Three Beautiful Things 08/31/16: Enrollments, Cold Case Revisited, Back to the Old Line

1.  I completed the enrollment for my health benefits and completed the health assessment. It's not that difficult, but every year I am happy to complete the process and, this year, to have it done two weeks ahead of time, not at the last minute.  I must have been in the enrolling mood. I also signed the Deke and me up for a free educational transplant conference being held on October 8th just north of Baltimore called The Transplant Journey.  I know. I really know how to have a good time.

2.  I finished reading a  true crime book, commissioned by amazon.com for Kindle, entitled The Killing Season. It's a grisly story about murders in Grand Junction, CO back in 1975 and how one of these cases, a double murder, lay cold for about thirty-five years, but was revisited a few years ago and a man was tried and convicted for these crimes. Later in the day, I listened to the story's writer, Alex French, be interviewed on the podcast, True Murder.  I'm going to take a break from true crime stories. I think I'll read Ron White's biography of Abraham Lincoln -- starting just over forty years ago, Ron White was the chaplain at Whitworth and I worked for an academic year for him as a Chaplain's Assistant back in 1976-77.

3.  The Deke ate dinner with and spent the night at the Diazes and I haven't quite stocked the pantry in our apartment home yet, so I vaulted into the Sube and whizzed up to the Old Line Bistro for dinner.  I sat at the plank and Kristin, a favorite server of ours, was working the bar.  Kristin is a low-key person and even though she didn't say anything, I could tell she knew I hadn't been in for about two months and, without a word, she acknowledged my return to Maryland and the Old Line by taking my pint glass when it was nearly empty and giving me a complimentary refill of Flying Dog's incomparable Imperial IPA, The Truth.  I, too, am very low key at the bar, and silently thanked her with a slight head nod and a warm look.  I enjoyed my burger and fries and topped off my dinner with a Kirsch Gose from Victory Brewing.  Gose is a tart, almost sour, style of beer and I love drinking such beers after I've eaten a meal and, for me, drinking this beer was like having a biting, unsweetened cherry cobbler for dessert. It was very satisfying.