Saturday Chores And Beer

Living For The Weekend

I enjoy my job Monday to Friday job but I definitely look forward to the weekends.  For the most part I can control my time and do what I want, when I want.  That being said, I still have to do “non-fun” things on many weekends such as home and car maintenance.  Fortunately beer can be consumed while doing most of these chores, as long as some common sense is employed.

This past weekend was one of those that required me to do some chores: cleaning the gutters and changing the oil in the car.  I decided to drink a couple of different beers while doing these.

Cleaning The Gutters

With all the trees in our yard, our gutters get filled up w/junk pretty quickly.  We are going to get “no-clog gutters” installed, but until then I have to clean them every few months.  It was hot and humid (surprise,surprise) and when I got done I was a little dirty and a lot sweaty.  I had decided to review another “king can” beer and picked up a Bud Light Lime 24oz at the beer store earlier in the day.  My expectations weren’t very high, to say the least, but I decided to suck it up and review the beer:

I was not disappointed, my low expectations were met 100%   The BL Lime was pretty bad and tasted more like diluted lime aid than beer.  I know exactly why they make this stuff: to appeal to people who don’t really want to taste beer but want something cold and semi-refreshing while they’re partying outside during the warm months.  It was bearable but it definitely is not something I would seek out to drink.  On the plus side, it was very cold, and it was easy to drink.  It just didn’t taste like beer.  As a result it got a “1 Mug” rating:

Here’s the score:

1.  Appearance- 2 points (out of 10)
2. Smell- 1 points (out of 10)
3. Taste- 3 points (out of 20)
4. Drinkability- 4 points (out of 10)

Total 10 (out of 50) Points-1 Mug

Oil Change Time

My second major duty of the day was to change the oil in our 2004 VW Passat Wagon.  We bought it new and it has about 50,000 miles on it.  It’s a great car, has plenty of space, and gets decent mileage.  I actually enjoy this chore because it is something I can do fairly easily, it saves money, and it increases my “man score” when I can tell my friends that I change my own oil instead of wimping out and going to the quick lube place   When I was in the beer store I found the perfect beer, Harviestoun Brewery’s Old Engine Oil.  I had heard great things about their Ola Dubh series of cask aged ales (based on Old Engine Oil) from my buddy Randy so I was looking forward to trying it:

Old Engine Oil neither tastes old, or like engine oil.  I will give them one thing though, it looks a lot like old engine oil.  It is a great beer with an amazing dark, bittersweet chocolate component.  It coats your mouth and leaves a great trail of flavor with a touch of hop bitterness to clean things up.  I really enjoyed this beer and I’m guessing if you like dark beers, Old Engine Oil will be a favorite:

Here’s the score:

1.  Appearance- 9 points (out of 10)
2. Smell- 8 points (out of 10)
3. Taste- 19 points (out of 20)
4. Drinkability- 8 points (out of 10)

Total 44 (out of 50) Points-4 Mugs