January 8

This post was posted a bit late because I was just plum exhausted and decided it was more important for me to sleep. That, however, is the award you get for having something hanging over your head for a few months and finally the relieving the pressure—you get to say fuck it, I'm out

Anyway, that was the reason for my lack of post yesterday, not for lack of cool things done—I actually had a pretty busy day.

It started with a trip to one of the best (if not the best) places in Cleveland: West Side Market. The market, housed in what looks like an old train station, is one of the few remaining large-scale public owned farmer's markets in the United States. Featuring over 100 vendors selling products ranging from fresh-from-farm produce and daily butchered meet to imported artisanal cheeses and old world bread, the market is a sight to behold. One of the coolest facts of the entire place is that since the market is 100 years old (2012 is its centennial), many of the vendors have been coming for 75 years or longer, meaning that every visitor has their own favourite vendors and visit the same stand a few weeks in a row and you will become a "regular."

Though the available bounty is incredible in breadth, my purchases this time were limited to some bagels and rolls because I will unfortunately not be around my current locale for terribly long and I didn't want anything to go bad. My companions, however, loaded up on a bunch of different items; cheeses, bacon, fresh veg, breads, and cilantro-lime sausages (many of which became a dinner of Bánh mì, or vietnamese sandwiches).

Shortly afterwards we headed over to an awesome craft beer destination called the Bier Markt (for a description of it's awesomeness, click here) where, after many a musing, we decided to purchase a make-your-own six pack from the bottles available. This ended the journey in the land of Cleve, but upon returning back to home base, the purchases were not. We ended up walking to the honest-to-god General Store in town for a few more supplies, including a winter seasonal pack of Sarnac Breweries beer (look for reviews soon on my beer blog)

After this, my day became relatively staid; I mostly just did some work in my studio and returned my mountain of required reading for my essay. I did have a great dinner of sandwiches (as mentioned above) and later watched the new episode of the BBC One show Sherlock, A Scandal in Belgravia—a show that if you're not currently watching, you should be.


-peace