friday brought forth (see what I did there) the most patriotic day of the year.  A lot of people were out of town/doing other things but I did get to tag along with my friend Samantha and some of her friends from Gonzaga.  We headed over to the potentially anxiety inducing, crowded, Waterfront area to watch the fireworks.  The show was decent but nothing too special.  Nothing says "Amuricah" quite like blowing things up.  The Waterfront was crowded but not as bad as I remember from the last time I saw the show there.  Taking the train back, on the other hand, was miserable. 

Taking pictures of fireworks never really works out

Random fun fact (at least I think this is true) of the day: John Adams thought Independence Day would be celebrated on July 2nd since that was the day the Continental Congress actually declared freedom from Britain.  After some edits, congress approved the final draft of the Deceleration of Independence on July 4th (although it wasn't signed until August 2nd).   Now you know.

That's all for now.  Bye.