I have never seen a town more obsessed with a poet

[prog]

Back home. Thanks to xach and jaq (har har sounds like a chewy candy product) for suggestions of stuff to do in Portland. We did indeed eat at the Sebago brewpub, and tromped around the enormous cemetery. The weather was fine. Pictures later, maybe, as well as the Central Maine report.

The Shipyard brewery tour was fun. Being in the middle of the day on a weekday our tour group was us, an elderly couple, some random beerfan dood and two teenage boys with lacrosse sticks. First we all watched a movie about the brewery's origins and its various ales (and they are all ales, specifically), and then a guide led us around to gawp at fermentation vats and bottling machinery. Took maybe 15 minutes, and then there was some beer sampling. (The lacrosse kids were invited to instead sample some of the soda pop they brew there, and they did.)

I got to look all smart in front of this handful of strangers by answering the tour guide's pop quiz about why India Pale Ale is so called. Then the guide followed us into the gift shop and started reading aloud all the jokey T-shirts to us, in case we had missed them, which seemed a little odd. He cheered and went away when classicaljunkie announced our intention to buy a case of beer. We ended up with three, of all kinds of beverage. Good times!

Comments

[doctor-atomic.livejournal.com]

Where does the poet come in?

[prog.livejournal.com]

There's a giant statue of Longfellow in the center of town, and a bust of Longfellow in the Shipyard's screening room (as well as an ale named for him), and shops selling Longfellow merch all over, and on and on.

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

I love brewery tours! Food factory tours, too.

Famous

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, but Longfellow was the most famous pop star of his time. That's why they were so obsessed with him. They just didn't have MTV to plaster his face everywhere with, so they went with stone :)

Mary
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