Beer Steins and Glasses

Local man snags Prince Farrington gem at auction

Beer Steins and Glasses — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 05:47:34 +0000

The era is Prohibition.

Speakeasies are common, and bootleggers quench the country’s thirst for that banned substance, alcohol.

It’s a fascinating piece of American history, an element known here in Lycoming County as well as the nation at large.

When two bottles of Prince Farrington’s Prohibition-era moonshine whisky recently landed on the auction block, local historian Robert E. Kane Jr. wasn’t going to let the opportunity to own one slip through his fingers. Another local man with a passion for historic preservation, Edward Lyon, was the successful bidder on the second bottle.

“This item really appealed to me when it came up for sale,” Kane said, “This item is something he actually touched and was actually his.”

Kane, president and CEO of Divine Providence Hospital, explained the bottle was a valuable addition to his collection of “a couple hundred” bottles, which can have their roots traced back to the area.

The “life-long bottle collector” found himself with the opportunity to be only the bottle’s fifth owner since it was first filled with its illegal contents during Prohibition.

“This passed through very few owners from Prince Farrington to me,” Kane said.

Farrington, the bottle’s original owner, was a bootlegger – one who produced and sold liquor illegally during the years of Prohibition – in Lycoming County.

The second owner of the bottle of moonshine was Harry Lewis Williams Jr., a driver who would deliver Farrington’s illegal packages to the customers. Kane said Williams once spent six months in prison because he was caught with the alcohol.

Williams’ son was the next owner. Kane said the son was a “teetotaler” – someone who doesn’t drink alcohol – and didn’t want anyone to find the bottle in his house when he died, so he gave it to a close friend before it wound up at auction.

Kane said like the journey from Farrington to him, the bottle itself, tells a story of the years of Prohibition.

“This is a pre-Prohibition whisky bottle,” Kane said, “And Prince Farrington used any bottle he could get his hands on.”

Though producing, selling and consuming alcohol was illegal during Prohibition – 1920 to 1933 – the bottle doesn’t hide what it contains, clearly stating it as a whisky bottle on its label.

Kane explained since it’s a pre-Prohibition bottle, the label was made before alcohol was banned.

“Of course he would never put his own labels on a bottle.”

Kane’s bottle collection includes medicine bottles, soda and beer bottles but Farrington’s bottle will add something extra to it.

“Prince Farrington was so much a part of local history, whether it is about illegal activities or the many good things he did, it’s important to the local heritage,” Kane said.

Kane’s interest in local bottles caused him to create his own display of products from a Williamsport brewery.

“One of the things I’ve collected … is memorabilia from Flock’s Brewery,” he said.

The company – started by Henry Jacob Flock – was in business from 1856 to 1954 and located where Lycoming College is today.

“Much of this collection came out of the Kast Hotel in Newberry,” Kane said of the display.

Kane’s collection includes beer steins, mirrors, advertising displays, ash trays and foam scoopers – a tool used in bars to knock the foam off of a glass of beer.

“You have everything from punch sets to lighted clocks,” he said.

In 1943, Flock’s was sold to a group of investors that brought new products to the company.

“They actually bottled things such as soft drinks and it was known as Bald Eagle Soft Drinks and Ales,” he said.

From a local bootlegger to a brewery, Kane’s collection is more about stories of the area than just a piece of glass.

“I think it all tells the story of progression and evolution of not only Williamsport but of the United States at that time,” he said.

Vacaville Firefighter Discovers His Stolen Property Responding To Call

Beer Steins and Glasses — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 02:02:42 +0000

Vacaville firefighter Louis Jones. (CBS)

VACAVILLE (CBS SF) – It was instant karma for Vacaville firefighter Louis Jones when he responded Thursday morning to a medical call at a mobile home on Sunset Drive in Vacaville.

A home on Bishop Drive that Jones had been preparing to rent out was burglarized overnight last week. He discovered the theft on Friday.

A 4-wheel dirt bike, washer and dryer, tools, lawn mower, wood chipper, power tools, hand tools and personal items were stolen.

When he arrived at the mobile home this morning in response to a medical call, he noticed another missing item that looked familiar—a plastic, bright yellow wedge used to stabilize cars during extrications was being used as a doorstop on the gate to the mobile home.

“I recognized it right away. I became suspicious right away,” Jones said.

His suspicions were confirmed when inside the mobile home was the missing Whirlpool washer and dryer he intended to leave to the new tenants of his rental home.

Construction work was underway on the mobile home’s deck, Jones said.

Being a firefighter and medical responder, he kept his cool, he said. The man in the mobile home was transported to VacaValley Hospital.

“We took care of our business and left,” Jones said.

Ricky Mankini (Vacaville Police Dept.)

As Jones and the other responders were leaving, they encountered 47-year-old Ricky Mankini, who also lived at the mobile home park, according to Vacaville police Officer Debi Lopez.

“We didn’t confront him. I called the police,” Jones said.

Vacaville police contacted Mankini at VacaValley Hospital where he was visiting his housemate, Jones said. A search of Mankini’s vehicle revealed more stolen items and Mankini was arrested for possession of stolen property and booked into the Solano County jail, Lopez said.

Jones returned to the mobile home where he identified the property that was missing from his rental home.

“The only thing we recovered was the washer and dryer, a lawn mower, some paint, hinges, paint brushes and keepsakes—beer steins with firefighting related artwork,” Jones said.

The recovered property is worth about $2,300, Lopez said.

“Ninety percent of the stuff is still missing,” Jones said. He estimates it’s worth between $8,000 and $10,000.

Jones, a firefighter for 20 years, 10 of them with the Vacaville department, offered his perspective about his stolen property.

“It’s just stuff. It’s not like it’s a life-or-death situation,” he said.

‘The Night Swimmer,’ by Matt Bondurant

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:11:44 +0000

Readers of the news of the weird may recall a contest sponsored some years ago by the Guinness beer company in which first prize was a pub in Ireland — title and deed, stools, steins and taps. You needed only to compose a clever essay, throw a few darts and demonstrate that you could pull the perfect pint. Those looking for escape — and unable to find it in the bottom of their mugs stateside — had their opening.

Swap Murphy’s Irish Stout for Guinness, and you’ll find, if not the full premise of Matt Bondurant’s haunting third novel, certainly the precipitating event. “The Night Swimmer” introduces us to an idealistic young couple from Vermont who take over the Nightjar, a moldering pub in a lonely corner of County Cork.

Fred and Elly Bulkington fell in love as graduate students in English literature. He harbors vague ambitions of becoming a novelist, while she longs to hone her skills as a deep-water swimmer (think of Lynne Cox and the English Channel). The isolation of this part of Cork, and particularly Roaringwater Bay, would seem to suit them both, but Bondurant suggests more ominous possibilities. Fred likens himself and Elly to the couple in “Revolutionary Road” — except, he adds, with empty confidence, “we actually make it; . . . we follow through and make it happen.”

Yet “The Night Swimmer” appears less influenced by Richard Yates than by John Cheever, whose journals supply epigraphs for each of its three sections — lines like “When the beginnings of self-destruction enter the heart it seems no bigger than a grain of sand.” In fact, a comparison to Cheever’s most famous story, “The Swimmer,” is unavoidable. Neddy, Cheever’s privileged suburbanite, evinces an “inexplicable contempt for men who did not hurl themselves into pools,” to which Bondurant’s Elly (whose name is clearly an echo) replies: “My natural state seemed to be damp and clammy, my hair stiff with salt or lake scum. It was my only true source of satisfaction, when I felt most complete.” Like Cheever’s, Bondurant’s characters are children masquerading as adults, unable or unwilling to brave life’s challenges.

Bondurant’s previous novel, “The Wettest County in the World,” is a model of tone and rhythm, and here too his prose teems with evocative detail and surprising metaphor, capturing the fervid mania of a couple spinning out of control. With Elly always in the water, Fred becomes hostage to a lifeless pub, ostensibly writing his novel but in reality scribbling bits of unconnected musings, a kind of madman’s commonplace book. (“You know when you have the image of something in your mind, but when you go to do it you can’t make it right? It just doesn’t match up? There is only one problem in this life and this is it.”)

Unfortunately, Bondurant isn’t satisfied with dissecting Fred and Elly’s increasingly troubled marriage. Rather, as his story progresses, it balloons with thuggish turf wars and streaks of magic realism: Cheever by way of Mario Puzo and Jorge Luis Borges. The mash-up of genres and an overabundance of half-sketched characters and cryptic plot turns threaten to neuter an otherwise powerful book.

Still, Bondurant’s lyricism redeems “The Night Swimmer,” especially in several passages describing Fred and Elly’s life before Ireland, a holiday gathering with Elly’s parents and a duck hunt with Fred’s father that throw light on a world the couple is soon desperate to re-enter. “We would start over, start a family,” an increasingly despondent Elly tells herself, admitting that “the sudden thought of a child filled me with a glorious kind of relief, like I was released from a net, like I was saved from drowning.” It’s a callow fantasy. Similar, you might say, to dreaming about what you’d do if you won the top prize in an audacious contest.

Mike Peed has written for The New Yorker, The Washington Post and other publications.

‘The Night Swimmer,’ by Matt Bondurant

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:02:44 +0000

Mike Peed has written for The New Yorker, The Washington Post and other publications.

Ready to trade your heavy guidebooks for a travel app? A trip to Central Europe shows the advantages and limitations …

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:38:39 +0000

Alex PulaskiBrandenburg Gate, Berlin

The biggest question for me in visiting Europe, after figuring out where to go, has always been what to pack.

Not in the sense of clothing and shoes, mind you. Shorts and T-shirts rule the day (unless you’re going to Italy, where they frown on T-shirts at many religious sites).

No, I mean what guidebooks to stuff in your backpack. There’s no point in going if you don’t know what you’re seeing and its layers of history, and I’ve been known to lug pounds of paper over the Thames, up the Alps and into the Vatican.

But that was before smartphones and tablets came along. Suddenly, hundreds of guidebooks and apps are at our fingertips in the same compact package.

So for my most recent excursion, an exploration of Central Europe (Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Salzburg and Munich) I left behind the paper and loaded up on 21st century guide tools.

Like picking out a guidebook, it takes some time and thought to settle on the right apps for your destination. I ended up buying cityscouter’s offline guide apps ($3.99 each) for Berlin, Prague, Vienna and Munich.

As a basis of comparison, I also arranged for the low-tech guide option: the personal touch, via guided walks (group and private) in several of the cities. I wanted to measure those real-life guides against the advantages and limitations of high-tech tools.

My techno-guide of choice would be the iPad, kind of oversized for the job, but my choice for three reasons: I didn’t own an iPhone (then), I didn’t want to try to puzzle out maps and text on a 2×3-inch screen, and I had read too many horror stories of consumers being hit with bills into the thousands of dollars because their iPhones racked up roaming and data charges overseas.

We did, as it turned out, pack an iPhone, as much for emergencies as to experiment with an innovative real-time mobile guide in one of our target cities, Salzburg. More on that later.

What I discovered, mostly, is that apps definitely have their limits. Many of those I sampled were poorly written, and weak on discerning the best places to sample the schnitzel or rest your head. But the mapping functions — particularly in big cities –save time, and the apps are pretty good about giving basic info and background. In effect, they were short on enlightenment and entertainment, but decent at informing.

And, of course, they’re easier on your back.

Alex Pulaski/The Oregonian

Berlin

Getting there/around: We used Eurail Passes (eurail.com), the most convenient, pleasant and cost-effective means of traveling between European capitals. Costs vary, depending on type and length of travel, but one thing is constant: ease of use. On most trains there’s no need for reservations or standing in line. You just grab a seat and wait for the conductor to come around. Plan right and most destinations in Central Europe are just a few hours apart. A tech note: I downloaded an app (Train Schedules Europe, $3.99) on train timetables thinking we’d be on the cutting edge. But the reality we discovered is that the printed timetable guide that comes with your Eurail Pass is easier to understand and isn’t bulky. Once in Berlin, the efficient underground system is your best bet; wear comfortable walking shoes — it’s a big, big city. Watch out for cyclists — they are intent on getting somewhere, and impatient with pedestrians in their path.

What to see: Begin your stay in Berlin (as Napoleon did in 1806) by passing through the massive Brandenburg Gate.

“You enter Berlin as a temple,” private tour guide Markus Muller-Tenckhoff told us. “People come to Berlin for a new chance, new possibilities.”

Though there remain ample opportunities for gazing backward — remnants of the Berlin Wall, the tourist-choked border crossing of Checkpoint Charlie, the moving Memorial to Murdered Jews — the pace of Berlin’s changes is so dizzying that you feel the need to jog to keep up. So spend a day or two soaking in the history, strolling through Unter den Linden or taking in the magnificent gates at the Pergamon Museum.

But don’t miss the dynamism of present-day Berlin, with its cutting edge architecture (Potsdamer Platz), pleasant strolling districts (Scheunenviertel) or endless shopping (KaDeWe — for the food court alone — or along Friedrichstrasse, to name just two).

Guide preferences: We found that a personal guide, in the form of Markus Muller-Tenckhoff (guidesinberlin.de/markus/english.htm), was invaluable for a few hours of history. The cityscouter app did some of its best work here as well. Because Berlin is so huge, getting around is a big deal. The app’s map function allows you to overlay subway maps with street maps, vastly simplifying the question of which underground line to take. The Berlin Essential Guide (Sutro Media, $2.99) offers better practical advice than cityscouter, and many more photos. But its maps are less useful.

Where to stay: A word on finding hotels: The apps I bought were not strong on credible recommendations for either eating or hotels. Plenty of hotels were listed, but it was impossible to figure out which ones were better than others. I suggest using Trip Advisor (tripadvisor.com) before you go, and look for a place with some character. The Savoy Hotel Berlin used to be frequented by Greta Garbo, which ought to be good enough for anyone. Opened in 1929, it has the modern touches of flat-screen TVs in the rooms and a pleasantly renovated lobby and restaurant. It’s centrally located in West Berlin, a short walk from the underground. If cigars are your thing, you’ll want to linger at the Casa de Habano in the Times Bar.

Prague

Getting around: Most sights are within walking distance. There is a subway system, but the convenient trams let you soak in the city better.

What to see: From Old Town Square, where it all begins, you walk and walk and walk, sampling street fare (cheese wheels as big as motorcycle tires). Admire a new building on every corner. Take in a concert (we saw mezzosoprano Yvona Skvarova singing Handel, Vivaldi, Mozart and more in an intimate setting inside picturesque St. Nicholas Church.) Board tram 22 to Prague Castle, where you can spend most of a day gawking.

Guide preferences: Here is where I began getting a better handle on the cityscouter app’s advantages and limitations. I loved a function that allows you to build your own “want to visit” list, but the scant few sentences on each sight left me hungry for better info. For iPhone, the Prague — Michelin Travel Guide ($5.99) is intuitive and offers some limited dining and hotel suggestions, but the map function is poor. Just out in late November (too late for our trip, a pity), Prague: DK Eyewitness (Dorling Kindersley, $6.99) for iPad offers the spectacular photos, graphics and background info that have characterized the DK guides in print.

Where to stay: The Grand Hotel Bohemia (grandhotelbohemia.cz) is superbly located, just a few steps from Old Town Square. The elegant hotel was built in the 1920s, so it retains an Old World feel while being completely modern (renovated in 2008), from stylish furnishings to the in-room music system. Ask to take a peek at the ornate ballroom, and soak in the amazing city view from the rooftop terrace. Buffet breakfast is included.

Alex Pulaski/The OregonianFlowers at a market stall in Vienna.

Vienna

Getting around: Convenient subway and tram system, but plan on some longer walks.

What to see: The Kunsthistorisches Museum is packed with portraits by Raphael, Rubens, Michelangelo and more. The striking building interior of marble and gold leaf alone is worth a visit. You could spend a day wandering around Schonbrunn Palace and its grounds, and there are concert opportunities practically everywhere nightly.

Stroll past the lovely cafes, food shops and flower stands of the Naschmarkt over the Wien River, and dawdle along the shopping street of Neubaugasse (next to a honey shop I saw a hobby shop with an Oregon Lumber Co. train in the window).

Mostly, at every opportunity, stop for a slice of heavenly pastry at one of Vienna’s omnipresent cafes. Some of our favorites (the research was extensive): Cafe Diglas, Cafe Central and Cafe Sperl.

Guide preferences: Personal guide Niki Koenig (email: niki_koenig72@yahoo.de) was indispensable, as remarkable for his good humor and patience as his encyclopedic mind. The cityscouter app performed the same as its counterparts for Berlin and Vienna. Vienna Map Offline (FidesReef, $2.99) was frustrating, and basically unnecessary because the cityscouter app has adequate mapping. A number of instant-translation apps have cropped up over the past year, at least two of them in German for iPad, but English was easily understood everywhere we went in Central Europe. A recent myTaxi app (Intelligent Apps, free) looks useful, promising to get a taxi to you in Germany or Austria with one click.

Where to stay: The Hotel Altstadt (hotel-altstadt-vienna.com) all but oozes charm, and is just a short walk or bus ride away from the tourist magnet of the Inner Ring. The place kind of feels like a comfortable apartment building; tasteful nudes and other art decorate the walls. A satisfying buffet breakfast — on linen and china — is included, and the service (Elizabeth, at the front desk, only giggled when we tried to offer her a tip) is incredibly friendly. Free Wi-Fi. The nearby Das Mobel Cafe is well worth a stop for lunch or dinner.

Alex Pulaski/The OregonianWater garden outside Salzburg.

Salzburg

Getting around: Rent a bike or borrow one (see below) from your hotel, and pedal along the scenic Salzach River. You’ll need to park it and walk through scenic Old Town.

What to see: When you just can’t stand sampling another chocolate or strolling past one more shop window filled with gorgeous clothing in picturesque Old Town, grab a taxi and head to Hellbrunn Palace and its trick water features.

Watch out when one of the guides starts rattling his keys, however, because you are going to end up soaked, and laughing.

“I had no choice. I had to do it,” said guide Georg Schneider after the third or fourth time one of our group was hit by spray from an archway, the pavement or even a seat.

Of course, because this is Mozart’s birthplace, you’ll want to take in a concert. We enjoyed the Mozart Dinner Concert (tinyurl.com/mozartdinner) — basically Mozart’s greatest hits, set in an elegant Baroque dining hall by candlelight.

Guide preferences: We experimented with — and ended up being frustrated by — the city’s real-time mobile guide powered by Wikitude (tinyurl.com/salzburgwiki), just based on functionality. The concept is that your smartphone, with its GPS function, becomes your complete guide — hold it up in front of a sight and it feeds you information about it. I struggled to make it work, and between the added cost (my carrier, AT&T, charges an arm and leg for overseas data plans) and the compact, lovely nature of Salzburg, we decided to power the phone off, wander around and enjoy getting lost. As a backup, I ended up downloading a guidebook, Rick Steves Snapshot Munich, Bavaria & Salzburg (Amazon, $6.29), which has all the historical background and user-friendly information that are hallmarks of Steves’ work.

Where to stay: The family-owned Hotel Auersperg (www.auersperg.at) is on a quiet street near the heart of Salzburg. It is ranked No. 4 among Salzburg hotels on tripadvisor.com, and for good reason. Built in 1900, it is exceptionally well cared-for, unprepossessing on the exterior but warm, cozy and modern inside, with extras such as radiant heated bathroom floors. Borrow a complimentary hotel bicycle and explore the city. Very attentive service. Buffet breakfast included. Free Wi-Fi. Be sure to grab a sausage and beer at Die Weisse brewery, just around the corner.

Munich

Getting around: The underground has trains running most routes every five minutes; cabs are plentiful, and if you stay close to the city center your feet can take you most places.

What to see: Beer garden, beer garden, a long stroll past the stalls of the Viktualienmarkt, then another beer garden. Repeat. Ask yourself: How can one petite server carry seven full steins of lager? Must be in the wrists.

Leave a half-day for a sobering exploration (see below) of nearby Dachau Concentration Camp. Though never designed for mass extinction, it had its own crematorium, and standing inside the gas chamber is both sickening and thought-provoking.

Guide preferences: I created a short “want to see list” on cityscouter, and when I needed better information cracked open the Rick Steves guide on the iPad. Our favorite excursion, through Munich Walk Tours (munichwalktours.de), was a group tour of Dachau.

Where to stay: Hotel Exquisit (hotel-exquisit.com) is well-located, a brisk walk from the city center. Rooms are large, comfortable and quaintly decorated, but this hotel is more about value and location than luxury. Some modern touches such as flat-screen TVs. Helpful staff. Breakfast buffet included. It was ranked 10th among 390 Munich hotels on a recent check on tripadvisor.com.

– Alex Pulaski

Ready to trade your heavy guidebooks for a travel app? A trip to Central Europe shows the advantages and limitations …

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:38:39 +0000

Alex PulaskiBrandenburg Gate, Berlin

The biggest question for me in visiting Europe, after figuring out where to go, has always been what to pack.

Not in the sense of clothing and shoes, mind you. Shorts and T-shirts rule the day (unless you’re going to Italy, where they frown on T-shirts at many religious sites).

But that was before smartphones and tablets came along. Suddenly, hundreds of guidebooks and apps are at our fingertips in the same compact package.

So for my most recent excursion, an exploration of Central Europe (Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Salzburg and Munich) I left behind the paper and loaded up on 21st century guide tools.

We did, as it turned out, pack an iPhone, as much for emergencies as to experiment with an innovative real-time mobile guide in one of our target cities, Salzburg. More on that later.

And, of course, they’re easier on your back.

Alex Pulaski/The Oregonian

Berlin

What to see: Begin your stay in Berlin (as Napoleon did in 1806) by passing through the massive Brandenburg Gate.

“You enter Berlin as a temple,” private tour guide Markus Muller-Tenckhoff told us. “People come to Berlin for a new chance, new possibilities.”

Alex Pulaski/The OregonianFlowers at a market stall in Vienna.

Vienna

Getting around: Convenient subway and tram system, but plan on some longer walks.

Alex Pulaski/The OregonianWater garden outside Salzburg.

Salzburg

Getting around: Rent a bike or borrow one (see below) from your hotel, and pedal along the scenic Salzach River. You’ll need to park it and walk through scenic Old Town.

Watch out when one of the guides starts rattling his keys, however, because you are going to end up soaked, and laughing.

“I had no choice. I had to do it,” said guide Georg Schneider after the third or fourth time one of our group was hit by spray from an archway, the pavement or even a seat.

Munich

Getting around: The underground has trains running most routes every five minutes; cabs are plentiful, and if you stay close to the city center your feet can take you most places.

– Alex Pulaski

‘The Night Swimmer,’ by Matt Bondurant

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 13:15:27 +0000

Mike Peed has written for The New Yorker, The Washington Post and other publications.

Bring on the beer: drinking resolutions for spring

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:18:41 +0000

Posted: Friday, February 3, 2012 12:15 am | Updated: 5:01 pm, Thu Feb 2, 2012.

Now that the month of failed resolutions is behind us (come on, you knew that gym kick wasn’t going to last past your first organic chemistry exam), we can focus on what’s really going to make this semester great: beer.

Beer can offer us so much: a hobby, an escape, a history lesson. You can challenge yourself through promotions like Stubbies & Steins Offender Program (drink 100 different beers in a year) or get educated on different styles through a beer club like Salty Dog Saloon’s Globetrotter Club (Drink one bottle of beer from each country on the menu, totaling 30 beers). Don’t accept drinking the same ol’ brews, decide what you want to get out of beer this semester, and go for it!

Here’s what’s on my list:

1. Drink stronger beer.

February’s cold weather is the perfect opportunity to try out strong beer styles. With the criteria of anything above 8 percent alcohol by volume, this can include styles ranging from dark abbey ales to strong English blondes.

If you think your stomach can put up a good fight, start off with an imperial stout, a Russian stout or an old ale.

2. Expand my beer education.

Talking with the experts, the brewers, the regulars. What beers are they drinking or looking forward to? What makes for the best beer education? Expect to see more video interviews, tastings and opportunities to learn more about not only beer flavors and styles but also the process of making it and the people behind each bottle.

3. Learn the art of pairing beer.

This is mostly to help in my attempt to convert my wine-drinking friends over to the brew side. Everything goes down easier once you add food to the equation.

I also want to experiment more with adding beer to recipes. Beer can add a new taste to dishes like chili, shrimp and even baked goods like cupcakes. It can take several attempts to find the best match, but that’s a challenge I’ll be happy to take.

4. Road trip to a brewery.

From Tampa to Atlanta to New Orleans, I plan on making a few trips around the Southeast to visit famous breweries like Cigar City Brewing, Abita Brewing Company and SweetWater Brewing Company. Who wouldn’t appreciate seeing the behind-the-scenes process of making their favorite beer?

What are some of your beer resolutions? Let me know in the comments below or tweet me @Beer_4Breakfast.

Posts in Beer for Breakfast appear on Fridays.

Vacaville firefighter responding to call finds stolen items — from his own home

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:15:14 +0000

VACAVILLE — Vacaville firefighter Louis Jones knew he wasn’t seeing things when he responded Thursday morning to a call at a mobile home — and saw items that had been stolen from him last week.

A home on Bishop Drive that Jones had been preparing to rent out was burglarized overnight last week. A 4-wheel dirt bike, washer and dryer, tools, lawn mower, wood chipper, power tools, hand tools and personal items were stolen.

When he arrived at the mobile home on Sunset Drive for a medical call Thursday, he noticed another missing item that looked familiar — a plastic, bright yellow wedge used to stabilize cars during extractions was being used as a doorstop on the gate to the home.

“I recognized it right away,” Jones said. “I became suspicious right away.”

His suspicions were confirmed when he went inside the home and saw the missing Whirlpool washer and dryer he intended to leave to the new tenants of his rental home.

Being a firefighter and medical responder, he kept his cool, he said. The man in the mobile home was transported to VacaValley Hospital.

“We took care of our business and left,” Jones said.

As Jones and the other responders were leaving, they encountered 47-year-old Ricky Mankini, who also lived at the mobile home park, according to Vacaville police Officer Debi Lopez.

“We didn’t confront him,” Jones said. “I called the police.”

Vacaville police contacted Mankini at the hospital, where

he was visiting his housemate, Jones said. A search of Mankini’s vehicle revealed more stolen items and Mankini was arrested for possession of stolen property and booked into the Solano County jail, Lopez said.

Jones returned to the mobile home where he identified his property.

“The only thing we recovered was the washer and dryer, a lawn mower, some paint, hinges, paint brushes and keepsakes — beer steins with firefighting related artwork,” Jones said.

The recovered property is worth about $2,300, Lopez said.

“Ninety percent of the stuff is still missing,” Jones said. He estimates it’s worth between $8,000 and $10,000.

But Jones, a firefighter for 20 years — 10 of them with the Vacaville department — kept his perspective about the stolen property.

“It’s just stuff,” he said. “It’s not like it’s a life or death situation.”

Vacaville firefighter responding to call finds stolen items — from his own home

Beer Steins and Glasses — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:15:14 +0000

VACAVILLE — Vacaville firefighter Louis Jones knew he wasn’t seeing things when he responded Thursday morning to a call at a mobile home — and saw items that had been stolen from him last week.

“I recognized it right away,” Jones said. “I became suspicious right away.”

His suspicions were confirmed when he went inside the home and saw the missing Whirlpool washer and dryer he intended to leave to the new tenants of his rental home.

Being a firefighter and medical responder, he kept his cool, he said. The man in the mobile home was transported to VacaValley Hospital.

“We took care of our business and left,” Jones said.

As Jones and the other responders were leaving, they encountered 47-year-old Ricky Mankini, who also lived at the mobile home park, according to Vacaville police Officer Debi Lopez.

“We didn’t confront him,” Jones said. “I called the police.”

Vacaville police contacted Mankini at the hospital, where

Jones returned to the mobile home where he identified his property.

“The only thing we recovered was the washer and dryer, a lawn mower, some paint, hinges, paint brushes and keepsakes — beer steins with firefighting related artwork,” Jones said.

The recovered property is worth about $2,300, Lopez said.

“Ninety percent of the stuff is still missing,” Jones said. He estimates it’s worth between $8,000 and $10,000.

But Jones, a firefighter for 20 years — 10 of them with the Vacaville department — kept his perspective about the stolen property.

“It’s just stuff,” he said. “It’s not like it’s a life or death situation.”