Given to the amenities of dining out in Washington (107Cong.Rec.)

This year, for my birthday I facilitated an online class for 6 hours, including 2 spent in live video chat. I'm pretty sure I ate out after the workday concluded, but I remember the beer more (Zoom fatigue is real, y'all). Much like everything this year, this was a great contrast to my birthday dinner last year. In 2019, a friend I was happy to be reunited with in DC met me at Morris American Bar for a swanky cocktail (top left). I requested ethnic food for the main meal because I was still reveling in the many cultures within the Beltway, and my friend delivered with Asian tapas at Momofuku (top right). But the real icing on the cake, to confuse a metaphor, was my dessert: ice cream from Milk Bar next door, complete with a token candle (bottom). 

Not long after my birthday last year, I spent a weekend at Rehoboth Beach with another friend I was happy to be reunited with in DC. Even then, the beach wasn't that crowded (left), but I still wouldn't have been willing to replicate the trip this year, given the COVID numbers on the Delaware shore this summer. Which means, unfortunately, that I wasn't able to have another helping of avocado toast with crab at Egg, right down the street from the hotel where we stayed, Ocean Glass Inn (right).

This year, I'm not missing the the long-weekend trips to the beach as much as the short-walk jaunts to markets in my and other DMV neighborhoods. Down by the Navy Yard intermittently last summer was a food festival called Smorgasburg, with vendors offering a diverse spread of street-food snacks. Looking for something different, I munched on okonomiyaki, an unusual Japanese pancake, and collared green spring rolls, an East Asian/Southern-fried fusion with mumbo sauce (left). As I feel daylight hours dwindling now, I remember how last year, as summer turned to fall, I made it to one last market, at Waterfront Station, before sundown on my way home from work (right). 

 

At this time last year, I was getting ready for a half-marathon in Brooklyn in November. I used my training runs at the time as an excuse to reward myself with beer. One of my long runs was to the Port City beer garden in Alexandria's -now-more-developed Waterfront Park (left). My last long run before the race was to Novemberfest at Rustico in Alexandria. I celebrated the end of my training with samples of some unusual and high-ABV beers:

• The Answer's Fancy AF hazy IPA
• Wheatland Spring Brewery's Natural Remedy, a dark saison
• Black Narrows Brewing Co.'s We Will Reap, a wild ale
• Commonwealth Brewing Company's Phosphor hazy double IPA
• Crooked Run Brewing's Bloom Berliner Weisse
• Benchtop Brewing Company's Wicked Walter imperial stout
• Back Bay Farmhouse Brewing Co.'s Macaron imperial stout

After I actually placed in the Brooklyn race, I decided to continue by beer-motivating tactics in preparing for the Rock 'n' Roll Half-Marathon in DC, which was originally slated for March 2020 before it was rescheduled to November 2020 then pushed back again to March 2021. One day from work, I did a mid-range run to Audacious Alewerks in Falls Church before catching the Metro home (right). 

 

Even when I wasn't training, I managed to intersect beer and exercise. As part of DC's annual Beer Week, I did a fun run from Right Proper in Brookland (top left) to Red Bear in NOMA (top right). The event this year runs for two weeks, Sept. 13-26; sadly, I will miss the festivities. Last year, I attended the kickoff party at Bluejacket (bottom left), where I was given a free Solidarity 2019 IPA because an extra was poured accidentally. As I drank it with my hush puppies, I felt great solidarity with that kind bartender (bottom right). 

 

After riding my bike to Oktoberfest at Port City, I decided to skip any further beer-related physical exertion that day and watched the stein-hoisting competition from the sidelines instead (top). I exerted myself just a little bit at a lambic event at Anxo. Although I went to try some of their Belgian beers, I ended up catching cider from their casks (middle). At another fermented-apple mecca, Capital Cider House (bottom left), I did absolutely nothing but 4-ounce curls with a flight of their first-class offerings (bottom right). 

I am quite beholden to beer and inclined toward cider, but I am willing to give other alcohol a try, which is why I attended the quarterly whisky-laced dinner at Catoctin Creek Distillery last December (left). Still, the group I went with enjoyed a pre-dinner drink at Adroit Theory, which specializes in creative fruity goses and strong dark beers. I had the B/A/Y/S imperial stout variant, whose cocoa nibs and maple syrup got me in a yuletide mood. To top it off, when I got home that night, I listened to Christmas carolers croon for my neighbors (right). And so I wonder: What will the holidays be like this year? Will Santa bring me the ability to unrestrictedly eat and drink out in the new year? Hopefully I've been a good enough girl. Hopefully all of us have.