#Also prepare to see his horns shift in size again and again because I cannot decide for the life of me how tall/long I want them to be <3< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[dailyperkele]

DAY 1 - Pick a face

I'm sure Rher only wants to help as well.

[reddtabor]

Cider Rite of Spring 2017: Meeting Your (Northwest Cider) Makers

Cider Rite of Spring 2017 included 31 Northwest cidermakers and featured 100 ciders unique ciders. Photo: Sean Connolly

Saturday, March 24, 2017--It’s 8:50 am, and we are unloading scores of cider-filled sixth barrels in preparation for Cider Rite of Spring, which starts in about three hours.  I’m one of about a dozen or so people in the vanguard at the Evergreen, this year’s event location, working on set-up. The mood is purposeful and jovial—it seems most everyone in this tight-knit regional cider industry knows one another—yet there’s also the slight tension that comes from knowing the clock is ticking with lots still to do.

As a Portland-based cider disciple, this will be my third tour of the Northwest’s largest springtime, local-cideries-only cider festival—and I only missed last year’s event because I was out of town.  This time I’m volunteering, because I want a window into an event Sip NW Magazine in 2015 called the Best Northwest Cider Festival swings from planning into execution.

The 2017 fourth annual Cider Rite of Spring, a six-hour affair presented by the Northwest Cider Association and presented by Square Mile Cider, is going to be big. Thirty-one Oregon and Washington cideries will be present and pouring about 100 ciders, plus six additional, limited pours in the upstairs VIP lounge. 

Association Executive Director Emily Ritchie has promoted Cider Rite on Portland’s KATU-2 News, and the Pomme Boots Society, an industry organization for women in the cider industry, has leveraged its marking and outreach panache to spread the word, too. Schilling Cider Company’s Regional Operations Manager and Pomme Boots co-founder Jennie Dorsey at one point informs those working the room that at least 500 tickets have already been sold, with more expected once the doors open.

In addition to General Admission tickets, 2017 Cider Rite of Spring offered a throughout-the-event VIP Lounge experience with exclusive pourings. Photo: Sean Connolly  

Over the next couple of hours from nine to noon, representatives from the Oregon and Washington cideries file into the hall, check in, set up their jockey boxes and pouring stations and unfurl company banners. As the main hall morphs to its event-ready state, it’s hard not to get caught up in energy that radiates from a collective of people and businesses at one of the epicenters of what I call the New American Cider Movement.  Cider, early America’s alcoholic beverage of choice, is seeing a coast-to-coast revival, and the Pacific Northwest is one of the trailblazing regions.

Cider barrels at the Evergreen.  Photo: Sean Connolly

After the kegs are sorted and sent to the cideries’ assigned tables, I spend the couple of hours with a Portland Cider Company colleague cataloging and organizing the bottles and cans that’ll go on sale in the festival’s Cider shop. It’s where I’ll be stationed from noon to 3pm, and we expect sales to be brisk. I get a quick orientation on how to use Square and run transactions. We set up the display table so festivalgoers can get a gander at what’s on sale.

 The lineup—and collective craft invested in the making and marketing of ciders and manifested across 100 cans and bottles of varying shapes, sizes, and styles, is impressive. I cannot resist a picture, but have to suppress the urge to start quaffing cider until my shift is over.

Cider Rite of Spring 2017’s Cider Store offered nearly 100 unique ciders for sale, plenty for all kinds of tastes.

Before the doors open, I manage to get a few quick tastes and brief ‘hellos’ to a couple of cidermakers I’ve met at previous Cider Rites like Kevin Van Reenen of Pear Up Cider and Laura Cherry of Dragon’s Head Cider or that are new to Cider Rite of Spring and are pouring ciders I haven’t yet tasted, like Mike and Nate Thierfelder of Portland-based Woodbox Cider Company and Jeff Bennett, co-creator Tumalo Cider Company in Bend, Oregon. I’m struck by the realization that behind every table is the story of people who not only share my passion for cider, but also have elevated it as makers and the investment of their life’s work.

And then before we know it, it’s time for the doors to open. And apparently a line has formed that stretches around the block.

The line to enter Cider Rite of Spring 2017 at some points stretched around the block. Around 900 people attended the fourth annual cider-tasting event. Photo: NW Cider Association. 

The next few hours are a blur. The hall fills with a hum of festivalgoers and tasters, and stays filled. What starts as a trickle of people visiting the Cider Shop wanting extra drink tickets becomes a steady, undulating stream of customers ranging in age from their early 20s to 70s who want more tickets, or to take one or half a dozen different ciders home.

Early crowd favorites emerge at check-out: Alter Ego’s The Guardian Angel Blueberry Pomegranate; Bauman’s Peach Raspberry; Locust Cider’s Smoked Blueberry; Portland Cider Company’s Sangria; Schilling’s Pineapple Passionfruit;  Seattle Cider Company’s Gin Botanical; Woodbox’s Double Barrel Whiskey Barrel Ice Cider. People’s cider tastes are truly as eclectic as the cross-section of Portlanders who showed up today and the cideries filling glass after tasting glass.

Ciders for Sale at 2017 Cider Rite of Spring. Photo: Sean Connolly

But really, everything we have behind the table’s selling, a good sign. I fill orders and event tote bags briskly, occasionally eye the cheeseburger someone brought earlier as a snack that I don’t have time to munch on.  When time allows I make small talk with the buyers, asking them their favorite pours of the day. Unsurprisingly, favorites broadly run the range of ciders on tap. 

Just before my shift ends, I’m asked to substitute in at the Locust Cider table so their server can take a much-needed break. I’m glad I have my OLCC Server’s Permit so I can legally pour. I recently began working part time as a Brand Ambassador for Portland Cider Company, and enjoy interacting with people that are either new to cider or steeped in the craft. In between steady requests for Locust’s Smoked Blueberry, Chili Pineapple, and Vanilla Bean ciders, I chat briefly with a representative from McMenamin’s, and am surprised to learn that their Edgefield Winery has been producing cider since 1992.

I return to the Cider Store to see—somewhat to my relief—that a new crew is handling the transactions ably and don’t need me. My shift’s over: now it’s time to sample some of the ciders myself.

Cider Rite of Spring 2017 drew a large—and enthusiastic—number of Northwest cider aficionados. Photo: Kolin Leishman, NW Cider Brokers

Midway through the event, and the Evergreen’s hall is still packed. It takes crowd gymnastics make way to the tasting tables. I return to the Woodbox and Tumalo table, taste a Pippin Dry and Prickly Passionfruit , one of three samples each cidery is offering, respectively. Both are excellent, and proof that relative newcomers into the cider industry are arriving not only with great product out right of the gate, but with offerings that’ll sustain the Northwest’s reputation of one of the most diverse, innovative, and successful cider meccas in the country.

As I’m tasting, a man approaches and asks if he can snap a shot of four cider bottles and a 2017 Cider Rite of Spring tasting glass in front of a cedar-framed jockey box. The image is artful and the photographer moves with precision, so I ask what he’s going to do with the picture.

Turns out he is Steven Shomler, a former corporate banker who’s followed his passion and re-emerged as an active writer, radio host, and culinary storyteller. It’s quickly evident that not only has Shomler established a storytelling niche in the New American Cider Movement – as well as the local beer scene and Portland culinary movement – he’s dedicated his life to his love of craft in the same way so many of the cideries and people working at Cider Rite have.

Screenshot from the Portland Beer Podcast’s 3/20/17 feature on Cider Rite of Spring 2017. Photo: Steven Shomler. 

For the last hour of Cider Rite I head to tables stations with cideries that are relatively or completely new to me: Steelhead Cider out of Lake Chelan, Washington, Salem’s 1859 Cider Co., Baird and Dewar in Dayton, Oregon, Eugene, Oregon’s  Elk Horn Brewery,  https://www.redtankcider.com out of Bend, Oregon, who’s Pumpkin Pie cider is spicily delicious.  In the quest for completely new, I reluctantly bypass offerings from ‘more established’ cideries—which in this business remarkably often only means established in the past 4-5 years.

Over and over again as I talk to makers and marketers, the same storyline emerges, albeit with slightly different details. It’s the story of people with a passion for their craft , a sense of place, and a belief in the integrity of Northwest fruit and the creative cider-making process. Of striving and sometimes struggling, sometimes completely reinventing themselves and their carers along their cidermaking journey. And, ultimately, finding deep satisfaction through living life on their own terms and embracing the organic, sometimes messy nature of an industry that embraces the cycle of the seasons. And of course, making something that people love to drink.

 At Cider Rite of Spring, even the good-natured, yet sometimes passionate Portland-Seattle rivalry takes a backseat to showcasing Washington and Oregon cidermakers. Photo: Sean Connolly

As the taps close down at 5:45 and the hall finally begins to clear, I feel a brief sensation of melancholy with the realization that Cider Rite of Spring 2017 is coming to an end. Like spring itself, the event was colorful, bustling, frenetic, and seemed (for me) to come to an end quickly.

 But for the event organizers and volunteers beginning the break-down process, it’s not completely over until the hall is cleared. As I leave the Evergreen the realization hits that what I think is a long day is even longer and harder for others.  It fits, my perception of the cider industry, too: people work hard, make time for fun, but there’s not a lot of time to rest on one’s laurels. Things, and trends, move fast.

Cider Rite of Spring is hosted by the NW Cider Association, a trade organization that connects cider aficionados with cideries and cider makers in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and British Columbia. Photo: Sean Connolly 

I recall watching throughout the day as Dorsey, Jana Daisy-Ensign of Finnriver and Gemma Schmit of Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider—also Pomme Boots co-founders and Cider Rite 2017 organizers—and Carolyn Winkler (also with Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider) were seemingly everywhere, coordinating logistics with the cidery representatives and VIPs, greeting event-goers, checking in with and providing volunteers like me affirmation and thanks. Their professionalism, energy—and effort—vastly eclipsed mine. I see Deron Davenport, Sam Rico, and Helen Lewis, Portland Cider Company colleagues that were here this morning even before I arrived and still here as I leave, still working.

It’s an ethos of hard work and energy that makes us cider aficionados who live in the Northwest, the region where dry-hopped cider was invented, very, very lucky. And despite our rainy, cold winter, apple and pear trees are beginning to blossom. Cider Rite of Spring 2017 was a reminder that warmer, brighter days are ahead.  And no matter what your cider preference is, there’s something you tasted today, or tomorrow, that’ll be worth raising a glass.

Sean Connolly is a cider enthusiast who’s much better at writing, talking up, and drinking cider then he is making it. He recently passed Level 1 of the the U.S. Association of Cider Maker’s Certification Program, and lives in Portland, Oregon.

Missed Cider Rite of Spring? Never fear, more spring cider festivals are just around the corner! Be sure to check out next month’s Hophouse Ciderfest on April 1, Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider Hopped Cider Fest on April 9, and the Hood River Hard-Pressed Cider Fest on April 22.

[caveangelascendant]

Thunderbird: A Wings of Fire Fanfiction

This fanfic is a prequel to The Phoenix: A Short Story.

A bright red dragoness awoke, and stretched her wings.

Appalachia prepared for a new day as a cook in the SkyWing palace. She put on her uniform, a simple necklace that identified her rank. It was made of finely smithed iron wire with a piece of white, cloudy quartz on it, identifying her as chef class. She checked her appearance in the mirror, then stepped out of her door and into the open air.

The sky was filled with other palace employees waking and commuting to work. Several miles from the palace, about a five minute flight, were the servant quarters. They were tall, hollowed out, stone spires. Inside, they could accommodate 10 or so dragons. There was a seemingly endless number of them, stretching infinitely into the distance. Some of the more fantastical dragons out there claimed that the spires, somehow arranged into little circles with small courtyards in the center, had been enchanted by the queen’s animus. Then, one had proceeded to tell her, the reason he was never seen was because he lost his soul and was killed. Appalacia wasn’t very sure he was a reliable source, however, since he thought that the RainWings were conspiring to take over the continent with wooden scavengers.

She was so wrapped in thought about the other conspiracy theories perpetuated by other dragons, she almost didn’t notice the palace in time. Rising magnificently from the mountains, the palace and the arena were a sight to behold. Appalachia abruptly changed her course in time to avoid hitting a tower.

She sailed down and swooped in through an open landing window. She took some time to get her bearings, then stepped down the hall. After taking several turns and going through multiple hallways, she arrived at her destination. She stepped through the door.

A large, stone, room with big windows opened up in front of her. Only one other dragon seemed to have already arrived. A burly dragon with was preparing the ovens by spitting fire into them. As Tomato (yes, that was his real name. However, he prefered to be called Tom.) heard the door close, his head whipped around. Appalachia was met with a hawk-like expression. “Seems like you’re the only one ever on time here,” He stated, lashing his tail.

“I try,” She responded.

“We need the stoves lit and sautéing supplies ready to go. The princess’s hatching day is in three days, and it looks like Queen Topaz is going  to be inviting some royals and having a feast. We need to start preparing. I’ll have the others get me some meat.”

Appalachia nodded and turned to start up the oven. She started the fire inside of her. It was an odd, warm feeling that she quite enjoyed. She released it onto the stoves, igniting the wood beneath. They flared up. Afterwards, she exited to the supplies closet. It was on the left wall, and was rather large. She looked to her right, once inside, and picked up several of the pans. She carried them to the kithen and rested them on one of the preperation islands next to the stoves.

She returned to the closet and grabbed some eggs, a bowl, some milk, and a knife for a breakfast that would be served to the kitchen staff and the royals. She was about to leave, when Tom called “Olive oil!” Appalachia grasped the olive oil with her long tail and left the room with her pile.

She set her supplies on the same island as the pans, then delivered the oil to Tom. She tossed a pan on the stove. As it heated, she began to crack the eggs. After cracking around 20, she stirred in milk.

Suddenly, six or seven other dragons started streaming in. Some of them tripped over each other. A particularly yellow one looked rather embarassed.

Tomato shifted his gaze to them, and set it into a glare. “All of you are late. We cannot afford to do this so close to a royal feast. Appalachia, on the other hand, was responsible and actually came on time. I expect all of you to get to work immediately. Sunshine, I want you to fetch me some turtles. Aconagua, get a chicken and start marinating it. Goshawk, help Appalachia with breakfast. Blood, I’m trusting you with those tartine croissants. The rest of you, I want you preparing the dining hall and ready to serve the royal family. Go!”

As the other dragons scattered, Goshawk dashed over to Appalachia. She was the color of tangerines, and smelled like them, too. “What are we making?” she asked in her high-pitched voice.

“Scrambled eggs. Go get a cutting board and spices you think would be good and chop some vegetables. I assume you know how to ma-”

“WE CUT WITH KNIVES, NOT OUR CLAWS! WE ARE NOT A BUNCH OF UNCIVILIZED HEDGEHOGS!” Poor Aconagua cowered as Tomato yelled. Goshawk and Appalachia shuddered, both remembering the times they had incurred his wrath.

“-make them.”

“Yeah, I think so.” Goshawk bustled over to the supply closet. Appalachia returned to whisking. Goshawk returned with her supplies and got to work on those vegetables. She added the spinach, onions, and tomatoes to the bowl. Appalachia poured the contents into the pan she’d selected earlier. The scrambled eggs were fairly simple, and she wondered if they had any bacon on hand. However, she was getting a little sick of the supply closet for today, and decided to just monitor the eggs for now. Goshawk sat beside her.

“What are we making next?”

“I don’t know. Could you see if we have any bacon?”

Goshawk sauntered to the closet. She poked her head out and shook it.

“Ham?”

Her head disappeared. It poked out again, shaking.

“Steak? Maybe?”

Another negative from her.

Appalachia lashed her tail, sighing. “Looks like I’m going hunting. Tell Tom.”

She departed from the room and found the nearest landing platform. She took off into the sky, twisting down, then spreading her wings wide. She shot into the clouds and steered herself towards the forest.

It was fairly close to the palace, and easy to find. She spotted several other dragons hunting in the pine forest below. The sound of birdsong echoed through the trees. She tried to remember what the queen’s favorite meat was. It wasn’t scavenger, it wasn’t chicken, it wasn’t pork or bacon…

While she was hovering, another dragon smashed into her. “Watch where you’re going!” He yelled, glaring at her and flying off.

Appalacia snorted in annoyance, then remembered. Cows! The queen liked cows! But that would mean she had to go to the outskirts of the scavenger den. Which, without weapons or armor, was not the best idea. But what was a good idea was landing so that another dragon didn’t crash into her.

She landed on the ground. Her thoughts returned to her. If she tried to set the scavengers on fire, she also might burn the cows. Actually, where even was the nearest scavenger settlement? She decided that she would try and find some venison.

She lifted into the air and flew slowly over the forest, trying her best to skim the treetops quietly. After several minutes, she saw a brown flash. She landed, and the thump attracted the attention of the buck. He released a call, and ran.

Appalachia took off, flying after the deer. He dashed away, but Appalachia’s size gave her an advantage. They raced through the forest. At some point, she began to wonder whether the deer was a mortal. He seemed to have endless energy. Finally, he began to slow down. She seized her chance and pounced. She made quick work of the buck, and started to fly back to the palace.

When she returned, the kitchen was just as bustling as before she left. Dragons kneaded dough, donned aprons, and placed things in the ice box. As Appalachia returned to her stove, she saw something that she should have expected.

Goshawk was squawking loudly, and Tom was tossing water on the stove she was using earlier. One of the serving dragons was removing a metal pan with black gunk inside.

She stepped forward. “What happened?”

“Well, somebody managed to set the scrambled eggs on fire. And the pan. I’m not sure how that happened.” Tom looked thoroughly annoyed.

“It was an accident!” Goshawk whined. “I was just adding in the flowers!”

“Flour? You don’t add flour to scrambled eggs. It’s not even a spice!”

“It was in the spice cabinet! And I thought it would make it smell good! Flowers smell good, right?”

Appalachia sighed. “Well, looks like I’ll be making yet another pan of scrambled eggs. We need pepper, onions, and spinach.”

“Not possible,” noted Tom. “We’re all out of eggs. Aconagua had to use some for the marinade, Blood needed two for the croissants, and Sunshine knocked over rack they were on.”

Appalachia groaned. “At least we have this deer I caught. Does the queen like venison?”

“She’ll eat it.”

“I’m taking that as a no.”

“You should.”

“So what are we going to make now?” Goshawk asked.

Tom thought for a moment. “We’re going to get some cows. Correction: You’re going to get some cows. Appalachia and I will be staying here. I’d go, but I don’t trust Sunshine with pointy objects.” As if on cue, a loud yell emnated from the back of the room near the cutting board.

“But I don’t want to! Why should I have to? Appalachia should do it!”

“Appalachia just went hunting. For half an hour. It takes half an hour to get to the scavenger den, where they have cows. See, it’s even. NOW GO.”

“But I’m Lord Jasper’s son!”

Tom rolled his eyes. “I know. You’ve told me a thousand times. You signed up to be a chef, so go be a chef and get ingredients. Shoo.”

Goshawk groaned overly loudly, stomped her foot, and stamped out the door.

“Wish I could fire her,” Muttered Tom.

Me too, thought Appalachia. Me too.

--------------------------------------------------

Appalachia prepared to serve breakfast. A late one, at that. She removed the beef from the oven, drained the extra sauce, and plated it. As she delivered it to the table, she saw the queen analyzing her out of the corner of her eye.

Queen Topaz was a positively terrifying dragon. Her scales were a shade of light orange, and her horns appeared to be gold-plated. She had rubies embedded in parts of her tail, and wore a ridiculous amount of jewelry. But the most infamous part about her was her penchant for murder and conflict.

She had laid 10 female eggs, killing all except her youngest, Rose Quartz. She had torn down the marketplace in what was the arena during Queen Scarlet’s reign. She had rebuilt the stadium, and farmed scavengers in the nearby den to pit them against prisoners. She was said to kill the parents of arena champions herself, and was always at the helm of every battle. She had convinced the NightWings to rebel from Queen Glory’s reign and intimidated the MudWings into joining her side in the war that she had created.

Her daughter, Princess Rose Quartz, sat beside her. Appalachia had met her, and she was… not pleasant to be around. The princess was stuffy, snobby, and had a perpetual way of looking down on a dragon, regardless of whether or not they were taller than her. She was slightly intimidating, though nowhere near as intimidating as her mother.

Across from her, Prince Sardonyx sat, eerily tranquil. No dragon, besides the royal family, saw much of him. His scales were a reddish-cream, with a brown ridge and vibrant red horns and wings. His eyes were a silent amber. She had heard that he had fought in the arena multiple times, but she found that hard to believe.

As she set down the meal’s main course, Queen Topaz snorted. “Finally. I have been waiting for ten hours.”

Sardonyx turned to her, his eyes serene. “It’s only been twenty minutes.”

“Shut up,” she snapped.

Sardonyx fell silent. Rose shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

Appalachia stood by, ready to serve the royal family. They already had water in their glasses, but still. She felt uneasy.

After several on-edge minutes, Topaz eyed Appalachia. “Are you Appalachia?”

Appalachia stiffened, and bowed. “Yes, your majesty.”

“I would like to speak with you after breakfast. We have… business to discuss.”