Happy Thanksgiving

I still want to have a beer with William Shatner.

I was looking at the Atlantic just now and thought "hmmm that looks like Bill deep frying a turkey". Why yes it is.

Hey's there's a video! And it's awesome. Bill delivers some hilarious lines. Now I want to have a beer with him even more.

What beer would I recommend for Thanksgiving dinner? I think a Belgian style abbey dubbel would go great with turkey and the fixings. Flying Fish makes a great one, as does Boaks. For those not near Philadelphia or can't find a locally made abbey dubbel, you can go with Chimay Red Label, which is the gold standard for the style.

It's Been a Few Weeks, but I'm Still Serious

It's been a busy few months.

Since my last post, we had three weekends of Oktoberfest at Hop Angel. And I am usually at Grey Lodge seven days week. We went out to Denver for the Great American Beer Fest. I also posted to my blog, The Third Quarter. I wrote a piece for Hidden City. I've been involved with Mayfair Business Association, Tacony Civic Association, Philly Beer Week, and Historic Tacony Revitalization Project. I also did some other stuff.

So I've been busy, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't drop everything to have a beer with Bill.... well most everything. So Bill, just name the day, time, and place, and I will be there.

I do stuff, so I'd have stuff to talk about. I can also shut up and listen. OK that's not one of my better skills, but I can do it when called for. I'm sure Bill would have a lot of interesting stories, so shutting the ef up wouldn't be hard.

I'll Show Up Anywhere Bill Wants

I know Bill is a busy guy with movies and TV shows and horses and sci-if conventions.

So I'll make it easy; I'll get myself to wherever Bill wants to meet up for beer*. I'm my own boss so within reason and with a little time for planning, I can give myself a couple of days off. Bill, just tell me where.

I'll even bring the beer.

* Disclaimer: it must be on planet Earth. I can't afford space travel.

Why Have a Beer with Me?

Based on the last post, tomorrow seems to be about a week for me. I guess I'm on Jupiter time.

Why should Bill or anyone want to have a beer with me? Well I'm sort of a beer expert. Heck I'm a professional even. I run The Grey Lodge Pub, one of Philadelphia's original beer bars. I knew a bit about beer before that and in 15 years I've learned quite a bit more.

I know which beers are great, which are overrated, and which suck. I can pair a beer to the climate, locale, and atmosphere. If you (or Bill) had a beer with me, it would be a tasty one.

If you want to have a beer with me (whether you are William Shatner or not), I can be found on the better side of the bar at the Grey Lodge almost every Friday after 8pm.

A Reason Why Bill Should Have a Beer with Me

Sorry for not posting for a few weeks. Life has been interesting in a good way and I have been living it. No worries, my yen to have a beer with Bill hasn't waned.

Here's a reason why Bill should have a beer with me.

==> We used Priceline to book a room for a recent NYC trip. <==

For those who haven't used Priceline.com recently, instead of a clock sort of icon during processing, they have an animation of Bill karate chopping prices. It's awesome.

This clip isn't that processing thing, but it's awesome in its own right.

Bill's last line is yet another reason why I want to have beer with him.

To those who are curious, Priceline found us a great room in a great location, right by Penn Station. And if you go to NYC, check out the other Chinatown in Flushing, Queens. There's a tiny dumpling shop there that's killer. Also in Flushing, the Unisphere on a breezy day is surprisingly dramatic and the full scale 3d map of NYC in the art museum next door is way worth seeing.

For tomorrow, a better reason why Bill should have a beer with me.

Bill Has A Big Announcement Planned

A big announcement? Could it be having a beer with me?

Probably not.

Guess we'll know next week.

Update: The announcement wasn't about beer.

I'm Not a Trekkie

Bill wouldn't have to worry about me being a fawning fanboy, bugging him about Tribbles or anything like that. I might want to talk about Evil Lincoln (who doesn't), but I don't believe Evil Lincoln had anything to do with the original Star Trek. So while Evil Lincoln might come up (OK it's highly likely to be a topic of conversation), it won't be fanboy stuff.

Sure I watched Star Trek reruns when I was a kid. There were only 7 channels and it was easily the best thing on at 7pm. And it was a fun show.

But I didn't realize how slipshod the procedures on the original Enterprise were until I made it half way through the boring first season of Star Trek the Next Generation. What sort of quasi military organization would let the captain, the second in command, AND the ship's doctor routinely go down first to unexplored planets with ravenous bugblatter beasts running around? The answer is an organization that knew what made for good television.

I do wish I had seen Star Trek Deep Shit Nine when it was on, but I had better things to do. I am pretty sure Bill wasn't in that one. If he was, I would have watched it.

I am Not Crazy

I think it's important to let Bill know that I'm not crazy. I wouldn't want to scare him off from having a beer with me.

OK I am a little crazy.

Having a blog called "I Want to Have a Beer with Shatner" sort of proves that. I might be a little crazy but I am harmless. I've never been arrested, let alone convicted.

After their correspondent submitted an extremely detailed series of reports on me, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy recently doubled their entry for me. The current entry is "Still harmless". I was hoping the Guide would include something about my garden, but whatcha gonna do?

An Interesting Development via Twitter

Today my phone alerted me:

fixgear RT @TechCrunch: Illogical? William Shatner Gets Booted From Google+ tcrn.ch/qzP8eU by // here goes a hot lead @scoats

So Bill was on then off and now back on Google+. What to do? Could this be a way to communicate directly with the Shat or a handler one removed?



I didn't add Bill to my Friends circle, that would look like I was stalking him (and I'm not), so I added him to my Following circle.

I'm not ready to contact Bill directly yet. I want to be a few blog posts in first.

Less than 24 hours into the quest and things are moving along.

One Reason Why I Want to Have Beer With William Shatner

... because he does stuff like this.



That's from the awesome movie Free Enterprise. If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend it. If you haven't seen it lately, it's time to watch it again.

I Want to Have a Beer with Shatner

Hello I'm Scoats. I run the Grey Lodge Pub in Northeast Philadelphia. I'm 46 years old and have managed to do some neat stuff in those 46 years.

We at The Grey Lodge Pub have gotten some national recognition over the years. Philadelphia Magazine named our French Fries best of Philly. Our cheese steak made 610 WIP's Top Five best. Esquire Magazine named us one of the Best Bars in America. I don't mention that to brag, merely to establish that I'm not a complete loser. More like a partial loser.

Once you get middle aged, you may start having bucket list ideas. One dream I have is to have a beer with William Shatner.

I got to do the weather on Accuweather.com. I got to go to Chico and brew a beer as part of Sierra Nevada's Bar Camp. I have handed a giant hammer to the mayor of a large city without being tazered. So unlikely things have happened to me already.

I have discovered with the Internet many highly unlikely things are possible. And having a beer with William Shatner is definitely highly unlikely for a regular Joe like me from Northeast Philadelphia. I have started this blog to hopefully make it happen.

Future posts will deal with why I want to have a beer with Bill and why Bill might want to have a beer with me.