4/21/14 2:17 PM

Spring finally seems to have arrived. My witty and scientific son who lives in Rochester, NY posted a Facebook update last week saying that he had "been informed that the pre-liquified snow now falling on Rochester is sometimes referred to as 'rain'".

I thought that worth sharing.

4/21/14 3:52 PM

just as simple as someone spitting out foul tasting Genesee "Beer" products.

My condolences to anyone living in the Rochester area. Only 60 days of non-overcast skies, over a 100 inches of snow on average, and it snows almost every 3 days from Thanksgiving until April 1.

4/21/14 4:58 PM

That has me craving a Genny Cream Ale. Not.

I've drank my share of bad beer (understatement) but that p*sswater stands alone...

From the crystal clear water of Hemlock Lake.

Nostalgic though. I grew up watching Genny commercials on TV, and hearing the vendors at Buffalo sports events sing out "Get yer ice cold Genny here!"

4/21/14 6:36 PM

The sports venues pretty much have everyone shanghai'd on board for the duration, so get to milk everybody for an over-priced drink of whatever quality generates max net revenue.

I got thru the past summer having an occasional beer on the rocks, the better for a post-yardwork hydration boost.

I pour the first 2/3 can over ice in an over-tall glass, to contain the foam.
After the foam settles, the remaining 1/3 can is gently added, and the cold, watered, de-gassed contents of the tall cup seems to absorb the remaining carbonation calmly at that point.

4/22/14 7:48 AM

I think dddd has found the "Gene-secret" at last. Pour on ice. Carefully take to sink and drain liquid off. Eat the ice.

4/22/14 8:12 AM

It is plain simple, God Awful. But, Matthew, I think you are close, but why waste perfectly good ice?

When you grow up there, you know no better. Once you leave though, the world is your oyster when it comes to beer/ales. Hell even Old Milwaukee, Schlitz, Schmidts, Carling Black Label, were tons better and they were God Awful too.

The "Packy" down the street had 5 case of Genesee Cream Ale a few years ago next to the checkout stand. I asked when they started selling this. They said about 2 months ago and they were trying it as they heard from the distributor and a person that kept asking for it that it was great. I asked how many cases have you sold? They said 1 case, to the guy who asked for it. He then said everyone who sees it says the same thing, "That stuff is awful". I went in a few weeks later and the 4 cases were gone. I asked the same guy if they sold the remaining cases. He said no, he had the distributor take them back.

As far as Rochester, it's a nice place to raise a family if you are young. Good schools, low cost of living, easy access to boating, lakes, the mountains, and a days drive away from some larger world class cities. June July and August are nice. I don't think it is place that you move to as a young single professional and then stay. If you're born and raised there, you may stay. Odd fact, There are 7 kids from my graduating class (300 ish), that I know of, that live within 6 miles of me, far away from Rochester.

Wheels

4/22/14 8:44 AM

>>Old Milwaukee, Schlitz, Schmidts, Carling Black Label<<

With those, we're talking premium brands, Wheels. In law school, the standard for me (and many others) was a TCO (tall cheap one), a 16 oz Schmidt's for $.50.

In Buffalo we had Simon Pure Beer. Mr. Simon lived across the street from us, and had a daughter about my age. My father said I should marry her so he could get free beer.

After college, we used to drink Waukee (not Old Milwaukee, Waukee) brewed in Hammonton, NJ from pure artesian well water, $.88 per sixpack. There was also Canadian Ace, same price, also brewed in Hammonton from pure artesian well water.

Now in Portland they brew Allegash and fancy stuff like that, Belgian style. I just read the Belgians don't drink much beer any more.

4/22/14 9:17 AM

Hamm's (From the Land of Sky Blue Waters). I was too young for Hamm's, but they actually printed QSL (contact) cards for "ham" radio operators and gave them away. Hey, it was a marketing idea!

Stroh's ("Fire Brewed Beer from Detroit") was the standard cheap beer when I was in grad school in the early '80s.

4/22/14 10:09 AM

Back long ago I worked in Copake, New York, and my co-workers and I would go occasionally to Larry's Hotel Copake for a couple of beers. The house brew was Genny on tap, which was a tiny bit better than the bottled stuff - in other words, just poor, not absolutely awful.

If you're a movie buff, and have seen the early Martin Scorsese movie "Who's that Knocking on My Door" with Harvey Keitel, you've been to Larry's Hotel Copake.

Golly that was a long time ago!

4/22/14 10:13 AM

That's pretty funny. Probably more appropriate from the skier's prospective?

"normal" folks would typically call snow "liquidfied rain" instead. I encountered a few flake of such Saturday skiing at Cannon! This has been the spring that I kept going back to the bag for more clothing...

4/22/14 10:15 AM

I didn't expect this to turn into a discussion of the merits of Rochester, much less a beer discussion ;-)

My son graduated from RIT three years ago (computer science) and found a decent job in the area, so he's staying for now. There's a bit of a tech business revival going on in the area, and it's recovering economically better than much of upstate (e.g., Syracuse, which is rather grim).

He doesn't drink Genny. He likes a lot of things about the area. He and his friends ride mountain bikes all over on the network of park trails along the river and canal. The winters are long and can be depressing, but there's a lot of nice outdoor stuff for 7 or 8 months.

Andy, I remember the Hamm's jingle (with the stereotypical Native American beat) growing up in Nevada. Hamm's is still made in St. Paul, I think).

Coincidentaly, my son is a ham operator. New York has a nifty special license plate that you can get, with your radio license number, a pic of an antenna, and the morse code for CQ DE.

4/22/14 10:27 AM

That is chuckle worthy to be sure.

As far as the Genny goes... Some beers [not sure it qualifies] NEED to be 2-3 degrees over freezing or forget it. These when approaching 50^ get so bad, you wonder why you were even drinking them previously @ any temp. ;0 From memory..

4/22/14 10:31 AM

April, I think the perspective was that of someone who had only seen precipitation in frozen form (and seen it about a hundred times) in the last 5 months. They'd forgotten there was such a thing as "rain."

4/22/14 11:44 AM

quote:

---

the perspective was that of someone who had only seen precipitation in frozen form (and seen it about a hundred times) in the last 5 months. They'd forgotten there was such a thing as "rain."

---

4/22/14 12:10 PM

It could still be made; I don't recall ever seeing it in my college days.

I was a ham when I was 13; I earned an Advanced license before I quit (around the time I discovered other things at 16, I had no interest in boosting my code speed from 13 WPM to 20 WPM). My call was WB0IKW, though it's since been reassigned. (Back in the DOS days, the 0 would have been the distinctive "0^H/" and you can still see that on ham plates in the Midwest...) Though the NY plate sounds pretty good as well.

There were some interesting call letter combinations in those days. I still remember a conversation I had with a (IIRC Milwaukee-based) ham whose call was K9EAT--his QSL card showed (what else?) a dog chowing down.

4/22/14 1:02 PM

Andy, you'd appreciate this. Our trip to TX last summer was for my Bro's daughter's wedding.

He lives in a sub-div with strict CCR rule, no dishes, ground planes/beams etc.

So my brother has a very patriotic flag pole he proudly hands Old Glory on. The ground planes are under the sod somehow, and the mast is the antennae for his HAM shit. So it does not look like what it is in the least.

4/22/14 1:13 PM

Here in CT, there are many, many patriotic flagpoles that are just a little, um, thicker than normal. Funny thing, cell phone service is remarkably good near those flagpoles!

Your brother has hit on a nice solution! Depending on the band he operates on, though, that could be a VERY tall flagpole! If he likes the 80m (~3.5 MHz) band, you'd be looking at a 66' pole, minimum (1/4 wavelength is the standard for vertical antennae, though I expect there are ways to shorten that a bit with coils and capacitors).

4/22/14 1:22 PM

Andy, here's what the NY plate looks like (I found this online, strangely with the RIT frame - my son's callsign is KC2ZGU)


No more morse code requirements for ham licences, though it takes a bit of study to get the license, and more to move up. Stephen's degree is in computer science, but he's basically an electronics engineer (builds hardware as well as software) so he moved up pretty fast. When he got a new car last year, it drove his mother crazy to see him drill a hole in the roof to install an antenna, and do a whole bunch of other electrical mods (it's a hybrid, so the electrical system is a lot more complicated than a normal car -- bigger voltages floating around, too). But he seems to know what he's doing.

The Hamm's brand is still around, but now made by MillerCoors. But I was wrong about St. Paul - they don't brew ti there any more. Back in the day, I think the beer was market mainly in the midwest and west.

4/22/14 2:02 PM

and The Erie Canal's Flour City!? Don't go steering the thread to HAM Radios and stuff. Since I know nothing of any consequence about this, I can't participate anymore in the discussion.

I'm hungry. Now I want a Garbage Plate.

4/22/14 2:22 PM

Garbaage plate. Good idea, Wheels. Or maybe chicken spiedie.

4/22/14 3:52 PM

Crap beer listed above.

Good beer listed here.

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2014/04/22/top-10-fruit-beers/?intcmp=features

Rob C. Hooked me up with some 3 Philosophers a few years ago. Best beer I ever had and I lived in Germany and drank plenty of great beer from that part of the world.