Another day, another shitty bottled beer.

So, I've been waiting tables at a pub here in New Hampshire. I've only worked 5 shifts, and while I'm not really good at it yet, it's interesting (after 5 shifts... I imagine that will soon morph to "annoying" and then later, in several months, perhaps "soul-crushing") to be serving the drinking public. I'm interested in what people drink.

According to the liquor class we had this week, 35% of wine coolers consumed in the U.S. is by underage drinkers (the other 65% would be.... people with no taste buds?).

Also according to the liquor class from this week, the number 1 purchased edible good in New England is Budweiser beer. Number 2 is Bud Light.

The pub where I work has many more interesting beers than Bud and Bud Light (though we do have those in bottles). I enjoy rattling off what we have on draft, and even utzing people into drinking some of my favorite brews. And I'm always confounded when they slip through my grasp and drink swill. Sample conversation from today:

Customer: "What do you have on tap?"
Me: "Guinness, Harp, Bass, Newcastle Brown Ale, Hoegaarden, Pennichuck Engine #5 Red Ale (brewed locally, and my personal favorite), Wolaver's Organic Brown Ale, Geary's Hampshire Special Ale, Long Trail IPA, and Harpoon Oktoberfest."

A handsome selection, no? Surely you can find something there to wet your whistle? Just wait...

Customer: Pause. "I'll have a Mich Light."

Then he took his fork and poked me in the eye.

OK, so maybe everyone has a right to drink what they like, but jeeeez. Mich Light? To our regular patrons' credit, we have some sophisticated beer drinkers in our midst. The 9% Geary's HSA is a staple on our taps. And for every person I encourage into the local Engine 5, there are another two who've had it and love it.

In other beer news, I poured two pints of Guinness yesterday and they both came out perfectly. Like, perfect head and everything. It was awesome.

In non-beer news, here's the view from one of the windows in my room:



I also took this picture to document Carson's war of attrition to become Gus's friend. He has two approaches: 1) bark and make gremlin noises until Gus runs under my bed, and 2) Inch closer to the cat as he sleeps and then pretend to be asleep as well. This is an occurence of the latter.

Here's the first shot, which is pretty close for a cautious cat and an excitable Chihuahua.



And then, five minutes later:



Shortly after this was taken, I believe Carson fell back on the barking and gremlin-noise approach, so Gus went under the bed to wait it out. I expect Carson believes that Gus will eventually give up on this "run and hide" nonsense as long as he's persistent. I'll keep you updated on how it goes.

And finally, my "thing de la resistance." This sign was spotted by me when Hayley pulled the car over this evening on the way home from driver's ed. Apparently we neglected to put the top down all the way, so the car was dinging indignantly (you see, the visibility is better in the convertible when the top's down, and Hayley's learning to drive, so we want everything to be as visible as possible, even if that means freezing my butt off in the passenger seat). I took the picture without the flash, because I was afraid somone would come running out of the shop thinking I was some kind of terrorist (in a black hoodie, chaufferred in a Volvo convertible by a 17 year old student driver). It didn't come out all that well, but I hope you can read it.




Yes. That would be the "It's Never To Late" bridal shop.

Well, they got the apostrophe....