About ThayerAvenue.com
Another Silver Spring blog, you say? Perhaps. But this one was inspired both by those that have come before and the overwhelming sense of community on our beloved street. I’ve tried my hand at blogs before and felt like they didn’t have a distinct purpose – so they just seemed to fizzle.
The purpose here, ideally, will be to provide a forum for both my own immediate neighborhood and to discuss larger issues within the Silver Spring community. Interspersed within all that will be small things to amuse myself and, hopefully, a few others.
Feedback is always welcome, and special thanks goes to all the current SS blogs that have kept my downtime at work entertaining. I hope I can add something to the mix.
6 comments6 Comments so far
I have lived in downtown Silver Spring almost 3 years now after 23 years in Germany. I reciently found all the local blogs while trying to find out more on The Birchmere. You, Mr Thayer Ave have hit upon my strong point, namely BEER. What can we do about these fascist who won’t let us get beer at our Trader Joe’s? I have to go to 25th st DC for Fat Weasel Ale, (7.1% for $5.49). They have Ommegang’s Three Philosophers,$5.99 for the 750ml bottle (a truely fine quadruple). And what about the Old Dominion Brew Pub that we were suppose to get? I have hit the one at the Convention Center downtown and their barleywine style Millennium Ale requires a Metro Smart Card in place of your car keys. Hell, how can we move The Brickskeller from Dupont Circle to Silver Spring along with their Guinness Record 1200 beer menu. And their sister pub in Chinatown,RFD’s with it’s 30 taps of international beers. Sorry, but it’s hard living in Germany for 23 years and being sent back to the land that ruined Budweiser (the original is in Czech, and the joke goes that a few pages of the recipe blew off the boat during a storm as the brothers were comming to the USA).
Sorry, but you started this by writing about beer. I work at Walter Reed as an Army civilian and it’s pretty obvious why these brave young men & women are comming to SS. It’s close, and much safer than going further south on Georgia.
Thanks for letting me vent.
B
Boy, have you hit one one of my soft spots. As for your first question about these fascists in Montgomery County, you need look no further than revenue. City Paper had a great article about it a few weeks ago. We got hosed on the Old Dominion Brewpub – as well as the rumored Dogfish Head Ale Pub – which you still have to go to Gaithersburg for (worth the trip, BTW). And while I’ve been to both the Brickskeller and RFD many times, I prefer the tap list at RFD – especially with their seasonal taps and hand-pump ales. Fantastic.
Now for some potential solutions:
1. Rodmans: Not sure if you’re familiar with it, but the best one for a beer selection is over by White Flint Mall in Rockville in the Shoppers Shopping Center on Nicholson (about 1/4 mile east of Rockville Pike). That’s where I go for all the Chimays, Deiriums, Orvals, and the much-coveted Dogfish Head 120-Minute IPA. *Great* selection, and I don’t feel so much like I’m getting screwed with my pants on.
2. Mail Order: I live in Maryland, so this causes problems. It would be potentially illegal for me to order stuff online, have it shipped to my wife’s office in DC, and have her transport it across the state line into Maryland. So I would NEVER do something like that. But you might feel compelled to pursue a similar solution. And we can just leave it at that.
3. Calvert Woodley: Down Connecticut Avenue in DC. For wine and hard liquor, this is the place to go. Pretty good beer selection, excellent wine inventory, and GREAT small batch bourbon and scotch selection.
Please pass all this along to the brave young men and women there at Walter Reed – as well as a note to try out the Quarry House in SS – if they haven’t already. Small beer selection, but always a couple of good things on tap.
Let me know if you’re ever around in the hood for a beer. When the newborn finally starts sleeping, I’ll have a great need for a few cold ones.
Closer to home, the “Beer Wine Deli” in the CVS shopping center on Georgia Ave. near the beltway has a surprisingly good selection of beers. Perhaps if we banded together with a list, they might start stocking some of our more obscure favorites…
The King Farm Beer & Wine store in the King Farm community in Rockville (across from Shady Grove metro) has a fun selection of beers! My most recent favorite hails from Maine: Bay Harbor Blueberry Ale (not too sweet).
I am so thrilled to have discovered your blog while googling Silver Spring Towers. Yet this is also bittersweet because I am being forced to move out of my Thayer Ave. apartment–Montgomery County is forcing my landlord to convert his 3-unit house into a single-family unit. I’ve lived here for five years and it never bothered me nor my neighbors that I’m in a house with 3 kitchens. This fascist adherence to housing code has catapulted four otherwise happy people into a tight, overpriced rental market without any recourse. Anyhow, if someone can recommend reasonably priced apartments around here (I hear you laughing) it would be much appreciated. I am trying to get into another place by November 1.
Hey Eric — how about an entry on the removal of that flimsy fence at the house on the corner of Thayer and Grove with the pit bulls? Already I’m sleeping better as my kids don’t get traumatized when we walk by and a charging menace zeroes in on them.
Just a thought,
SG