Craft Beer Fest L.A. + Chaya Happy Hour

Josh's 29h birthday is Sunday, so to celebrate, he wanted to check out Craft Beer Fest L.A. happening in Echo Park this weekend and then maybe go out for some drinks. (I really feel like "Beerfest" should be one word ... anyone with me?)

Jackie and PJ were awesome and arrived to Beerfest (that's it, I'm making it one word) early. All of the tickets were sold out earlier this week, so we decided to take our chances at the door. Josh, Bug, Ajax, and I met up with Jackie and PJ in line.


Thankfully, because of Jackie and PJ, we were at the very front of the line, so it wasn't long before they let us in.


Beerfest was held in the Echoplex, a concert venue. Once inside, we were handed tasting glasses and 15 drink tickets each.


It was crowded and dark inside, so none of my pictures turned out -- everything was fuzzy like this.


(Any tips for taking pics in low lighting? The auto setting always makes everything in the background black.)

The inside had two bars set up for tasting and a bunch of food, including gourmet cheeses, pizza, burritos, and beer-flavored ice cream from Scoops (Guinness chocolate and Hefeweizen infused banana). Yum!

Some of the best beer we tried, in my humble opinion, was the Pizza Port Hefeweizen (tasted like coconut!), the Crafstman Scottish Isle, and some of the beers from Bruery. PJ loved the special release Pale Ale from Stone Brewing, and Josh was pretty much in heaven.

A (blurry) pic of my glass.


Josh and PJ -- who loves Beerfest? :)


Group pics (sans Jackie and me)


Next stop was Chaya downtown for their awesome Happy Hour.

Josh and PJ with chopsticks. I swear, I can never get a nice, not goofy picture of these two!


We ordered some apps and a few more drinks (Jackie and I stuck with water since we were the DDs). Chaya is delicious -- I occasionally will eat lunch here with co-workers -- and their Happy Hour is a terrific value for the quality of food. We ordered hummus, some sushi, the lamb and gorgonzola sliders, and the calamari (which was salty and scrumptious). Luckily, Chaya was a little dead, given that the rest of the kids had that loud, I-just-drank-a-bunch-of-beer-at-Beerfest-and-can't-control-my-volume thing going on. We were having fun, and luckily, we didn't spoil anyone's dinner! :)

After some beer, Josh decided to switch to sake. Speaking of trying to get a nice picture of Josh and PJ, sake and drunkenness sure did not help my cause. The next three pictures crack me up.







Sigh. :)

Josh's 29th Birthday is tomorrow! One more year until the big 3-0! Happy Birthday, sweetheart!

Hello again, Alaska.

We are in Alaska for a week for Josh's 10-year high school reunion. Already, this trip has sent me down memory lane. So, a little personal background before I launch into our trip: I grew up in Camarillo, CA. My parents are divorced. When I was in eighth grade, my step-dad's job transferred him to Alaska. My mom, sister, and I moved to Kenai, Alaska about a week before I started high school. I lived in Kenai for four years and spent the summers with my dad in Camarillo. Josh and I went to high school together (he was a year ahead of me). Our friend PJ (who now lives in L.A. also) was Josh's best friend in junior high and high school. PJ's mom and my mom became best friends, so we spent a lot of time with PJ and his family in the high school days.

We arrived in Anchorage at around two in the morning on Sunday. My mom was in baggage claim waiting for us with both of her Yorkies, one in each hand. We hugged, gathered our luggage, and went outside to find Doug who had pulled their new camper around outside baggage claim. Now, I had mocked the camper when they bought it (I'm not exactly the camper type), but I must admit, it was a very comfy three-hour ride back to Kenai. My mom brought two bottles of wine and snacks, and we drank wine and chatted while Josh snoozed.

We pulled into my mom's driveway at five in the morning, and Josh and I headed to bed. We woke up at 11:00 a.m., got dressed, and headed out to pick up PJ who got into town Wednesday.

Doug let us borrow his pick-up truck. The "Anyone Can Become An American, But You Have To Be Born a Texan" bumper sticker has since been replaced with "Bush/Cheney '04" stickers. When I said I needed to borrow some Goo Gone to remove them, I was told that he would bring me a magic marker to change the 'o4 to '08. Scared at the thought, we peeled out of the driveway and headed "for town."

Mom and Doug now live in Soldotna, but when I lived here, we lived in Kenai by PJ's parents. We drove through Soldotna into Kenai, and both Josh and I could not get over how everything was pretty much exactly the same. It was ... surreal.

We arrived in my old neighborhood. I have always been very nostalgic for the house we lived in during high school. Josh and I even had our first kiss in the garage of that place. Bug and I were devastated when mom and Doug decided to sell it. We're sappy like that.



We arrived at PJ's house and met his mom's new puppy, Bonita. She is half Chihuahua, half Poodle. PJ calls her a Beanie Baby. She really does look like one.











PJ in tow, we drove past Josh's old house and then north to Nikiski where a new brewery has sprung up since we were last here: Kassiks. PJ has raved about the beer after his last trip to Alaska, so of course, it was one of our first stops.





And, the verdict was ... two thumbs up!! We tasted all of their beers on tap, and then selected growlers of our favorites for the bbq we were having at PJ's house in the evening. We are apparently not the only fans. The place was packed!! We ended up having to wait awhile to get our beer. I passed the time by taking some candids of PJ and Josh.





I captured Josh in the middle of a rant about beer. This picture cracks me up!



We left Kassiks and headed to Carrs, the main grocery store in Kenai. To call Carrs a grocery store is really inaccurate. It is more like town square. This is the place where you will inevitably run into people you know (or who know you) and where high schoolers come to hang out (or at least did "in our day"). There is no mall in Kenai, so if you were an aspiring mallrat in the 1990s, Carrs was your place.

Luckily, we escaped Carrs without seeing a soul we knew, stopped by the liquor store, and then headed back to PJ's house where we had dinner, played Wii, and then played a card game called "Screw Your Neighbor." I suck at this game.

Around 10 p.m., we started to fade, and headed back to my mom's house to sleep. It was still light outside, which was pretty wild.

This morning, I was up early to log in and do a little work while everyone is sleeping. My mom's new house is on the Kenai River, and the office is on the second floor with a gorgeous view. Somehow, it made work feel less work-like.





While I was working, Josh dug through my closet and found his old football sweatshirt he gave me when we started dating.



Yes, that says 1994. Jesus.

I am going to crank out a little more work this morning, and then start the day. More soon ...