Michelle and Mike, as mentioned in previous posts, are here visiting. Mike is here for a new job based just north of us, and Michelle came along to check out the area. He loves his new job, and can work remotely until October when they really want everyone to be living in the area. So they have some time to make decisions and get organized.
With Mike at work yesterday, I went and got Michelle and we spent some time driving around the county. They've decided they want to live in the county north of us, but, I still wanted her to dig on this area. I picked her up and we drove around. We went to gawk at a local landmark, and another local landmark. We drove into downtown and past the 3 breweries there. We came back here to the house and hung out with Doug for a little bit. Michelle liked our house and how it is laid out. They're looking for something with at least one more bedroom for her office, and Mike wants a garage for his motorcycle. There aren't a lot of garages around here, in this neighborhood, but if they go north, there are plenty.
It the occured to me that I basically know my way around this area in terms of where breweries are. So three downtown, then up over to the north to the two up in the woods, then over by another one, oh and there's a nice brewery over here but we won't drive over to it.
I was able to give her the total downtown experience, and the in the woods experience.
We ate lunch at Brookville Beer Farm. The only food they serve is pizza, but, it's so good. And we're technically in Pizza Jail here in Maryland, there is no good pizza. But they have beautiful sourdough crust, hand thrown and cooked in a great oven. They upped their oven game since our last visit before the pandemic hit. It was an adorable stone pizza oven, wood fired, classic. But they could only cook one or two pies at a time. So they've got a better, bigger rig. No waiting. We had our pizza in less than 10 minutes. It was wonderful.
While we were up there, I wanted to drive her by another brewery called Waredaca. I thought we could just pull in, look at the grounds, see if the horsies were out, walk about, drive away. The brewery isn't open until 4pm but I figured yeah, we can go be lookie lous. And then drive down to another brewery nearby. There are so many good ones!
The gate was closed, but there was a sign that said to pull up to a certain spot and the gate would open. So we did, and it did. Cool...
There were a couple of horses out, and someone was riding. We noticed that the path to the tasting room itself was blocked off saying for employees and handicapped parking only. So we looked at the area, I told Michelle we'd bring them back, and we went to leave.
But the gate didn't open from the inside. There is no sensor to trigger, and Michelle got out to see if she could manually push the gate open and it didn't budge.
We started laughing, and did some Ken Burns style narration of "my darling Douglas, we are now trapped these 15 minutes inside the gate of the brewery in Maryland. We do not know when the horror will end..."
I was about to do a 20 point turn to get us pointed back to the tasting room, park in the lot and walk up to see if anyone was there with a suggestion on how to get out when a car pulled up to the gate and triggered it to open. He drove in, waved, and we drove out laughing.
Of all things in life, I'm super glad I have friends who don't get mad when stupid things happen. It was a good laugh.
We then drove back roads and woods-routes, past farms and horses and more farms, and I realized I literally had no idea where we were. I expected at any moment we'd be approaching Gaithersburg or Germantown or something, and finally put on Waze to pinpoint where we were. For the first time in a long time, I was somewhere unfamiliar, and while not lost, I was on roads I've never seen. It was kind of cool.
I dropped Michelle back at her hotel, came back here and got dinner ready. Our plan was grill and then build a fire and chill. But the weather decided to go pear shaped, a giant thunderstorm rolled in just after 7pm when Doug had finished grilling. We ate inside and sat at the dining table talking for hours. Michelle and I looked at house rentals in the county north of us, where they pretty much have decided they'll land. They may be an hour away based on where they are looking. But that's fine - they'll be close. And it will be nice to have them locally.
I said to her one of my big regrets is that I sometimes don't spend enough time hanging out with people I love, and after leaving Massachusetts, it was apparent to me that I took my friends for granted, and I miss all that social aspect of things.
Tomorrow they fly back to New England. Mike has to be back her in mid July, and Michelle isn't sure she's coming. We'll at least get to see him, and talk more about places to live. I told him to buffer the trip with some weekend time on either end - stay here with us and we'll toodleaboot.
And maybe get stuck in a brewery.
Still waiting on Sara for our ride to Richmond, speaking of spending time with friends. She just texted me to ask if I wanted anything from Starbucks but I am all set. I've been packed and ready since 10. She had a meeting this morning and said they'd leave immediately after it was over. But. I know how they roll.
"We'll be there before noon" is code for "Maybe by 1:30" and that's perfectly alright. We aren't in a hurry today. Air bnb is booked, we have VIP seats instead of lawn, the weather forecast is supposed to be priceless and perfect. No sign of rain, 0% chance. Not like yesterday when we got blasted out.
I'm always a little wary of outdoor concerts after our Summerfest 2019 experience in Central Park when they got 4 songs or so into the set and the sky just opened up... Tonight should be pretty alright.
Part of my plan was I thought maybe I'd go spend Friday and Saturday with my cousin. But he's got a houseguest coming on Friday that he forgot was coming because (like me) he forgot what weekend it is. I am not mad. I'm happy to gome home.
And the garden needs attention. Farmer Chris has been very lax.
Today's picture is in honor of Mike. He's a huge Iron Maiden fan, and brews his own beer. He reversed engineered one of the beers (maybe more) they make, and it is pretty good. Essentially what Guster is to me, Iron Maiden is to Mike. I like it.
This beer pictured is from Fair Winds brewery in Virginia, and Doug picked up a bunch of it when he and Geoff were out that way recently. Just for Mike. And he loved it.
Now I just need my Guster Brewery started and we'll have plenty of suds!
Exercise: limited due to car ride, but concert steps are good.
Blood Glucose:
9:30am 178
xpm n/a
11pm 228
Food:
Coffee
iced coffee
water
5 or 6 kalamata olives
prosciutto & mozz wrap-ups (left over from the crudite yesterday)
jimmy johns turkey and bacon sub
diet coke
2 beers
2 tacobell quesadillas with extra chicken
icewater icewater icewater.
No comments:
Post a Comment