Last week!!

Last week was an even bigger week than we anticipated.  Andy survived his first couple of classes without too much panic.  We did make the decision very early in the week that he would need a bus pass.  TriMet raised their prices pretty significantly for month passes.  The price for the Adult 1-2 Zone went from $65 a month to $75.  When two adults are buying passes each month the price increase has an impact on the overall budget.  But it just didn’t work for him to wake up so early to catch the shuttle.  Actually it was hard on me too.  You should only have to wake up at 4am if you are 1)catching a plane 2)sick or 3)in the throes of midterms and finals.  It cannot be the norm.

And our bank was taken over by JP Morgan.  It is being cited as the biggest bank collapse ever. Oh yay! Andy and I watched the Presidential Debates and had a bit of fun playing the Debate Drinking Game. We decided to forgo the Polish Festival due to lack of funds.  Instead we stayed at home and enjoyed a Polish beer and a vegetarian kielbasa.

Today it’s a beautiful day in Portland.  Sunny, warm and a high in the 90′s.  Absolutely perfect except it was a little warm.  Are you sure it’s almost October? PS. I’ve linked some of the key words to REALLY funny things.  I’d start clicking if I were you.

Back to School

Today was Andy’s first day back at Portland Community College. He’s trying to use the campus shuttle rather than using TriMet to help save money. We don’t know yet if it will work as it looks like he will have to leave much earlier than he anticipated and gets home later as well. Today’s classes were math and chemistry. Tomorrow is biology and chem lab. Wednesday is math and chemistry again and Thursday is biology and biology lab.

Andy

I am taking an on-line Business and Promotional Writing class to help improve my writing skills. I am still studying CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) to also improve job skills as well as to aid in my blogging efforts (check out my links, yo!).  Usually there is a blog posting about what happened over the weekend however not a lot happened over Saturday and Sunday.  The usual grocery store and house clean up but nothing exciting.   This weekend is the Portland Polish Festival which is supposed to be the largest festival of its kind West of the Mississippi.  There will be art exhibits, food, music, and of course beer.

Clean Carpets

Andy got our landlords to agree to come out and clean the carpets.  We were both so excited as the shag is not shag anymore.  Years of wear and tear plus numerous cats coming in and out have taken there tole on our flooring.  So our responsibility is to expose as much carpet as possible.  How hard could it be?  Well, let me tell you.  Andy started the process on Friday.  He was able to get SO much stuff put away in our spare bedroom aka the office aka the brewery in addition to figuring out how to get globs of wax off of the carpet.  Hint:  it takes a warm iron and a bunch of brown paper bags mixed in with a lot of patience!  Yesterday as you saw from the posting, we went to the zoo.  Sitting here at 7:52pm, I am glad we went because today was spent getting the rest of it taken care of.  We vacuumed and moved stuff around much to the extreme displeasure of the cats as you can see.

Tutt

Andy came up with some creative way to expose more carpet including stacking our dressers on top of each other.

Scary dressers!

With the temperature over 90 degrees, we had to take several breaks for ice tea, beer, and cashews.  Andy was having a great time hamming it up.

Crazy Andy

Our new neighbors were nice enough to let us use their storage unit.  They have the large 3 bedroom unit and aren’t using their storage space.  We moved chairs, bottlers, monitor, paper shredder, bottles, etc. into the unit.  We figure we’ll be able to put everything back in the apartment tomorrow.  Andy and I are both really excited to have clean carpets.

Sweet Andy

We’re both pretty tired right now and Andy was sweet enough to make dinner tonight.  The week after next Andy goes back to school for another full term of science classes.  It should be pretty interesting to find out all the new cool things that he’ll learn.

Bridgeport Hop Harvest Celebration

Last night, Andy met me at my office and we walked over to Bridgeport  to try their fresh hopped beer.  Bridgeport had their 2006, 2007, and 2008 fresh hopped ales available to try, all of which were named “Tall Hop Ale”.  Although we arrived about 5:20-5:30pm, the upstairs bar area was getting packed!!  There were several tables of guys wearing beer shirts who were there to try out the new ale.  After conferring with the bartender, Andy decided it would be best to try the beers out chronologically.

yummy

So first we tried the 2006, I thought it was delicious!  Andy thought it had a strong plum/raisin smell.  The hops were a little astringent but well balanced.   Very cloudy and had a nice amber color.

2006

The 2007 (our least favorite) was a little redder in color and the plum/raisin smell was replaced by grapefruit.

2007

2008 was much darker in color and had a malty taste to it.  It was better than the 2007 but I liked the 2006 the best.

2008

Aleta & the 2006

Aleta & 2008

All in all the event was a lot of fun.  We don’t hang out in downtown Portland too often so it was fun.

Widmer Oktoberfest

Oktoberfest

This year Andy and I decided to go out and attend Widmer’s Oktoberfest mostly due to their new Pale Ale that they would be sampling.  The actual product won’t be hitting the shelves until January 2009.  We wanted to be some of the first people (not associated with the brewery) to try it.  We decided to take mass transit there.  It’s faster and easier.  After last years experience, neither one of us wanted to stay longer than a pint or two.  <Last year, it was so packed! If I were a fire marshall, I would have shut the event down.>  Due to sheer luck, Andy and I got to the event about thirty minutes early.  We both decided the best course of action was to wait rather than walking around or going to neighboring pubs for a quick pint.  Andy was the first customer to get in.  <We had to defend our front line supremacy more than once>

Aleta & Andy

Upon entrance to the festival, Andy and I found the stand that was sampling the Pale Ale and quickly grabbed a pint.  It was in one word:  unremarkable.  Sure it was a pale ale and had the color and all of the elements that a pale ale should have.  But what it lacked was creativity and spark.  Accrording to Andy, “It was an American Pale Ale in the style of fresh hopped ale.  They achieved the stale urine, crack smoke smell that really comes from fresh hopps.”  Andy thinks that they may have used hopps that were rushed through production.   The beer was okay.  I personally liked the Okto better which I’ve all ready had.  Nice and balanced.

The festival itself was okay.  The music was surprisingly good.  I think it was music by “Those Darn Accordians”.  I’m probably wrong.  We sampled, we laughed, and we took photos.  Prost!!

Andy at Oktoberfest

Me at Oktoberfest

Camping

Aleta & Andy

Andy in car

Look at me!

getting ready

Andy and I went camping.  Originally we were going to stay at the Silver Falls National Forest area.  Well, we got there and the campsites afforded no privacy.  We went back to the office and was helped by a young woman named Stacy who gave us a map to one of her favorite sites.   After a bone jarring 30+ minute drive on a gravel road, we arrived at Paradise.  We had a fabulous time there.  The food came out perfect, the stars were bright, and the area was quiet.  The next morning, we were awoken to a convict cleaning crew complete with a sheriff who let us know that they were going to be making tons of noise complete with a jackhammer.  We made great time getting out of there.  After several mishaps including a locked gate and a one that appeared to be locked (great driving Andy!!), we left the area in search of coffee and breakfast.

setting up the tent

Lost Hawaii photos

One last photo

The Canal

Canal

Stormy downtown

I wanted to share some photos of the scenary outside of the hotel and hotel itself which was awesome.  If you ever get a chance, check out the Aqua Aloha Surf and Spa.  It’s a beautiful hotel and according to their website have other specialty hotels.

My hotel