Ok, so this is how my ‘vacation’ went:
Right off the bat, let me say that the time spent at war with friends was well worth the effort…. I had not been looking forward to this war as I had others. No sense of excitement for the tasting was washing over me, nor was I looking towards the 1700+mile roundtrip to get there and back. It wasn’t until the Sunday before when I figured I was committed to it, since that was when I had packed my bike in preparation. And it wasn’t until Tuesday before that I was 100% sure I was going…
Click the link below for the full story… Be warned, this post is as long as the 1700 miles I rode to make it.
So, yeah… double jeopardy for me today because I get to be a disappointment AND disappointed all in the same go.
I have been worrying about how I would be able to meet my project deadline at work, and realized this week that October is going to be a month FULL of long days and probably weekend work in order to do so. With my trip to Irvine next week taking me out of the office for 5 days, and my major project portion in a stop-work scenario until I can get funding approval, I am finding my time to be very constrained.
This all means that I will not be making it down to Great Western War as I had previously planned. To take another (essentially 5) few days off from any ability to work in October, would put me behind my deadline in a way that I couldn’t recover.
Sadly, I had the feeling all along that this would happen, but up until last week I thought I’d be able to pull it all off. Obviously that isn’t the case anymore and something had to give. Since I can’t cancel my Irvine trip (required for my job), I have to adjust my schedule with regards to the things I can control… of course GWW isn’t the only item on the chopping block, but my personal time at home is going to be devastated as well. At least until Nov. 1, after which I’ll have a bit more breathing room until Feb. 2nd ‘09 when my next deadline looms….
The only saving grace here is that I can see some friends during my Irvine trip, and that both Jean and I will be down in OC over Thanksgiving weekend as well. So at least there is SOME light at the tunnel’s end.
Last week was Estrella War XXIII, an SCA event which takes place in Arizona. As many of you know, the 3 Drunken Celts got their start in the SCA at Great Western War, and have since been expanding our empire both inside and outside of the SCA.
Well, last week was the first tasting in which the 3 original members were not in charge, and in fact only one was able to even attend! Our “East Coast” contingent (see that’s funny cause Arizona is east of California, but no where near the east coast) decided to take the reigns this go around and put on an Irish Whiskey Tasting as an Official 3DC event.
To hear people talk about it, this tasting was on par with the first one we held some 6 years ago, which will always hold a special place in my heart. This entire week I have been amazed at the feedback I have heard about the Irish tasting, and have been all smiles to think something I had a hand in starting has grown so much, to the point where it is beginning to run its self (ie. without intervention by myself, Raz, or Fergus). It is kind of like watching your child grow up, I suspect… I feel like quite a proud pappa right now.
With that said, the following link will take you to the summary of the tasting event along with the text of the presentation given to begin the tasting and introduce the whiskies provided.
http://3drunkencelts.com/Mambo/content/view/44/2/
While the write-up is indeed a bit lengthy, it does contain some wonderful bits of information about Irish Whiskies specifically which should help to educate any burgeoning taster.
