Three Beautiful Things 03/12/15: Renal Life, Colonial Beer, Sergeant -- Not Father -- Hathaway

1.  Today my getting stuff done regarding the kidney disease I deal with came to a climax.  I got the referrals from my primary doctor.  I made the cardiology appointment I needed to make.  I found out that the chest X-ray was a walk in so I drove over to Silver Spring and walked in to the radiologist and got a chest X-ray.  I made an appointment for a TB skin test.  I go in on the 13th and return for the results on the 16th. And, in non-renal news, I have a tax man appointment.  Now I just need to make sure that the colonoscopy clinic in Eugene is acting on the voice mail I left there and sending the report from the 2011 procedure to my nurse coordinator in Baltimore. Good thing I'm retired so I have time to do all this stuff.  Lord.

2.  Our region's Total Wine superstore is outside Laurel and not terribly far from the clinic I go to.  So I dropped in to check out their inventory and buy twelve bottles of assorted beers.  I'm on a mission to find some Yeti stout for the Deke in Maryland and this part of my shopping trip was a failure, but I picked up some other beers we like and bought a six pack of Brewer's Alley 1634 Ale, a beer made from a recipe based on ingredients found in colonial Maryland, using malted barley, malted wheat, malted rye, molasses, and caraway -- no hops.  My first bottle struck me as more interesting than tasty -- you know, getting a feeling for something like what colonists in 1634 drank, using only the ingredients available to them -- and, the beer started to grow on me after about half a glass.  Over time, I'll finish the six pack and be glad I gave it a try, but I probably won't buy more inte future.  However, if I went to the Brewer's Alley brewpub in Frederick, I might give the 1634 Ale a go served on tap.

3.  If you've ever seen the episode, "Life Born of Fire",  in the second season of Inspector Lewis when people involved in a group called The Garden are murdered one by one, then you know that it's an episode that reveals a lot about Sergeant Hathaway's days in the seminary and how he came to his decision to leave a possible vocation as a priest.  In other words, the mystery of Hathaway was far more intriguing and enlightening than the murder mystery of these people getting killed.