Sometimes I wonder what this column would've looked like if I had thought of the idea a little earlier in life. Like, what if discoveries of beer tasting were secondary to the context in which I drank said beers? If I was 22-year-old drinking a different beer every day, then maybe each entry could be about whatever crazy nonsense I got into that night. This Is My Blood could eschew the beer count, and forget about the concerns over being an alcoholic, and just get into the craziness of life. Document the sloshy Tuesday nights and the craft-beer-soaked Friday bangers. Write about how weird and wonderful life is, ya know?
Not that I necessarily disagree with that notion at this point, that life is weird and wonderful. It can be, on occasions. Like today, Father's Day Saturday, a day that ironically has become for the past three years the one day on the calendar where it is permissible to shirk some of one's fatherly duties. I met up with a couple friends (also fathers) at 7:30 in the morning and had some beers for breakfast as we sat on top of a cave in Wissahickon Park. That's the kind of shit that doesn't usually happen in my life, at least not anymore. If the beers I choose each day are symbolic, then choosing a beer modeled after the life of Hunter S. Thompson was perhaps perfect for the occasion of day drinking in the woods.
Life can be weird and wonderful in different, more subtle ways as well. Consider the family gathering where I spent my afternoon. The other half of my six-pack consumed, we were still somehow able to avoid coming to verbal fisticuffs over the usual political nonsense happening around us, and instead were able to all hang peacefully as our adorable children and niece(s) played in the sprinklers. It was weird only in that I got drunk and behaved myself. It was wonderful because family is goddamn important and we were with them.
Still... this life is different from the life I used to live. Drinking seven and a half beers today was abnormal. This column usually covers the days when I have one half of a beer. It's a beer tasting column. That can be boring sometimes. If every day was weird, then this column would be a whole lot different.
But it's not. I'm cool with that. I had a nice day.
NOTES (Beer #1)
BEER: Gonzo
GENRE: American Imperial Porter
ABV: 10.0%
BREWED BY: Flying Dog Brewery
LOCATION: Frederick, Maryland
PURCHASED AT: IGA, on the warm shelves, in a six-pack
PAIRED WITH: Various snacks throughout the day—Wawa breakfast shorti, cheeseburger from the grill, Pam's pasta salad, etc.
GRADE: 3 pukes out of 5
Oh yeah, I also split a big beer with anyone who wanted to try it. We had spent a large portion of the day talking about different beer styles and our preferences, so it was cool passing out a German Kölsch, a style that not too many people are familiar with. In any case, it's nice to be with kin, sharing something you are passionate about.
BEER: Reissdorf Kölsch
GENRE: German Kölsch
ABV: 4.8%
BREWED BY: Brauerei Heinrich Reissdorf
LOCATION: Köln, Germany
PURCHASED AT: Iron Abbey in Horsham (stopped on the way to my in-laws' to kill some time and get a beer or two)
PAIRED WITH: good times
GRADE: 2.5 pukes out of 5
BEER COUNT: 234
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