Who Couldn’t Use Advice From Mister Rogers?

Seriously? Who couldn’t use advice from Mister Rogers every so often. We all grew up on him. (Unless your like 15 or something reading this.) Even my oldest two daughters know him (14 and 12). He was everyone’s favorite neighbor; he was America’s neighbor. Was, and still is, one of the biggest influences on most people’s lives and they don’t even know it.

So I ask again, who couldn’t use advice from Mister Rogers now and again? Just harken back to the time as a small child, sitting there watching him come in through the door, asking us all “Won’t you be my neighbor?”. The man was simplicity, the man was gentleness, the man was kindness, the man was Buddhist lovingkindness. The man was the Uncle, the father, the neighbor, that we all wanted. He was wise like a sage and as gentle as a monk.

Too little do we think about the wisdom he espoused when we were kids; especially now as grownups. As adults with our busy lives that has us running to and fro, scurrying about like mice in the dark with no lights on. Sadly, we’ve all moved away from the little things he imparted on us – love, kindness, respect, gentleness, compassion, empathy, understanding, listening. And we’ve moved on to – busy, money, work, status, importance, etc.

I know personally I’d trade being busy, working, looking important, and status for passion, empathy, kindness, compassion, and understanding every day of the week.

Life’s Journey

Fred Roger’s wife does a good job with writing the prologue. Discussing their dynamic as a couple, saying how she needed to work at the piano, and how it was her form of creativity. You can see in her how much of his thoughts and empathy and philosophy comes through. The two clearly fed on each other for much, despite as she says, “we gave each other our space”. One of the most poignant things, is her discussing how she still hears him even though ‘he’s no longer in sight’, and then later in the book when we read his poem about not seeing people but still loving them and being with them in spirit, even when they ‘completely move on from sight’.

This book has so much to teach us about going through our own journeys through life. Mainly – how everyone’s is different. He talks about a very well educated man who left seminary school to instead become head of a department store, and how some people said he missed his calling, but was then later checked in on; but he wasn’t there at his work, so the man talked to his co-workers, and they talked about how great he was, how he changed the work culture at the department store, etc; and Rogers says to the effect – ‘and he ended up right where he needed to be’.

Book Review

GoodReads Blurb:

An inspiring collection of thoughts to take with us on the paths we travel in life.

For all the roads we choose to travel, and even those we don’t, Fred Rogers has an observation, a story, some insights to share. Whether you’re facing graduation, a new job, a new baby, marriage, any change in your life–expected or not–the wisdom that Mister Rogers offers can contribute mightily to the grace with which you handle the change.

With sections titled Who You Are Right Now, Loving and Being Loved, and Guided Drift, Fred addresses the scope of human transitions. It all comes down to knowing we’re valuable, and that we’re worthy of that value. As Fred would say, “You don’t have to be anything more than who you are right now.”

In her Foreward, Joanne Rogers shares the Fred she knew. With stories from their life together, the joys as well as the struggles, Joanne shows how Fred looked at life as a journey–with the ups and downs and in-betweens.

Known as “America’s favorite neighbor,” Fred Rogers dedicated his life to serving children through public television as creator, composer, writer, puppeteer, and host of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. He studied at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Child Development and was ordained a Presbyterian minister, with the unique charge of working with children and families through television. Fred Rogers’ relentless commitment to all that is best in people led to an astonishing array of honors, from induction into the Television Hall of Fame to the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Fred Rogers passed away in February 2003.

Family Communications, Inc. (FCI), founded by the late Fred Rogers in 1971 to produce Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and related projects, continues to expand its reach through early childhood trainings, publishing, and new technologies–perpetuating the values and philosophy of its founder.

GoodReads: Life’s Journey (Fred Rogers)

Wikipedia’s quick opening summary of Mister Rogers:

Fred McFeely Rogers (March 20, 1928 – February 27, 2003), also known as Mister Rogers, was an American television host, author, producer, and Presbyterian minister.^[1] He was the creator, showrunner, and host of the preschool television series Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, which ran from 1968 to 2001.

Born in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh, Rogers earned a bachelor’s degree in music from Rollins College in 1951. He began his television career at NBC in New York, returning to Pittsburgh in 1953 to work for children’s programming at NET (later PBS) television station WQED. He graduated from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary with a bachelor’s degree in divinity in 1962 and became a Presbyterian minister in 1963. He attended the University of Pittsburgh‘s Graduate School of Child Development, where he began his 30-year collaboration with child psychologist Margaret McFarland. He also helped develop the children’s shows The Children’s Corner (1955) and Misterogers (1963). In 1968, he created Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, which ran for 33 years. The program was critically acclaimed for focusing on children’s emotional and physical concerns, such as death, sibling rivalry, school enrollment, and divorce.

Rogers died of stomach cancer on February 27, 2003, at age 74. His work in children’s television has been widely lauded, and he received more than 40 honorary degrees and several awards, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2002 and a Lifetime Achievement Emmy in 1997. He was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1999. Rogers influenced many writers and producers of children’s television shows, and his broadcasts have served as a source of comfort during tragic events, even after his death.

Wikipedia: Fred Rogers

This is a wonderful short, quick, incisive, and thoughtful book. Its 161 pages, counting prologue, counting acknowledgements, and with a few blank pages. Each page is a paragraph (some paragraphs / thoughts run into two pages) style thought by Fred Rogers, some short, some long. They each express an idea or thought.

You can hear his voice in each piece of this book. You can see him sitting there, taking off his shoes, or coat, coming in from the outside, and telling us these things as we sat there rapt as always as children, now as adults. And this is what we all need to hear from time to time.

Its nothing earth shattering or profound, but its the profound at the time. And coming with the weight and knowledge of Fred Rogers behind it, nothing is an empty aphorism or crappy ‘inspirational quote’ you might hear from “Becky” the girl who peeked in high school and is now trying to sell you Avon or LullaRoe.

He speaks to the children in us as adults, giving us the thoughts and wisdoms we still need, despite growing up. Some of us have moved on, to bigger and better things, some of us have floundered, some of us are still trapped, some of us are working on ourselves, some of us are working to just survive; but we are all working on our journeys. And all of our journeys are different, and that is to be celebrated. It is to be lived, and it is to be human. And that is precisely who Fred Rogers is speaking to with this book – the human progressing through their journey.

My GoodReads Rating: ****
Global Average GoodReads Rating: 4.44 (as of 11.12.21)
My LibraryThing Rating: ****.5

Some Other Recent Book Reviews

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• Armageddon in Retrospect (Kurt Vonnegut)
• The Philosophy of Snoopy (Charles M. Schulz)
• The Art of Stillness (Pico Iyer)
• Plotted – A Literary Atlas (Andrew DeGraff)
• How To Be Interesting (in 10 Simple Steps) (Jessica Hagy)
• On Bullshit (Harry G. Frankfurt)
• Free Will Explained (Dan Barker)
• Free Will (Sam Harris)
• What More Philosophers Think
• Heart and Brain (Nick Seluk)
• Machiavelli – The Art of Teaching People What to Fear (Patrick Boucheron)
• Wit’s End (James Geary)
• For the Love of Beer (Dr. Alison E. Feeny)

Thanks for Reading

As always everyone, thanks for reading. Be sure to hit the like, the follow, the subscribe, and make sure to check out our social media pages and do the same.

Cheers!

-B. Kline

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Woke up in the hotel, drove to Cincinnati, stopping about an hour into the two hour drive to walk a one mile little park area called Brum’s Woods, just to give my legs a wake up and keep myself from falling asleep. But once I got into Cincinnati, I fell in love, immediately.

I got to park right near the Cincinnati Red’s stadium – Great American Ball Park. For 5.50$ I got two hours on the meter. I walked along the river front, walked along the one street, and found this Taste of Belgium restaurant. …I couldn’t help but go in.

Next thing I know I’m having Rodenbach, Avobode, and other high quality Belgian beers. And its only 11AM. I finally manage to pull myself away, and walked the Roebling Bridge into Kentucky and back, and then I stop in at the Christian Moerlein Lager House.

Another fine brewery establishment. This was great, got to drink upstairs at the bar (something I never realized I would be so grateful for, since we can’t do this back in Pennsylvania anymore), and talked to a wonderful young sweet bartender who told me all about Cincinnati and we discussed the changing laws. She was saying they were expecting a news conference today about some new restrictions. From my view, I could see Paul Brown Stadium while I drank my pint.

After saying goodbye, I went back to my meter, put another 5.50$ in, and then went to the Underground Railroad Museum. If you are in Cincinnati, this is something you should definitely do. It is extremely powerful, and a very well done museum.

I then got back in my car and drove to Braxton Brewing Company in Kentucky. Now…. I hate to speak ill of a state…. but Kentucky was horrible. The brewery was AMAZING. But getting to it… and then leaving it… was so extremely aggravating. I have no idea why… but it was only 1.5 miles and it took me twenty minutes to get there, and fifteen minutes to leave. Apparently Kentuckians don’t know how to do round-a-bouts correctly. I have no idea what was going on with that.

But, let me just say, the brewery was amazing. And Adam – the bartender – was one of the best bartenders I’ve gotten to spend time with and talk to in a while. I promised him I’d make a shout out to him in this blog post, so there you go. Dude is straight up nice, knowledgeable, and great bartender. If you stop in at Braxton Brewing, make sure you say hi to him, he is a class act. He too mentioned the governor of Ohio, and his own governor, doing an announcement at some point.

After making it back into Ohio, and Cincinnati, thankfully, I went to the Cincinnati Art Museum. Where I puttered about acting like I know what art is. I don’t. No clue. My ex-wife went to school to be an art teacher, and I have zero understanding of art. I always want to put a sign over urinals in bathrooms at art museums that just say: “THIS IS ART. YOU ARE MAKING ART.” And see if people will take pictures of it and believe it.

After the art museum, I then went to Taft’s Ale House.

This is another one of those beautiful stories of a church being turned into a brewery to preserve the building. Also, if you see the logo its Taft in a bathtub, so if you know the story of that, you’ll understand why I find that so amusing. (I’ll elaborate on that in the full write-up.)

After Taft’s I then went to Urban Artifact. It came as the most highly recommended place for me to visit from all of my friends, and I am so completely glad I did. Wow, every beer was absolutely amazing and fantastic. All sours. All sooo sooo sooooooooooo good. I picked up plenty of beers for Deuene Hoffman, and myself, and a t-shirt for myself, bid them a fond adieu, and then drove to Wilmington Ohio, where I was hoping to hit up a cidery right before they closed up, but unfortunately I got there at 10:05PM and as I walked up they closed the doors. So next time I’m in the area, I’ll try and hit it up again, I’m not a huge cider person, but if its there, its there, might as well. And figured this would be a great ending stop to the day. Oh well, so it goes. The cidery is called TinCap Cidery. In case you are ever in Wilmington Ohio, there is a cidery.

Ok, tomorrow will be Hocking Hills and some more legit hiking again, as well as Jackie O’s in Athens, and then on to Ohiopyl Saturday and the end of my trip sadly. My bank account I think is looking forward to this trip being over the most… …and my liver.

Well, stay healthy out there everyone, cheers!

-B. Kline

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The Trip to Indianapolis:

• The Trip to Indy
• The Trip to Indy – Day One Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Two Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Three Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Four Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Five Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Six Recap
• The Trip to Indy – Day Seven Recap
• Recap and Stats

So yesterday was just kind of one of those days. Long day at work. Went directly to Tattered Flag and had me a flight. Spending the night at a veteran owned brewery with several veterans who work there, on Veteran’s Day sounded like a fantastic idea. For veterans they were doing free burger or half rack of ribs as well as a beer, and they just put on tap a bunch of veteran / military themed beers brewed along with two other veteran owned breweries in the area – Cox Brewing Company and Newfangled Brew Works.

The flight I had was Tattered Dreamz (collab with Wolf Brewing Co.), Twin Mount .50, Government Overspending 2019, Seven.Point.Six.Two and then this stout – 556 Stout by Cox Brewing Co. The collaborations each got headlined by one of the breweries: Twin Mount .50 is Newfangled Brew Works first, with collab credits to Tattered Flag and Cox Brewing, Seven.Point.Six.Two is credited to Tattered Flag with collab credits to Newfangled and Cox, and the 556 Stout is credited headlined by Cox and collab credits to Newfangled and Tattered Flag.

This review will be centered around the 556 Stout. Tomorrow I will likely be doing the full flight review (and will link to this; and have this link back to that; so if you check this article out in two-three days you’ll see a link to the flight article).

I will break out a spoiler and say this was my favorite of the bunch. The whole flight was really good though, with a great Belgian, a couple wonderful IPAs, and a good high ABV sour as well. Its just that this one blew me away the most and thus why I’m giving it an individual review.

Beer: 556 Stout
Brewery: Cox Brewing Company (CBC)
Collaborators: Newfangled Brew Works and Tattered Flag
Style: Stout – American
ABV: 5.56%
IBU: No
Untappd Write-Up: Vet Collab Stout with Newfangled and Tattered Flag

For those who don’t know, and I haven’t had a chance before this to do a Cox Brewing Company (CBC) review, here is some basic background info on them:
Cox Brewing Untappd
Cox Brewing FaceBook
Cox Brewing Twitter
Cox Brewing Website

Their Untappd page lists them as having 90 unique beers, 6,505 ratings, and a global rating of 3.68. Their bio on the page reads: Cox Brewing Company (CBC) is a veteran-owned brewery located in Elizabethtown, PA in the village of Rheems.

They are a must-stop see at every Renaissance Faire brewfest and Littitz Brewfest. At the Lititz Brewfest they even sponsor to have a home brewer who they selected at the home brewer’s portion of the event to come brew for a day with them. The owners are great people and are very active in the home brewing community and are big help to many home brewers in the area.

So let’s get into this delicious beer.

Appearance is dark black like a good normal stout, with nice lacing, and a good head. The head is thin white with porous bubbles that are spaced and varied. The lacing lasts on the glass and the look stays the same under light.

Aroma is a good caramelized stout. Heavy malts, nice aromas, you get mostly the heavy malts and a caramel sweetness to it.

Taste is what really drives this. It is immediately amazing. Wonderful flavor profile, wonderful mouth feel, wonderful taste, wonderful notes and characteristics, and …. wonderful any other cliche catch-all terms that you want to use. Its sweet, its malty, its caramel, its dark, its heavy, its low key and not boozy, and only a 5.56% ABV (get it… … …you know… since the name is 556… they made sure to work the OG and sugars to make it 5.56% ABV). This all combines perfectly and into one wonderful stout. A perfect cold weather stout, a perfect warm weather stout, a perfect all year round stout. But more importantly, a perfect Veteran’s Day stout.

My Untappd Rating: ****.75
Global Untappd Rating: (None yet. Unfortunately there’s only been 8 total ratings, so obviously too soon to get a global rating.)

I certainly can’t recommend this beer enough though. Make sure you find your way to Tattered Flag, Newfangled Brew Works, or Cox Brewing Company, where it will be on draft at all three of these locations. This is an amazing beer. Some even got to try it as a sampling at the 717 Armory yesterday, a very cool thing and another collaborator with the breweries on these beers and making Veteran’s Day so positive for many veterans in the area.

We here at The Beer Thrillers want to thank and salute all veterans who have served, and have given the biggest sacrifice possible, as well as to all those who still serve our country and defend its ideals and people. We thank and appreciate you for all you have done, for all you do, and for all you have given and sacrificed. Thank you.

Please make sure you venture out and support these great veteran owned breweries. They deserve it, and you deserve some great beer, so check them out.

Cheers All!

-B. Kline