Smooth and juicy, plenty of citrus and tropical notes to keep me happy on a cold day. 4/5 stars.
This beer was my reward to myself for surviving a family outing.
We did something this weekend that may have been ill-advised. We’ve been looking for activities to do away from home with the kids and decided to visit the Portland Art Museum. I’ve been before, and so has my wife. The museum was not overly busy when either of us had gone, so it seemed like a relatively safe bet. We packed the diaper bag, snacks, extra clothes, and brought our new tandem stroller in case the older child got tired of walking. What could go wrong?
The first thing we didn’t properly account for was how popular the traveling exhibit was going to be. The museum has a special Frida Kahlo and Diego Riviera exhibit for the duration of Spring, but we opted to stick to the permanent collection in the interest of focusing the experience on H (our older daughter) and not spend money on something that we (the adults) wouldn’t be able to properly enjoy. It was just as well, because the exhibit was packed. Like, busier than I’ve seen any museum in the Portland area. That would have been fine, but the extra foot traffic spilled into the rest of the museum once visitors finished the special exhibit. By the time we realized, we were already committed.
My wife had a very clever idea for how to make the museum fun and engaging for a 3 1/2-year-old. She wrote up an age-appropriate scavenger hunt to help H engage with the art and get used to examining pieces for specific elements. It was simple things like the color purple, a square, or a boat. There were even a couple items to help her understand the emotional context of art, asking her to find something that made her feel happy and something that made her feel sad. Fun, right? She seemed excited about the activity too. In reality, however, things didn’t work out entirely to plan. H didn’t get quite enough sleep the night before, and so was a bit overstimulated by the number of people and the new environment. That led to her wanting to move very quickly through each area, as if there were a final destination to reach. It took a lot of effort to remind her what she was looking for, and we frequently had to point out the painting or sculpture she was supposed to find. Still, that was par for the course with a toddler, and we expected something like that to happen.
What we were truly unprepared for was how her younger sister reacted. She helped us discover the exact acoustic properties of all the concrete, wood, and glass the museum was constructed from. F had decided she wasn’t in the mood for an excursion, starting with sleeping twelve hours (!) the night before. You may think that a long night’s sleep like that would be a recipe for a great day, but for a 3-month-old it was a poor choice. That meant that she 1.) wasn’t interested in napping the rest of the day, even though she can only stay awake for a few hours at most at this age, and 2.) was voraciously hungry all day after missing a meal or two compared to her normal routine. The end result was a tired infant was got upset and uncomfortable quickly (see this other post for an example). That meant that she was testing out her lungs for a good portion of our visit. Sorry, other patrons! It’s one of those unfortunate parts of parenting.
The real icing on the cake wasn’t the actions or moods of either child. It was the elevators. See, the museum is situated in two buildings, each with four floors and a lower-level tunnel connecting them. There are easily-accessed stairs, complete with ample signage and benches at each landing, to help visitors navigate between those floors. Each building also has a single slow-moving elevator to give access to all of the installations for those who can’t manage stairs. Like, for instance, someone who is elderly or wheel-chair bound. Someone who is young and small, but too heavy to be carried up and down stairs. Or someone in a stroller. I’m going to rant for a moment here, because the overwhelming majority of people who joined us on the elevator that day were none of those. They were able-bodied adults who didn’t feel like taking stairs. Yes, I’m making assumptions about other people’s abilities. Yes, that is insensitive of me. I acknowledge it, I own it, I’ll work on it. For now, let me say my piece. It’s a little hard to believe the number of people who walked around a museum, unassisted in any way, who also felt the need to take an elevator. An elevator, mind you, that my family would not have taken if we didn’t have the baby with us. An elevator that takes longer to move between levels than walking, especially when you account for the amount of time required to wait for said elevator to arrive BECAUSE IT IS BEING STOPPED AT EVERY FLOOR. While I didn’t clock it, I think we spent a full 30 minutes of our 90-minute visit waiting for and riding elevators. OK, rant over. But, if you’re reading this, don’t use elevators unless you absolutely must. It’s incredibly inconsiderate of the people who do need them, and life is already hard enough for people who need an elevator every time they need to move to a different floor.
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A Beer a Day 