Friday, December 31, 2021

(Bonus) Pic(k) of the Week: A year's sunset

Blue Mt. Sunset (04)

It was a winter's sunset at Blue Mountain Brewery, in Nelson County, Virginia, USA, in 2010. No artifice; no 'fancy' camera.' Just point and shoot. Nature did the rest.

When the sun rises tomorrow morning, for the first time in 2022, I'll wish for fewer "unprecedented times" for all.

Thank you for reading.

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Thursday, December 30, 2021

(Bonus) Pic(k) of the Week: Brewster Fashion

Brewster fashion

Form and function.
Found 'still life.'

The boots and shoes of a brewster lie close to a brewhouse locker, at the Heavy Seas Brewery, in Halethorpe, Maryland, USA.

I took this photo in July 2013. It should have been a Pic(k) of the Week years ago. I'm making amends today.

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Saturday, December 25, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Nutcracker Welcome

Nutcracker welcome

Christmas curiosities,
Nutcracker welcome.
Y'ule come back now.

And the photo-bombing piglet...all seen at antiques shop Kudzu in Scottdale, Georgia, USA. 18 December 2021.

Sorry for the two groan-er pun but a merry Christmas, nonetheless.

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Saturday, December 18, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Forest Bleak

Forest bleak

Chaos in a thicket,
Lichen on a bare tree.
Forest bleak.

Seminary Wood: Decatur, Georgia, USA. 10 December 2021.

The December solstice ("winter solstice" for us here in the northern hemisphere) occurs on Tuesday, 21 December at 10:59 a.m. EST. In terms of daylight, the day will be the 'shortest' of the year. And astronomical winter will have begun.

Bleak, indeed.

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Saturday, December 11, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Bicycle PATH

Bicycle PATH

I'm no professional photographer; I only play like one on Flickr. That being said, a photo of mine has been published in...

Rails-to-Trails Magazine
Fall 2021
"Georgia's PATH Foundation Trails"
— Laura Stark
  • Rails to Trails is the house magazine for the eponymous non-profit conservancy that is "dedicated to creating a nationwide network of trails from former rail lines and connecting corridors to build healthier places for healthier people."

  • The PATH Foundation has been "dedicated to trail planning and implementation in Georgia for three decades [since 1991]. The organization is aiming to [soon] reach 300 miles of open trail."

Cizauskas published (in Rails To Trails Magazine)

I took the image in August 2019, in Decatur, Georgia, USA, on the PATH's Stone Mountain Trail. I set focus on a logo'd bike rack in the foreground and waited for a bicyclist to travel into the frame. Then...voilà.

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Sunday, December 05, 2021

Ignominy repealed

"Pretty good. Not bad at all!"

Happy Repeal Day!

Eight-eight years ago, today, on 5 December 1933, Utah became the 36th (of 48 states) to ratify the 21st Amendment (3/4 of all states are required by the Constitution to ratify an Amendment) thus nullifying the 18th Amendment and ending America's 13-year ignominious experiment with the Prohibition of alcohol.

Take a moment today to honor the sagacity of those Americans of eighty-eight years ago. Hoist a beer, sip a whisky, or drink a glass of wine. Legally.

Read more at YFGF: here.

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Saturday, December 04, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Stoop gourds

Stoop gourds

Thanksgiving in rear mirror.
Pumpkins on back stoop.

DeKalb County, Georgia, USA. 26 November 2021.

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Saturday, November 27, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Reeds in autumn veltd

Reeds in autumn veltd

Veldt, poetically.
Autumn meadow, prosaically.


Legacy Park: Decatur, Georgia, USA. 11 November 2021.

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Saturday, November 20, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Full Beaver Moon, eclipsed

Full Beaver Moon, eclipsed

Syzygy!

This was the ruddy, full Beaver Moon, 97% eclipsed, at 4:11 am ET (9:11 UT), 19 November 2021. And, unlike the night sky of a non-eclipsed full moon, on this night the stars were readily visible, surrounding the umbral-shadowed moon.

Pictured above is the maximum point of the nearly partial lunar eclipse. At nearly 6 hours, it was the longest such since the year 1440 and the longest such until the year 2669.

If you were sleeping that night or you'll be unable to wait for the next event, fret not! North America will be witness to not one but two total lunar eclipses next year, on 15 May and 7 November 2022. (Your geographical results may differ. Check your local listings.)

When the damnable alarm went off, the outside temperature was 0 °C and the winds were nippy at 16 kph. Charlie the dog didn't mind; indeed, he thoroughly enjoyed his cuckoo-o'clock constitutional. And me? Afterward, back inside, the coffee seemed somehow tastier and more warming than it had been.

Mira la luna. La bella luna!

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Saturday, November 13, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Morning breaks over fen

Morning breaks over fen
Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from Heaven,
Like the first dewfall, on the first grass. *

Crepuscular rays illuminated a marsh in morning mist. (Well, ok, deliberately induced sun-flares did.)

Legacy Park: Decatur, Georgia, USA. 7 November 2021.

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Saturday, November 06, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Autumn livery

Autumn livery

Livery
  • a servant's uniform
  • the distinctive clothing or badge formerly worn by the retainers of a person of rank
  • distinctive dress
Merriam-Webster

Assume the tree, a servant. Assume nature, the person of rank. Assume autumn foliage, the distinctive dress. Indulge the metaphor.

Autumn livery.

Legacy Park, Decatur, Georgia, USA. 7 December 2020.

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Saturday, October 30, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: (Almost) Halloween Guest

(Almost) Halloween guest

A spider —and her meals— at dusk. She may have been a week premature for a Halloween visit, but who's checking?

24 October 2021.

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Saturday, October 16, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Morning on the Tennessee

Morning on the Tennessee

I was hiking the Tennessee Riverwalk, near the Veterans Memorial Bridge, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA, when I turned around and this: mist rising over the Tennessee River in early morning light. I may have missed deeper fog only thirty-minutes earlier but, with this view, I didn't mind.

10 October 2021.

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Saturday, October 09, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Field o'cattails

Field o'cattails (01)

Field o'cattails.
Riparian autumnal.


Autumn on the marshy edge of Echo Lake —a shallow, 18-acre pond— in DeKalb County, Georgia, USA. 23 September 2021.
Typha latifolia (broadleaf cattail, bulrush, common bulrush, common cattail, cat-o'-nine-tails, great reedmace, cooper's reed, cumbungi) is a perennial herbaceous plant in the genus Typha. It is found as a native plant species in North and South America, Europe, Eurasia, and Africa. T. latifolia is always found in or near water, growing mostly in freshwater but also in slightly brackish marshes.
Wikipedia.

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Sunday, October 03, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Off-Ford-able cooperage

Off-Fording cooperage

Off-Ford-able cooperage.
Night kegs at the diner.

At night, outside the Universal Joint Bar & Grill, in Decatur (Oakhurst), Georgia, USA, on 1 October 2021.

I had pre-envisioned this shot as a black-and-white night street scene. But its teal-and-orange cinematic look —supplied in situ— made me reconsider. Then, again, the (maybe) American-southwest vibe of the monochrome version intrigued me as well. Here's that version:

Off-Fording kegs (b&w)

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Saturday, September 25, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Waxing gibbous Harvest Moon

Waxing gibbous Harvest Moon

In the Northern Hemisphere, the Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the autumn equinox. Depending on the year, the full Harvest Moon can occur anywhere from two weeks before the autumn equinox to two weeks after. Thus, the Harvest Moon is either the last full moon of the summer season or the first full moon in autumn.

In 2021, the Northern Hemisphere autumn equinox comes on September 22. The full moon falls less than two days earlier, on September 20. Thus, for the Northern Hemisphere, this upcoming full moon is the Harvest Moon and the last full moon of summer.
EarthSky.

As it happened, clouds and rain obscured my view of the full harvest moon. But not all was lost.

Six days prior, on 14 September, I looked up at the (only slightly clouded) night sky over Atlanta, Georgia, USA, and saw the moon, beautiful even if it was only 52% illuminated and waxing gibbous, announcing the impending end to summer.

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Saturday, September 18, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Fallen Oktoberfest

Autumn carpet

On 12 October 1810, Ludwig, crown prince of Bavaria, celebrated his wedding to Therese, princess of Saxe-Hildburghausen, with a big party in the capital city of Munich. He celebrated again the following year and each thereafter continuing to do so after even ascending to the Bavarian throne in 1825. Social unrest —including the Bavarian Beer Riots of 1844— ended his reign in 1848 but the beer-drinking and feasting endured. Bavarians and visitors continue to celebrate the annual bacchanal, from mid-September into early October, calling it Oktoberfest.

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Fallen Oktoberfest

Since 1810, there have been only twenty-six occasions on which Oktoberfest has not been held. The COVID-19 pandemic accounts for two of those: last year and again this. Only twice before has disease caused the celebrations to be canceled —in 1854 and 1874— on both occasions because of a cholera epidemic.

If Oktoberfest had occurred in Munich this year, it would have begun today, Saturday, 18 September, and concluded sixteen days from now, on Sunday, 3 October, German Unity Day.

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Pic(k) of the Week

Someone (maybe even I) once said, "The colors of autumn are the colors of beer."

So, here, to remember a fallen Oktoberfest: an autumn leaves tableau...but taken last year. Autumn here in the Northern Hemisphere won't begin until 22 September, so things haven't quite yet reached THAT point of fallen color!

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Saturday, September 11, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Mantis preying for autumn

Mantis praying for autumn

Preying,
She hunts.
Prematurely autumnal.

As seen alongside the East Decatur Greenway in the city of Decatur, Georgia, USA, on 22 August 2021. (Autumn does not officially begin for another month, on 22 September.)

The species praying mantis (Mantodea), like the cockroach, has existed since the Cretaceous period, 145 million years ago. It probably will continue thus for hundreds of millions more. Unlike us.

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Saturday, September 04, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Porcelain on the vine

Porcelain on the vine

Robin's-egg-blue but invasive.

In mid-summer, bedewed porcelain berries grow wild, ringing Postal Pond in Legacy Park of Decatur, Georgia, USA. 1 August 2021.
Ampelopsis glandulosa var. brevipedunculata —with common names porcelain berry, Amur peppervine, wild grape, and creeper— is a deciduous, woody, perennial vine climbing trees and shrubs via tendrils to a height of 15-20 feet (4-6 m). It is naturally found in Northeast China, Korea, Siberia, and Japan, but was introduced in 1870 to the United States where it has become invasive along the East Coast. Fruits are circular berries about 1/3 inch in diameter (8 mm), in many colors on the same plant, including green, blue, purple, pink, or yellow. The vines are found in disturbed areas such as roadsides, old fields, and floodplains where sunlight is abundant.
Wikipedia.

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Saturday, August 28, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: La Grande Vitesse

La Grande Vitesse

La Grande Vitesse (1969)
Sheet metal, bolts, and paint
Alexander Calder (American, 1898–1976)
Calder Foundation, New York

In his last decade, Calder focused on large-scale public sculpture commissions. This is a model for a vibrant red sculpture installed in the plaza of City Hall in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “It’s really just for differentiation, but I love red so much that I almost want to paint everything red,” Calder said in the 1960s. The bold, curving shapes summarize his lifelong interest in creating a dialogue between voids and volumes.
— High Museum placard

This is one of about one hundred artworks by Alexander Calder and Pablo Picasso on exhibit at the High Museum of Art, in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, during the summer of 2021.
Alexander Calder and Pablo Picasso are two of the foremost figures in the history of twentieth-century art. This touring exhibition, which debuted in 2019 at the Musée National Picasso-Paris and is coming to the High this summer, presents more than one hundred paintings, sculptures, and works on paper spanning Calder’s and Picasso’s careers that reveal the radical innovation and enduring influence of their art.

Conceived by the artists’ grandsons, Bernard Ruiz-Picasso and Alexander S. C. Rower, and organized by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the exhibition focuses on the artists’ exploration of the void, or absence of space, which both defined from the figure through to abstraction.

Calder’s wire figures, paintings, drawings, and revolutionary nonobjective mobiles, stabiles, and standing mobiles are integrated throughout the exhibition with profoundly inventive works by Picasso in every media. The juxtapositions are insightful, surprising, and challenging, demonstrating the striking innovations these great artists introduced through their ceaseless reexamination of form, line, and space.

One impression I departed with was that THIS is a exhibiton of art that children should be taken to. Of course, neither Picasso nor Calder are juvenile in any way, but their macabre and whimsical (and mobile) exploration of forms and shapes could make many young people lifelong appreciators of art, unencumbered as they are by instilled preconceptions.

By the way, Mr. Calder may have loved red but, under the lights at the High, this official maquette (1:5 scaled-down model created in 1975) of La Grande Vitesse appeared orange. And the name? It translates from French as "the high speed" or, eponymously for its home city, as "the grand rapid."

Mais, oui!

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Saturday, August 21, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Pat's Budweiser truck

Pat's Budweiser truck

"But Tom," I'm asked, "where are the images of good fermentables?" So, here (even if the modifier "good" might be cause for debate).

The side panel of a Budweiser truck, as seen through the entrance of the renowned bar, at O'Brien's, in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, on 22 July 2011. (The gumbo melange of a Gaeilge bar in an arrondissement français can't be overlooked.)

Drinking is permitted on the streets of New Orleans; the mask is nine years pre-COVID.

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Saturday, August 14, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Hibiscus mauve

Hibiscus mauve

In the forest
One, expected, returns
Mauve, too briefly.

A rose of Sharon blooms in Seminary Wood of Legacy Park, in Decatur, Georgia, USA. 31 July 2021.

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The more you know...

Hibiscus syriacus is a species of flowering plant in the mallow family, Malvaceae. It is native to south-central and southeast China but widely introduced elsewhere. Common names include the rose of Sharon (in North America), Syrian ketmia, and shrub althea (UK).
Wikipedia

Mauve is a pale purple color named after the mallow flower. The first use of the word mauve as a color was in 1796–98 according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Another name for the color is mallow, with the first recorded use of mallow as a color name in English in 1611.
Wikipedia

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Saturday, August 07, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Bees vs. ladybugs

Bees vs. ladybugs

Bees vs. ladybugs: who's winning? It's checkerboard whimsy.

Seen in Frazier-Rowe Park, in suburban Atlanta, Georgia (DeKalb County), USA, on 15 July 2021.

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Saturday, July 31, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Osprey in nest on light pole

Osprey in nest on light pole

The osprey tolerates a wide variety of habitats, nesting in any location near a body of water providing an adequate food supply. Ospreys construct their nests at the tops of dead trees, atop power poles, on manmade nesting platforms, and sometimes on buoys, chimneys, or other structures.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (pdf)

Look up!

Call it "environmental irony" or (less humbly) "new topography": man-made elements intruding (?) in an image otherwise of natural beauty. But, if you do, you might see (and hear) ospreys in their nest, high overhead...on a light pole, in a supermarket parking lot, as I did in St. Augustine Beach, Florida, USA, on 3 July 2021.

The osprey —or, more specifically, the western osprey (Pandion haliaetus), also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk— is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor, reaching more than two feet in length (60 cm) and six feet across the wings (180 cm). It is brown on the upper parts and predominantly greyish on the head and underparts. It is found on all continents except Antarctica, although in South America it occurs only as a non-breeding migrant.
Wikipedia

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Saturday, July 24, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Proto-aureate

Proto-aureate

Proto-aureate,
Yellow wildflower,
Half-fledged.

Trailhead Community Park, of the East Decatur Greenway, in Decatur, Georgia, USA, on 6 June 2021.

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Saturday, July 17, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Dune fence down.

Dune fence down

Dune fence down: desolation at/on St. Augustine Beach, Florida, USA.

Photo taken on 30 June 2021.

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Saturday, July 10, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: OCA x2

OCA x 2

Old Coast Ales is a production brewery (with taproom) that opened in 2017. It's located in St. Augustine *, Florida, USA, a few blocks southeast of the Bridge of Lions, a 100-year-old drawbridge that connects Anastasia Island to downtown St. Augustine.

We visited on 1 July 2021. Here are two draught beers we ordered (and enjoyed) in the brewery's taproom.

Left to right:
  • Oh-8-Oh
    5.7% ABV
    (alcohol-by-volume)
    "Mildly bitter and balanced between malt and hop flavors, this pale ale features Sultana and Sabro Cryo hops."
    ---> Me: Yep. More like a classic pale ale's bitter and earthy than a latter day's fruity or cat-stinky. Had two.

  • Empirical
    American IPA
    6.6 % ABV
    "Old skool American IPA with a solid malt backbone and a heavy hop of Amarillo, Simcoe, and Centennial hops."
    ---> Me: Yep. Bonus points for beauty.
Old Coast Ales is a production brewery: meaning that it does not have a kitchen as would a brewpub. But, 'not to worry.' Innately connected to the brewery is a taco eatery that was busy when we visited. After purchasing some fare (which we ate while pairing drinking our beers in the brewery), we understood why.

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Hop geeky

Hops —the female (and non-seed bearing) flowers of herb bines— are used by brewsters in beer:
  • for their herbal/spicy/fruity flavors and aromas
  • to add drying bitterness as a counterbalance to malt sweetness
  • to lesser extents as beer-foam enhancers, beer shelf-life stabilizers, and anti-microbial agents.
There are many varieties of hops grown (such as Amarillo and Sultana, above), propagated for their flavor, aroma, bittering potential, farming yield, and resistance to agricultural disease.

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Saturday, July 03, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Beer-Mobile? Ale, yeah!

Beer-mobile? Ale yeah!

Is it on the wrong side or the right side of the tracks? Either way, it's a beer-mobile, so...ale, yeah!

As seen in Decatur (Oakhurst), Georgia, USA.


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Independent Beer Run Day

Today, the [U.S.] Brewers Association encourages you to buy local beer. That's something I do regularly, but with these privisos, in this order:
  • 1) Good beer first (beer whose flavor I like and which I respect, that is, well-made and/or created with human-first principles).
  • 2) If the above is satisified, then from a brewery that is local to me (community, 50-mile radius, state, region, nation, in that order).
  • 3) From a small and/or independent brewery...again, with human-first principles.
  • 4) From a local and small and/or independent purveyor.
  • 5) Bonus points for cool vibe and/or lack of pretension.
  • 6) Cask-ale prepared well and served well, and created without extraneous cocoa-puffs and dingleberries. This is last on my list because if it were first, I'd go thirsty. In the U.S., non-polluted cask ale is in the red zone for extinction.
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Saturday, June 26, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: It is so ordered.

It is so ordered

On this day (26 June) in 2015, the United States Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, that the U.S. Constitution grants same-sex couples the right to marry and that, under the Constitution’s guarantees of due process and equal protection under the law, no state or jurisdiction can abridge that right.

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy (now retired) wrote the majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges.
No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed. It is so ordered.
Supreme Court.gov (pdf)

Image: Pride flag proudly flying over a pub, in Decatur (Beacon Hill), Georgia, USA, on 26 June 2021.

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Saturday, June 19, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Condor extinct

Condor extinct

Commerce bereft, 
 Laved in vernal set, 
The Condor extinct.

I've driven by this former automotive repair shop many times; on this day, the sunset light was fantastic. So, I tried my hand at capturing some urban decay or, if you will, some shuttered small-business Americana...with a bit of doggerel tossed in.

Decatur (Oakhurst), Georgia, USA. 14 June 2021.

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Saturday, June 12, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: 'Old-Fashioned' tacos

Old-Fashioned tacos

Cocktails and tacos!

Pop-up kitchen Mascogo Tacos 1 was cooking up their fare on 4 June 2021, outdoors on the 'whiskey patio,' at small Independent Distilling Company, in Decatur, Georgia, USA.

We were there; we ate; we drank. Pictured clockwise from top:
  • Old Fashioned cocktail 2
    Independent Distilling Hellbender Bourbon, demerara syrup, aromatic bitters, Regan's Orange Bitters, twists of lemon and orange.

  • Barbacoa taco
    Braised brisket cooked in smoked chilis, with spices, onions, cilantro.

  • Pollo con Chili Verde taco
    Hatch-chili-verde-stewed chicken breast, onions, cilantro, Cotija. 3

  • Los Cactus taco (partially obscured)
    marinated grilled cactus, onions, cilantro, charred tomato salsa, with/without Cotija.
"What's the cactus in the taco?" I asked Mascogo Tacos' chef, Craig L. Headspeth, "It's tasty." "There's only one edible cactus," he replied. "Prickly pear." 4 "Ah!"

I thanked him; the other half complimented him on the two meatier tacos. Thanks were also proffered to Independent's 'mixologist' Corey for the cocktail and to Michael Anderson, Independent's owner/distiller, for the Hellbender Bourbon, the first bourbon distilled in the Atlanta area since before Prohibition. That's one hundred-one years ago, in 1920(!), in case you're counting.

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Saturday, June 05, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Rapeseed stalk

Rapeseed stalk

A stalk of rapeseed (Brassica napus) blooms in Decatur’s Kitchen Garden —an immigrant-operated community garden— in Decatur, Georgia, USA. 16 April 2021.

In the cabbage family, rapeseed is the plant from which the vegetable cooking-oil, canola (an adman's portmanteau of 'Canada' and 'ola', the latter itself meaning 'oil, low acid'), is extracted. * The re-name may have seemed more, err, palatable.

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Sunday, May 30, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Little Cottage Brewery (and pale ale)

Little Cottage Brewery (and pale ale)

On a delightful spring afternoon, Hymn Songs of an Alternate Universe —a 6.1% alcohol pale ale— was on draught, alfresco on the patio, at Little Cottage Brewery, in Avondale Estates, Georgia, USA. 29 May 2021.

Little Cottage —a production brewery— first opened on 15 May 2021. Its brewer/owner is Jon Shari, a successful Atlanta, Georgia-area homebrewer. The facilities, especially considering the light-industrial confines, are quite pleasant.

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Saturday, May 22, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: The creek at the end of the pond

The creek at the end of the pond

It looks as if it were a beaver dam...that is, if beavers could move rocks.

Cecilia Creek flows from the southeastern end of Postal Pond, in Legacy Park of Decatur, Georgia, USA. 22 April 2021.

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Sunday, May 09, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Tiny wood sorrel on the Greenway

Tiny wood sorrel on the Greenway

April showers bring May flowers. Like these.

Tiny violet wood sorrel flowers blossom on the East Decatur Greenway, in DeKalb County, Georgia, USA. 2 May 2021.
Violet wood-sorrel (Oxalis violacea) is a native plant in much of the United States, from the Rocky Mountains east to the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico coasts, and through Eastern Canada. It has a tendency to cluster in open places in damp woods and on stream banks, and in moist prairies.
Wikipedia.

By the way, this is a closeup. The wood sorrel appears much larger in the image than it did in 'real' life.

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Saturday, May 01, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Bullfrog in pond

Bullfrog in pond

The bullfrogs (Lithobates catesbeianus) have begun bellowing. It's mating season, in among the water clover, of Postal Pond, in Legacy Park of Decatur, Georgia, USA, on 27 April 2021.

I could hear this loud fellow well before I could see him, well camouflaged as he was. That is, until I used my camera's telephoto lens as a monocular to spot him.

Legacy Park is an in-the-city park. But at 77 acres, it can have an in-the-country feel. Just ignore the occasional bleat of a car horn in the distance.

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  • On 29 April 2021, Flickr's editors chose this image as one for inclusion in their Flickr Explore feature.

  • Pic(k) of the Week: one in a weekly series of images posted on Saturdays, and occasionally, but not always (as is the case today), with a good fermentable as the subject.
  • Photo 18 of 52, for year 2021. See it on Flickr: here.
  • Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M10 II.
    • Lens: Olympus M.40-150mm F4.0-5.6 R
    • Settings: 150 mm | 1/160 | ISO 200 | f/5.6
  • Commercial reproduction requires explicit permission, as per Creative Commons.

  • For more from YFGF:

Saturday, April 24, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Let us pray

Let us pray

During a tour of Independent Distilling Company and a tasting of the company's spirits, owner/distiller Michael Anderson paused (as if in prayerful thanks).

Decatur (East Decatur Station), Georgia, USA. 26 March 2021.

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Et seq.

When Georgia repealed  Prohibition in the state in 1935, it forbade distilleries (and breweries) from selling their own products on-site. It wouldn't be until 1 September 2015 that Georgia’s distilleries (and breweries) were permitted to sell their products directly to consumer from their tasting rooms. But...

The law limited distilleries to offering only three, half-ounce samples of their spirits per person. And if a visitor wished to purchase a bottle of spirits, hey/she first had to pay for and attend a tour of the distillery (of course, equal to the retail cost of that bottle). Providing distillery guests with cocktails, however, remained strictly verboten. But...

Two years later, on 1 September 2017, Georgia removed blue law pretense. Now, distilleries can sell consumers up to three 750 ml bottles directly on its premises. Additionally, they can sell cocktails (of only their own house-produced liquor) and unlimited full-ounce samples to vistors to their facilities, without the pretense of a tour ticket. Topping it off, any distillery can sell up to five hundred 53-gallon barrels of its liquor per year on-site. That's 133,754 bottles of bourbon (or whatever the spirit may be)!

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Ergo

In the photo above, Mr. Anderson may have been ruminating upon all that. That weekend, his small distillery was celebrating its 7th anniversary. But...

Even during a celebratory tour, his work was not done. Fermentum nunquam dormit! *

Stirring the wash


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  • * Translated, from the Latin, as "yeast never sleeps." Amusingly, an alternate meaning of the word "fermentum" is "trouble." Thus, with poetic license, the phrase could be translated as "trouble is always brewing." Seems apt.

  • Pic(k) of the Week: one in a weekly series of images posted on Saturdays, occasionally (as is the case today) with a good fermentable as the subject.
  • Photo 17 of 52, for year 2021. See it on Flickr: here.
  • Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M10 II.
    • Lens: Olympus M.40-150mm F4.0-5.6 R
    • Settings: 123 mm | 1/250 | ISO 200 | f/5.3
  • Commercial reproduction requires explicit permission, as per Creative Commons.

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Saturday, April 17, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Avonator Doppelbock

Avonator Doppelbock

Small beer?

USA Today recently selected the small city of Avondale Estates, Georgia, as comprising “the nation's best small-town beer scene for 2021” (the nation being the USA). The town (population: est. 3,093) defeated nineteen others for the honor.
The charming town of Avondale Estates, just east of Decatur, Georgia, has a small downtown area packed with unique food and beverage offerings. For beer lovers, there’s Wild Heaven Beer (brewery), The Lost Druid Brewery, The Beer Growler & Pint Haus, and (soon) Little Cottage Brewery. *
USA Today 10 Best
26 March 2021

Pictured above is a beer enjoyed at one of those emporia in that winning beer scene: to wit, Avonator Doppelbock, on draught, in the beer-garden at Lost Druid Brewery, on 9 April 2021.


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But how did the beer taste?

Bock is a traditional, strong, malty Bavarian lager. ... Dopplebock is a strong [bock] beer with a typical alcohol content beyond 7% ABV. The style originated in the Bavarian capital of Munich, Germany, and was for a fairly long time synonymous with the Salvator beer brewed by Paulaner. Other breweries indicate the style by amending “-ator” to the beer's name. While they can be brewed to any color and made by different methods, doppelbocks are usually reddish-brown bottom-fermented lagers, and generally show a toffee-like, bready aroma and rich malty palate with notable residual sweetness. Hops are usually robust enough to offer some balance, but rarely about 25 IBU.
The Oxford Companion to Beer (Oxford University Press, 2012).

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Yes, but how did the beer taste?

Nose of plum, dark bread, and black olives. Flavor follows suit. Medium-sweet body and medium-full mouthfeel; off-dry finish. Tasty and sipping strong. (The brewery provides little online description although the label on a take-out can certified alcohol by volume to be 9.6%.)

Many latter day American 'craft' breweries tend to eschew 'traditional' European beer-styles (although there may be a guerilla return). So, it was refreshing (pun intended) to find one and enjoy it, close to home and, indeed, during bock season.

A series of occasional reviews of beer (and wine and spirits).
No scores; only descriptions.

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Saturday, April 10, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: This way, in red.

This way, in red

In 1869, the Stone Mountain Granite Company built a railroad spur to serve granite and quartz quarries at the foot of monadnock Stone Mountain, thirteen miles east of Atlanta, Georgia, USA. Now, still in operation but as a tourist attraction, the Stone Mountain Scenic Railroad extends 3.88 miles (of standard gauge of 4 ft 8 1⁄2 inches), encircling the base of the mountain.

This way, in red: a rail switch along the track. Photo taken 26 March 2017.

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Saturday, April 03, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Painting the Box

Painting the box (05)

Here is a photo I took, on 12 May 2016, before an Atlanta Braves baseball game at Turner Field, in Atlanta, Georgia. Ballpark employees were measuring and chalking the lines of the batters' boxes at home plate, and dusting and sweeping the clay surface clean and smooth.

According to MLB rules (Major League Baseball), there are two batter's boxes (right-handed and left), one on each side of home plate. Each is four feet wide and six feet long, centered lengthwise at the center of home plate, with the inside line of each set six inches from the near edge of home plate.

Baseball and COVID-19

In 2020, Major League Baseball dealt with the global coronavirus pandemic by shortening its 162-game season to 60 games, postponing its start until July (rather than its planned start at the end of March), adopting a few temporary rules changes, and prohibiting fan attendance (except during the Championship Series and World Series, in October). Fake crowd noise was added to game broadcasts. As a result, MLB, as a whole, lost more than six billion dollars in revenue, versus 2019.

This year, with U.S. partial vaccinations already having reached 38.1% of the eligible population, baseball fans could hope for a continuing return to near normality. The league reset to a full 162-game schedule, albeit with only a limited number of fans in the stands (the exact restrictions up to each individual ballpark).

Then COVID-19 struck: four positive tests and multiple exposures forced the cancellation of Opening Day at Nationals Ballpark in Washington, D.C. and the postponement of a three-game series between the Washington Nationals and New York Mets.

Not so for the Braves, who, unafflicted (so far) by the disease, played and lost their opener to the Philadelphia Phillies.

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Georgia, baseball, and the inalienable right of Americans to vote

This year, the Braves were also to have hosted baseball's All-Star Game. However, in response to the Georgia state government's recent adoption of draconian voting restrictions, MLB took that honor from the team.
Over the last week, we have engaged in thoughtful conversations with Clubs, former and current players, the Players Association, and The Players Alliance, among others, to listen to their views. I have decided that the best way to demonstrate our values as a sport is by relocating this year’s All-Star Game and MLB Draft.

Major League Baseball fundamentally supports voting rights for all Americans and opposes restrictions to the ballot box. In 2020, MLB became the first professional sports league to join the non-partisan Civic Alliance to help build a future in which everyone participates in shaping the United States. We proudly used our platform to encourage baseball fans and communities throughout our country to perform their civic duty and actively participate in the voting process. Fair access to voting continues to have our game’s unwavering support.
Rob Manfred
Commissioner, MLB
2 April 2021.

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Saturday, March 27, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Beware the mercaptans!

Beware the mercaptans!

Alfresco may be beautiful but beware the mercaptans. Beer lovers don't allow their beers to get 'skunked.'

About beer, hops, sunlight, and mercaptans (aka thiols):
Certain compounds in hops are light-sensitive and when exposed to strong light a photo-oxidation reaction takes place, creating the intensely flavor-active compound 3-methyl-2-butene-1-thiol (MBT), one of the most powerful flavor substances known to man. Commonly referred to as 'skunky,' the pungent odor resembles that of the famously malodorous defense spray deployed by skunks.
The Oxford Companion to Beer: Oxford University Press, 2012.

To ward off the stank, keep beer out of direct sunlight or fluorescent light. Cans (and kegs) are best for that and brown glass is ok. But green glass? In sunlight, it's nearly worthless (e.g., that 'Dutch' beer) and clear glass (or plastic) is merely a vessel for liquid skunk (e.g., almost every 'craft' beer patio). Yummy...not.

Light-struck vs. oxidized

PS. Light-struck 'skunkiness' is NOT the same off-flavor (or biochemical mechanism) as that in a beer left warm. Beer exposed to heat (and over time, such as an old beer) will oxidize. The beer will develop malodors such as cardboard (!) and sherry and quickly lose its hop aroma. This can happen to any beer left warm, whether in direct sunlight or not, whether in a can, in brown glass, or in a keg.

By the way, when a beer is pasteurized, it is deliberately exposed to high heat over a short period of time. Draw your own conclusion.

A series of occasional reviews of beer (and wine and spirits).
No scores; only descriptions.

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Saturday, March 20, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Cecilia's wetlands

Cecilia's wetlands

Marshlands of Cecilia Creek (or more prosaically, East Fork Middle Branch Shoal Creek), in Seminary Wood.

Photo taken in Legacy Park, within the boundaries of the City of Decatur, in the state of Georgia, USA.


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Saturday, March 13, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: Bird perched on branch over pond

Bird perched on branch in pond

She came.
She saw.
She flew 
Away. 

A North American tyrant flycatcher (tyrannidae) poses, perched on a branch jutting over Postal Pond, in Legacy Park, Decatur, Georgia, USA.

I took this photo on 31 October 2020, when this lady and many other birds were preparing to (or already) flying further south to winter. Five months later, many are returning (or flying through) in anticipation of the imminent return of Northern Hemisphere spring. (This year, the vernal equinox will occur on Saturday, 20 March 2021.)

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Saturday, March 06, 2021

Pic(k) of the Week: White Flags of Georgia's COVID-19 Devastation

White Flags of Covid-19: Georgia's Devastation

White Flags of Georgia's COVID-19 Devastation is a memorial installation illustrating the devastating human and economic cost of the pandemic —and the urgency for local and federal elected officials to act now to meet the real need in our state. These white flags represent the more than 15,000 Georgians who have already lost their lives to COVID-19. Every person we have lost was loved and needed. Please join us to honor those who have died. And take action to urge elected officials to take bold action today. No one should have to plant a single flag more.

The installation was inspired by artist Suzanne Brennan Firstenburg and created by the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization that promotes lasting peace with justice, as a practical expression of faith in action.
American Friends Service Committee.

First Christian Church of Decatur, City of Decatur, Georgia, USA. 28 February 2021.

The church displayed the flags for two weeks in February 2021. By the end of the month, Georgia's total COVID-19 death toll had risen from 15,000 to 17,376. Since the pandemic began a year ago in February 2020, 514,660 Americans have died nationwide; globally, more than 2.54 million human beings.

Placards displayed at memorial

  • 3.9 million Georgians experienced loss of a job or reduced hours last year.
  • Many Georgians face eviction and mortgage or rent failure due to pandemic-related economic deprivation.
  • 1.7 million public school children [in Georgia] have had their futures disrupted.
  • 60% of public school students in Georgia faced food insecurity even before the pandemic.
  • In Georgia prisons: 5,011 COVID-19 cases; 92 deaths (including incarcerated people and prison staff).
  • No Georgian should die because they don't have access to health care.
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