Words On Wednesday

I’m a huge fan of the flavor of coffee, and coffee-infused beer is no exception, even if it is from Highland Brewing. That isn’t a knock on Highland, as much as it serves to highlight how recently I’ve come to appreciate their offerings. The first beer I ever tried by Highland was their Gaelic Ale. As is the case with many of my beer-related experiments, it started at the Mix-N-Match at my local Ingles. A friend of mine is a big fan of his Scottish roots, so he was super excited to try the Gaelic Ale when we found it. We tried it back at my house, and it was just alright. I wasn’t put off by it, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to get it again either. Better than an IPA, not as good as a porter or bock. For a while, the Gaelic Ale was the only thing I saw (or noticed, at least) from Highland. Eventually, though, I started seeing other styles from the brewery. Most notably, we came across Thunderstruck in due time. It is a seasonal offering, unfortunately not available all the tim...

I’m a big fan of data, and that includes the books that I read or listen to. However, the means by which I have recorded what books I consume has shifted over the past few months. I started with a spreadsheet  on my Google Drive. The main pieces of information I wanted to maintain were the book, the order, and the reading dates. In addition to books that I had already finished, I kept a few rows without order or date to indicate books that I wanted to read. This solution worked perfectly fine for my needs. However, I started gradually folding in Goodreads  for some additional functionality that it offers. Notably, it has a social element where you can see what your peers are reading, what they’ve rated books, and even promotes reading challenges where you commit to a certain number of books for the year. For a while I used both methods concurrent. It wasn’t really much effort to add books to either, and they both had their own benefits. Eventually, though, I starte...

I recently signed up for a weight loss competition between my coworkers and it occurred to me that I never told the tale of my participation in last year’s competition. It is a story of close calls and my own susceptibility to money as a motivator. This is The Biggest Loser 2019. The lady who hosts the contest sent out an email around the end of the year for the following month, announcing the contest details as she has some years previously. “Hey guys, it's that time of year again. What better motivation to drop 10 pounds than to enter a contest & have peer pressure to help you along the way. Here's how it works. Starting January 7th thru Jan 9th you can weigh in & pay 20.00. On March 20th weigh inagain & if you lose the 10 pounds then you get your $20.00 back. Plus the money from everyone that did not reach the goal of 10lbs will go back into the pot and will be split between the ones that did achieve the goal of 10lbs. I will be downstairs at the scale...