Emusing

Apparently MeeMoo the Emu decided to make a break for freedom form the farm where he was living in Tennessee.

This led to the owner seeking assistance from the police and while the aviation unit was apparently not involved, it became a police car chase of an avian.

USA Today:  'He took off down the highway': MeeMoo the emu escapes owner, starts police chase in Tennessee

Thankfully MeeMoo was returned to his farm without incident after 8 hours being on the lam.

The score is thus Harriman PD 1, Emu 0.

As such, the Harriman PD did better than the Australian Army, as they're 0-1 against Emus.

The Weekend In Nashville

Drove to Nashville this weekend.

Did an tour (on our own with a "virtual tour guide") of Vanderbilt University, the Harvard of the South.

Abby is applying there so we wanted to show it to her and it was a nice weekend get away.

Weather leaving Michigan frankly sucked. Icy snow and sleet was coming down that morning and it made the roads a treat, and then a cold rain kept up all the way through Ohio. 

We arrived Saturday night rather hungry and checked into our AirBnB.  We then walked to Hattie B's Chicken for some Nashville Hot Chicken.  The place was packed, and the chicken was out of this world outstanding.  Great stuff.

Sunday morning we started touring Vanderbilt.

Nashville was cool in the 50s so sweaters were worn.  Still, it was sunny and beautiful and it was a fine opportunity to wander around the campus.

In short, the campus is gorgeous.

Right in downtown Nashville, but it's very green and feels secluded and away from the city in its own space, yet with tons of things to do but a few minutes walking distance in the city itself.

The campus is heavily treed with many old trees of many types and squirrels about.

 

Including the Squirrel of Judgment, who looked down upon us judgmentally from a tree mere feet away without flinching or being concerned in the least.

In short it's a great campus, has great programs that meet her interests, and Nashville is a thriving city where I'd think she would be very happy to attend college. Pity the acceptance rates this year are in the single digits percentage-wise, which makes getting in any elite school rather tough.  We will see what happens.

After the morning tour of the university, the kids checked out a local mall and Tash and I went to Belle Meade Plantation/Winery/Stud Farm.  Quite an interesting and historic place.

Did you know that every winning horse of the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont from 2000 to 2021 can trace its bloodline back to a Belle Meade stud?  Pretty amazing.

Lots of historic buildings remain, including some of the original slave cabins, a dairy from 1884, and the 1892 carriage house, as well as the mansion itself.

The carriage house contains some rare carriages and a cannon belonging to The Harding Light Artillery, named after the owner of the Belle Meade farm at the time, a unit raised in 1861 in  Nashville.

After we had explored the grounds we headed in for a wine tasting.

The tasting experience was conducted by the Belle Mead's executive sommelier and we were in for a treat.

Learned an absolute ton about wine and food pairings in a fun and educational experience.    Started with learning how to properly open a bottle and it went from there.

All the wines were from Belle Meade's winery.  Starting with sparkling wine, the Lady's Cuvee,  that went well with the aged piece of cheese on the far left of the plate. Tasted great. 

Then tried the same cheese with the next white wine poured, and it tasted absolutely awful.  Then paired that wine with a more appropriate cheese to the immediate right of the first one and all was well again.  Learned a lot about food pairing from that.

Next on to red wine and why it needs to breathe and how to swirl it around in the glass to aerate it.  Tried the Iroquois  Cabernet Sauvignon right out of the bottle and then swirled it per instructions and it tasted completely different and much better as a result.  Then on to the Gentlemen's Blend which is a really big and tasty wine, and we had some great food pairings with it as well.

Then finished with the blackberry wine which is a delightfully sweet dessert wine that cannot be recommended enough.

It was a great experience and really enjoyable.

If you go to Belle Mead, sign up for the wine tasting experience, it is more than worth it.

After that, we wandered the grounds again for an hour as all that wine meant no driving until we had burned it off.

Then, once we were well and truly sober we picked up the kids from the mall, had some BBQ for dinner, and that was our visit to Nashville.

In short, I really hope she gets into Vanderbilt as I think it would be the perfect environment for her with both a top rated school and city.

Whatever You Do, Don't Say The I-Word

The Detroit News: Chattanooga gunman’s motive a mystery

Quite the politically-correct willfully induced blindness there, wot?

To quote the most eminently quotable Tam: "Ooh! Ooh! I know the motive! Pick me! Pick me!"

NRA 2015 Annual Meeting In Nashville

The NRA's 2015 Annual Meeting is coming up fast, April 10-12 in Nashville, Tennessee.

To pre-register and get your attendee badge ahead of time go here and sign up.

Yes, you can carry at the NRA's annual meeting at the Music City Center in Nashville if you have a valid CPL recognized by Tennessee.

As stated by the NRA:

During the 2015 NRA Annual Meeting & Exhibits, lawfully carried firearms will be permitted in the Music City Center with the proper license in accordance with Tennessee law. Bridgestone Arena prohibits the possession of firearms. When carrying your firearm, remember to follow all federal, state and local laws.

Be sure to check out the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security page on Handgun Permits to get the law to ensure you comply with Tennessee's rules while you're visiting Nashville and don't carry in the very few no-carry zones that they have listed.

While civic centers in Tennessee are typically off limits to carry under TCA 39-17-1311, an exception under 39-17-1311(b)(J)(iii) exists for gun and knife shows and this is indeed a gun show of gun shows.

Looking forward to seeing many of my fellow bloggers there, as well as attending the NRA's Firearms Law Seminar, which is well worth the price of admission. Besides, Instapundit will be the luncheon speaker, Mas Ayoob will be lecturing, and David Hardy will be in attendance.

Should be a great time, and we should be able to organize some blogger get-togethers during that weekend.

Abuse of Alcohol- Historic Fine Whiskey to be destroyed

While the raison d'etre of government is waste this needs to be halted: From WSMV Nashville:

Vintage Whiskey May Be Poured Out

Law Requires Officials Destroy Whiskey That Cannot Be Sold Legally
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Here's a sobering thought: Hundreds of bottles of Jack Daniel's whiskey, some of it almost 100 years old, may be unceremoniously poured down a drain because authorities suspect it was being sold by someone without a license.

Officials seized 2,400 bottles late last month during warehouse raids in Nashville and Lynchburg, the southern Tennessee town where the whiskey is distilled.

"Punish the person, not the whiskey," said an outraged Kyle MacDonald, 28, a Jack Daniel's drinker from British Columbia who promotes the whiskey on his blog. "Jack never did anything wrong, and the whiskey itself is innocent."

Investigators are also looking into whether some of the bottles had been stolen from the distillery. No one has been arrested.

Authorities are still determining how much of the liquor will be disposed of, and how much can be sold at auction.

Tennessee law requires officials to destroy whiskey that cannot be sold legally in the state, such as bottles designed for sale overseas and those with broken seals.

"We'd pour it out," said Danielle Elks, executive director of the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission.

“If it's forfeited to the ABC, we will divide the alcohol into sellable and unsellable alcohol. The alcohol that's available for sale will be auctioned off to the licensees in the state, and the funds will go to the state,” she said.

The estimated value of the liquor is $1 million, possibly driven up by the value of the antique bottles, which range from 3-liter bottles to half-pints.

One seized bottle dates to 1914, with its seal unbroken. Elks said it is worth $10,000 on the collectors market. Investigators are looking into whether the liquor was being sold for the value of the bottles rather than the whiskey.

"Someone was making a great deal of profit," she said.

Tennessee whiskeys age in charred white oak barrels, but the maturing process that gives them character mostly stops when it is bottled. A bottled whiskey can deteriorate over a long period of time, especially if it is opened or exposed to sunlight and heat.

Christopher Carlsson, a spirits connoisseur and collector in Rochester, N.Y., said old vintages of whiskey in their original containers are highly prized.

"A lot of these bottles are priceless," he said. "It's like having a rare painting. It's heavily collected."

...

For now, the whiskey is being stored in a Nashville vault.

Elks acknowledged that pouring out the whiskey would not be a happy hour for her.

"It'd kill me," she said.

Officials with Jack Daniel’s agree.

“Certainly we would be all in favor of the bottles being auctioned off in some way in which the proceeds could go to charity. We've had some discussions with ABC in Tennessee about that particularly, with the oldest bottle that dates back to 1914,” said Jack Daniel’s spokesman Phil Lynch.

But not everyone’s motives are so noble. Some just wish that enormous stash of Tennessee sipping whiskey could be put to good use.
. . .

Attorneys are currently researching Tennessee law to see if the bottles that aren't sold at auction could somehow be preserved for historical purposes.

Pouring a million dollars, literally down the drain is unconscionable and the law should be changed immediately to prevent such waste. At the very least convert it into E85 rather than pour it down the drain - some lucky car would get some very vintage fuel.

This is Jack Daniels Whiskey - a signature American and indeed Tennessean product, for the State of Tennessee to desecrate such a fine and historic item is simply awful. Indeed, the Executive Director of the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission even acknowledged it would be a terrible fate for such fine alcohol.

While my personal favorite is Irish Whiskey, specifically Bushmill's or Jameson's, Jack Daniels is an American icon and a fine and noble whiskey that can stand on its own merits and such historic whiskey, especially the 1914 bottle should be preserved. At least give it to the Jack Daniels Distillery with the condition that it must be kept there in a museum to show the history of their fine product, auction it off for charity in the state, or simply, since its already seized, make any buyer pay the appropriate tax on the alcohol and reintroduce it into the stream of alcoholic commerce.

Save Jack!