A few odds and ends I’ve observed over the past couple of days at the Oregon Brewers Festival…

It’s interesting to note the general level of “hum” or background noise you encounter when entering the tents after a certain time of day; keeping in mind that these tents are open at the sides, there’s this general buzz of activity that’s really quite remarkable compared to the open areas. Noticeably noisy and (if you’re sensitive to this type of thing) distracting.

Maui Brewing’s CoCoNuT Porter apparently sold out in the first half hour of the Fest on the first day—taps were blown by 12:30 which seems insane and must be some kind of record. I don’t know about the exact timing but I can confirm that later on, they had posted “Mana Wheat” on their sign in place of the original “CoCoNuT Porter.” (I have picture evidence coming.)

Typical Portland weather: today (Friday) started out cloudy and gray but by noon had burned off and was nice and hot and beautiful. The crowd was perfect when I arrived today at noon: small and manageable. Even so, there was a line already formed at the Firestone Walker Double Jack station (go figure).

The north tent at the Fest today definitely seemed far busier and more crowded and loud than the south tent—more party-ish and a younger-feeling demographic. Not sure why this is delineated so obviously considering the park isn’t that big; maybe the higher-alcohol beers are in the north? (Note to self, look into this later…)

The two best beer-names-as-puns so far: “Berried Alive!” and “Ginger and Meyer Ann”.

Finally, Portland is ripe for people watching, but I can only relate two that stuck out in my mind (and one is simply a t-shirt phrase): some guy that from behind looked like Guy Fieri (from Food Network) although he didn’t have enough tattoos (which in Portland is saying something), and a girl whose t-shirt read, “Shakespeare doesn’t like your emo poems.” I enjoyed that one.