Stroll the Cemetery: Winter 2013

Technically, this stroll took place at the every end of 2012. But, it'll hit the internet-waves in 2013, and I'm way more inclined to live in the present rather than in the past. The cemetery in the wintertime is boring. Sheeeesh. Walking through (with great care and caution; the pathways were a bit icy), it was hard to believe that this was the same place that was bursting with amazing color just a few months prior.

The cemetery was eerily quiet. It was cold, but not terribly unpleasant. The snow was falling lightly. For as much as I hate winter, this wasn't the worst way to spend a few hours outside of the apartment. Enjoy the photos I took along the way.

The infamous grave looks ever goofier in the winter.

Last year's purchase of good winter boots has finally come in handy.

Surviving December: Whiskey Before Breakfast (& Pittsburgh Boozes)

Let's be honest. A lot of drinking happens in December. There are holiday parties with friends and for work. There are holiday dinners with family. There is New Year's Eve.

As I write this, I'm recovering from my work holiday party. Well, a work holiday party preceded by a day of whiskey drinking, which started before breakfast thanks to Pittsburgh's Wigle Whiskey.

Wigle Whiskey

2401 Smallman Street (in the Strip)

I never used to be a whiskey drinker. It's been a semi-new development over the past year. See, when your main mode of transportation is a bicycle, it's not terribly easy to get a case of beer from the distributor to your fridge. It's a whole lot easier to transport a bottle of whiskey, and thus I have become a whiskey drinker.

Yesterday morning Wigle released their first bottles of aged whiskey. I arrived with friends a little before 9 a.m. and got in a line that was already wrapping around the building. While waiting, we placed our orders for the whiskeys we wanted to take home. We were also served a delicious drink called the Bees Knees (Wigle White Wheat + cream + honey). I picked up one of each of the aged whiskeys (one regular, one cherry wood, and one maple wood). Anyone who, like us, got out of bed early enough on a Saturday to get their hands on these limited bottles was welcome to sign one of the small casks used in the aging process. It's nice thinking our names will be on that cask and that the cask will be a part of Wigle's history for (hopefully) many, many years to come.

My aged Wigle whiskeys, at home atop my fridge.

Now, if whiskey's not your thing, Pittsburgh has other options for local alcohol. Fortunately for me, two of those options (as well as Wigle!) are located along my route home from work. 

East End Brewing Company

147 Julius Street (Larimer)

East End Brewing may be located in Larimer (they've recently moved into their newer, bigger building on Julius Street), but they have a very convenient growler station at the Pittsburgh Public Market in the Strip. They stay open til 6 p.m. on Fridays, which is the perfect for a quick stop after work to bring home a growler of one of my favorites (Pedal Pale Ale, Big Hop, Fat Gary...).

Arsenal Cider House & Wine Cellar

300 39th Street (Lawrenceville)

Arsenal Cider House is such a treat to have in the neighborhood. Really. The ciders are tasty and the fun of sampling and choosing which growler to take home with you is made even more fun when your growler is labeled with your name and a ranking. Last time, I received my growler with "Admiral Allison" on it. 

December is a long month. Thankfully, we've already survived half of it. As the rest of the month goes into the books, make an effort to drink locally. Wigle, East End, and Arsenal are only a few of the many ways to do so. With so many hardworking local businesses serving up homemade and homegrown brews and libations, there's good reason we've been described as a football town with a drinking problem. 

Make Some Cookies: The Lawrenceville Cookie Tour

Warning: there are pictures of baked goods in this post, but they are not of cookies. Don't worry. There will be cookies.

The first weekend of December brings things. If you're like me and try to avoid the holidays as much as possible, those things aren't great. For example, Christmas music: unavoidable. It can also bring cold cold weather to town, but fortunately this weekend was incredibly mild (continuing into today; I wore just a t-shirt and leggings home from work). But it will always bring cookies. Up and down Butler street and other nearby locales in Lawrenceville.

The idea behind the Cookie Tour is great: encourage people to shop locally for the holidays by offering free cookies at each shop throughout an entire neighborhood. OMG. This is, like, way better than going to the mall. [hair flip] (Or shopping online. Unless I'm buying my dad tickets to an event, which is generally what I give him for the holidays now, a bunch of weird events in Pittsburgh he might not otherwise get to experience. Remember Strata?) 

The best way to start any holiday shopping venture (cause you can hit up Butler Street any weekend between now and the big day, there will just be fewer cookies along the way) is with a quick carbo-load from La Gourmandine. I picked up a cinnamon roll and a bit of brioche. 

I didn't go for the coffee option here, as I knew Espresso a Mano was down the road and in my future. We hit up a good number of stores on our trip down Butler: 720 Records, Pavement, Pageboy, and one of the furniture stores. At the new record store, Rather Ripped Records, I found what appeared to be an Allison-like heaven:

A corner of used CDs, prices $2 each or 3 for $5, all mostly from the 90s. 

I don't think I even have a working CD player, but I picked up the Spin Doctors, Starship, and an album by a band I don't even know, but the title of the album was Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs! What? Don't act surprised.

At Divertido I bought myself a nice-smelling candle, as cold weather brings closed windows, and closed windows bring the constant fear that my apartment smells something terrible. One of my favorite shops in Pittsburgh, Wildcard, was crazynuts inside. Close to panic-inducing crowded. But I braved it and picked up a t-shirt for my brother (don't worry; I don't think he reads this), a bookmark for a faraway friend, and a set of letter stamps and an inkpad for myself! 

What?! Listen. I have to get through the holidays somehow. And, like last year, I'll do it by indulging myself in a new craft. Be prepared to be barraged with photos of stamped/stitched creations soon, friends.

So, where are the cookies? Well, as with the stamped/stitched creations, they are forthcoming all month. I've decided another way to survive December will be through baking cookies. I'm hoping to do two batches a week. Be prepared to be barraged with ooey-gooey cookies soon, friends.

(P.S. Shop local! A list of Lawrenceville's shops is here!)

Stroll the Cemetery: Summer 2012

Residing so close to the Allegheny Cemetery is a really wonderful thing. It's such a quiet place, and a semi-haunting place, to walk through. After our walk through of the Frick grounds, Allie and I parted after checking out a couple shops on Butler. Instead of walking back up the hill to Bloomfield through Lawrenceville, I took a leisurely stroll through the cemetery to Penn Ave. I'm going to make an effort to visit the cemetery each season coming up, to gather a collection of photos showing this beautiful place in its different states. Here is the summer series. (Sadly, they are a bit crappy because of that dead damn cellphone camera. Oh well.)

I have a weird fascination with graves that contain my name.

Downtown peeking through the cemetery trees.

The pyramid boobs. Best mausoleum, ever.

Doing a little clicking around on the Allegheny Cemetery website, I've learned that the cemetery has an app for Android phones loaded with tours. I'm downloading it now so I can test it out next time I find myself strolling the cemetery.

Keeping it Local in Lawrenceville on a Saturday Night

I've been in self-imposed isolation for the past week and a half due to my lovely poison ivy legs. But, with the weather being fortunately cooler, I dragged myself out to get some grub at the first Pittsburgh Food Truck Roundup on Saturday night. We walked down toward the empty lot where the trucks were set up, and walked right to the back of a line. We weren't sure what line we were in. I don't think anyone knew what line anyone was in. It was very British of us all to be standing there in a queue, not really sure of what might be at the end of it. Eventually, I ended up with cheddar potato pierogies from the Pittsburgh Pierogi Truck and some honey lavender ice cream from the Dozen dessert truck. 

We hurried down Butler toward 39th just in time for my first visit to the Arsenal Cider House. This has been on my Pittsburgh to-do list for a while now, and I went with some seasoned veterans (Steph and her boyfriend Derek) who already had empty growlers ready to be filled. We sampled four different ciders (and here I thought they only had one cider at a time!) and picked two (one that was peach-like and one that was sour cherry) to take back to their house.

Steph and I sat in her backyard in Lawrenceville listening to LCD Soundsystem and drinking some pretty great cider until my legs started itch and I needed to make my way back to the comfort of the couch where calamine lotion and bags of ice were easily accessible.

I'm nearly out of the woods with this whole poison ivy nightmare. I've been able to bike more the past few days and spend more time outside without feeling like I need to scratch off the top layer of my skin. There's so much good stuff coming up with PedalPGH and Bikefest in the next two weeks that I would hate to miss.

PGH CHEAP: Spending Little to Stay Cool

My. It's been hot, huh? As has been the case in most places across the U.S., Pittsburgh has been riding a heat wave. I'm writing this on Sunday, and our high is only expected to be 89 degrees. As Eric said while we walked back toward our apartment building this morning, "I never thought I'd be excited about temps in the high 80s."

I try not to complain about the heat. But Saturday it was brutal. I spent as much time as I could tolerate in my apartment reading and writing, but eventually I needed to seek out ways to beat the heat. So I made a list of inexpensive ways to cool off around town and set off by bike to the Carnegie Museum.

If this heat keeps up throughout July and August, I think I'll be using my Museum membership more and more for quick spells in air conditioning. I only had an hour to kill before I was expected at the pool, so I decided to check out the coolest exhibits I could think of.

First I spent a good chunk of time walking around in the cool darkness of the Hillman Hall of Minerals and Gems.

Glow in the dark rocks!

As might be expected, the orange gems and minerals were my favorite.

Gemstone dino!

The second stop on my visit was the most obvious choice of all:

Yes. To beat the heat, I spent some time pretending I was in the Arctic. Genius, I know.

On a day when it feels like it's over 100 degrees outside, it was easy to feel incredible jealousy of this scene.

Just in case on one of my wintertime Canada journeys I need to know how to build a shelter out of snow, I watched this video about building snowhouses.

Jealous of how cool these dogs must be feeling in the snow.

After the museum I pedaled over to the Highland Park pool for a few hours of swimming and sunning. Entry also free; Pittsburgh pool passes are a beautiful thing. I passed out on my couch for a couple hours before meeting up with Ross to walk down to 36th and Butler for a pop-up beer garden, Tapped. We had a whiskey drink from Wigle Whiskey and an IPA from Full Pint. Cost $10. I had a hot dog from the Franktuary. Cost $3. It was all the money I'd spent all day, and I felt good about staying cool while keeping costs low. 

These pop-up beer gardens will be going on throughout the summer, and I will be making an effort to go to many of them. Such a nice (and relatively cheap) way to spend a hot summer night.