De Construction by Odell Brewing - Evo Terra on Flickr
I like beer. Good beer, you understand. Beer where a brewer had an intent beyond producing a lowest common denominator swill that would be consumed the world over.
I live in Phoenix. Sometimes I get sick of the heat, but by and large, I enjoy this city.
My friend Rob Fullmer has a new project that blends those two nicely. It’s a new blog; Beer PHXation. Rob and Dave are just getting started, but they’re already carving out a niche for themselves. Both are active and talented homebrewers, and champions of many of the Phoenix-based craft breweries.
They recently released a “manifesto” of sorts, aimed at Arizona Restaurant Week. The issue? Loads of attention paid to wine lists of mentioned establishments — but beer was an afterthought. They wrote about the subject much more cogently than I would have. It’s worth a read.
So kudos, Rob. Keep ‘em coming! There’s a lot of beer-related happenings in this town. Thanks for showcasing all of it!
I’ve always considered myself a sort of amateur astronomer. Blame it on Mom, who kept me up late watching the meteor showers from the hood of the car when I was a wee lad.
My friend Dr. Pamela Gay makes it easy for would-be stargazers to do more than simply look up at the stars. She’s one of the brains behind Galaxy Zoo. Think SETI@home, if you recall that project, and you’ve got the basics of this. You, the person reading this because you have nothing better to do with your time, can help forward human-kind’s collective intellect by looking at pictures taken by the Hubble telescope and helping classify the astronomical objects shown. No PhD required!
Sound cool? It is cool. Very, very cool.
Hanny & the Mystery of the Voorwerp
And sometimes, that cool becomes something even bigger than before. That happened when school teacher Hanny van Arkel discovered a strange blob of glowing gas in one of the images she was analyzing through the Galaxy Zoo interface. She brought this strange blob to the attention of the project scientists, and for the past 3 years astronomers have been using telescopes around and above the Earth to try and find out what it is. They now think Hanny’s discovery, which she called a “Voorwerp” (Dutch for Thing), is the first known light echo of a quasar.
The significance of that may be lost on you at first. It was for me. But with the help of smart people like Pam and Phil Plait, I’ve come to understand why it is, in fact, so cool.
But not everyone has an astronomer in their back pocket. So Pamela and crew decided to take an odd turn in their educational outreach programs: comic books. Her team received funding to write a comic book telling the story of Hanny’s discovery and the subsequent adventure in understanding it. That comic book will premier at Dragon*Con on Sep 3, 2010 (10pm Crystal Ballroom of the Hilton), and will be available for digital download on their website.
See you there. Don’t hog all my bandwidth. And go join Galaxy Zoo. Helping forward the cause of science, reason and understanding seems a might more worthwhile than fertilizing non-existent crops.
I’m a huge fanboi of Joe Johnston. He’s the mastermind behind Liberty Market, Joe’s Real BBQ and other iconic eateries past and present in the Phoenix area. And he’s a super nice guy.
But this time, he’s gone to far. And I’m registering a formal protest.
But back to my protest. I’m protesting this on the following grounds:
Exhibit A: Liberty Market is too far from my house to drive there every day.
See how far away Liberty Market is from my house?
Putting the pressure on me to drive that far each and every day during the month of August to enjoy each tasty burger is simply too much to ask. It goes well beyond reasonable and customary practices and borders on cruel and unusual punishment.
Exhibit 2: Like I need to add any more mass.
Weighting Game or Why My Ass Doesn't Need To Get Bigger
I’m over two decades out of high school and am not proud of the fact that I’ve gained an average of 2 lbs. every year since then. Now with Joe pumping out a burger a day, I fully expect my mass to increase exponentially. Which means I’ll weigh 896.4 lbs by September. Good thing I can’t wear white after Labor Day.
Exhibit III: What am I made of money?
So there’s the burger, the obligatory beer, maybe a coffee and most likely one of those GIANT cinnamon rolls… Now multiply that by 30 and you get just under the Gross National Product of Tuvalu. Dammit, Joe! I’ve got a kid in college and wife with expensive hobbies, man! One of them will have to be sold off to slavery for me to afford this!
So join me in protesting Liberty Market and their insidious “Burger Daze” next month. I figure the best place to protest is on-site. We’ll get our message across that way better. And I hear they have some real tasty burgers in case we get hungry carrying those signs.
“When you’re dealing with the Universe, ignorance can be deadly.”
One of the baddest quotes from the Bad Astronomer himself, my Dr. Phil Plait. He’s been playing all super seekrit with everyone for the last few months, as he jets all over the place filming and shooting his new project. And today, we found out what that super seekrit project is. I give you a sneak peek of a new Discovery Channel series, Phil Plait’s Bad Universe!
I’ve watched it at least a half dozen times already. Partly because it looks so stinkin’ cool. And partly because I can say, yes, that man is a friend of mine. He has the hots for my wife, and I have his cell phone number. How the hell do I deserve such cool friends? I don’t know. But I’ll take it.
Congrats on the pending release, Phil. Know you’ve got a dedicated household hoping you’ll show us how to save us from a universe that obviously wants us DEAD!
And if you haven’t picked up a copy of Death from the Skies!: The Science Behind the End of the World by Phil, I highly recommend you do. I wouldn’t call it an uplifting read, but it’s fascinating none the less. And you can hear Phil read from the book on on the track by the same name on George Hrab’s latest album, Trebuchet. (Another person who I’m just giddy to know calls me a friend!)
I don’t play Rock Band. I’m convinced of an inverse proportional relationship to your skill as musician with the real world analog of the Rock Band “instruments” and how well your performance is measured by your ability to strike or “strum” the shitty pieces of plastic required in said game.
But get a few beers and [...]
This is my mom, Vickie. Today she passed a milestone that I’ll never make: she retired from her job with the state of Oklahoma after 387 years*. With budget cuts looming and just a few years short of her initially planned date, they offered her an out. Which she took. Smart cookie. She takes after [...]
In November 2004, I seriously considered getting into politics. Luckily the voice of reason — my wife — spoke up, with the true fact that I’ve not lived nearly a clean enough life. It’s not that I have a lot of skeletons in my closet. No, I have an entire basement full of them. I’d [...]
It’s hot. And to combat the heat, I’ve created the Perfect Cuban Mojito. No, it doesn’t use white rum. It doesn’t use piles of sugar. And no, you probably won’t like it. But if you like drinks the way I like drinks, please enjoy.
Evo’s Perfect Cuban Mojito
Dark rum, probably by some distiller you’ve never heard [...]
I’m very close to being done with Sprint. I’ve been here before over the last 10+ years and it always boils down to the same thing: Sprint’s customer service is terrible. So if you’ll indulge me (and this is my blog, so you have to indulge me,) I’d like to share my story from today.
I [...]
I’m fortunate to have lots of friends with talent. Talents come in many shapes and forms, but it seems a large number of mine are talented in artistic ways. I’m not without skills in this area. I’m just without the drive necessary to hone many of those.
Take video editing. I did some very VERY [...]
For months, I’ve been walking around, singing songs aloud that no one has ever heard of. That’s not all that unusual, as my musical tastes plunder the eclectic. But recently, there’s been an air of exclusivity to my music of choice. I was fortunate enough to get a copy of George Hrab’s Trebuchet before it [...]
In about 18 hours, I’m going to do my level best to piss off a good chunk of those who consider themselves part of the creative class. I’d apologize in advance, but what I have to say needs to be said. For you are not as fantastic as you think. And those who keep telling [...]
I’m having a blast in San Francisco. Sheila spent a long weekend with me, and now I’m attending ad:tech. Guess which part I like more?
And while I’m here, I’ve been continuing my “Give Evo an EVO” movement. Thus far, I’ve posted 27 videos of me pining for the new HTC EVO [...]
Clearly, I am an enigma. Offer me a quality craftbrew beer and I can wax poetically about a host of subtle nuances that are completely undetectable — or unpalatable — to most consumers of beer. I can do the same (to lesser degrees) with scotch, sushi, tequila and chili rellenos.
But I have to scratch [...]
So right about the time of this posting, I should be on stage doing my thing at Ignite Phoenix #6! This is my fourth time to present to the Ignite crowd, and I’m stoked to be doing it again.
For those who can’t make it and aren’t watching the live stream, here’s my dry run [...]
Dear Sprint,
I just got off the phone with Monica. She’s a great customer service rep of yours. She informed me that I’ve been a Sprint customer since December 1, 1999. Sure, we’ve had our ups and downs, but the scales have been tipped more in to positive for most of that time.
I pay you [...]
Actually, I’m having a lot of fun over on my new blog about digital business strategies, A Simpler Way.
Now you may not care. In fact, if you’re a loyal follower of my antics over here, you probably don’t care about the new blog. And that’s OK. Just know that things may [...]
Recently I was asked to write an article about podcasting. I don’t do it very often, probably because I’ve said about all I had to say in the 2.5 books I co-authored on the subject. But this was an article about podcasting and fiction, and I haven’t wrote extensively about that. I do that extensively, [...]
I went from hating this, to not being able to get it out of my head, to loving this.
And because I continue to run into people who’ve not experience the awesomeness that is Trololo…
There’s also version for people on ludes, ecstasy, and LSD. Yes, each one is a different experience.
I love the internets.
W007! Just found out that I’ve been selected as one of the presenters at Ignite Phoenix the Sixth! I’m totally stoked!
When I wrapped up Ignite Phoenix #4, I said that had reached the end of my three-part series on Big. I sat out — as in, in the audience — for Ignite Phoenix #5 [...]
by Phil, I highly recommend you do. I wouldn’t call it an uplifting read, but it’s fascinating none the less. And you can hear Phil read from the book on on the track by the same name on George Hrab’s latest album, 
