The plan was to drink a single beer today. There's obviously never been a day at the shore where I've had a single beer. It's either all or nothing here in Wildwood. Either I'm too young / too hungover to drink, or I'm hitting a twelve-pack. That's just how vacation goes. I thought it would be interesting, then, to do something different, something I'd never done. Choose to drink one beer.
The beer: a gose with a fitting name for such an occasion. Salt and Sea is a Flying Fish beer (from that mix-pack I bought last week), and it was... okay. I'm not a big fan of goses, whose calling card is salt, and it's weird to taste a salty beer. I guess if you are a fan of, like, margaritas, maybe you'd like a gose too? Definitely this one, which had a surprisingly strong strawberry flavor to it, in addition to the salt. I liked it only because it was beer and because I was on the beach doing it.
Here's another new beer culture thing I did while drinking this beer: I finally used my YETI® metal koozie. I received it as a gift at a wedding in 2016, and for three summers in a row, I forgot to bring it down the shore. 2020 was my year! I remembered to bring it! And I drank one single beer on the beach the entire week! Here was that beer! In this YETI® koozie!
The product acts as advertised—it keeps your beer cold, even a beach day as hot as this. The top of it screws off, you see, and the can of beer is placed in the container, so when the top screws back on, the beer is trapped inside, and the heat is trapped outside. Plus, it acts as the proverbial "paper bag" for the pesky Wildwood Police, who will cite you if they see an open container, but won't bother you if they technically can't see it because there is another metal cylinder around your illegal metal cylinder. (The police were honestly a non-presence this year, possibly because the city wanted people to come to the beach instead of going to the bars, and so they were told to lay off the peaceful folk just drinking a goddamn beer on the beach. The dogs were leashed.)
That's it. I spent the rest of the day completely sober, able to enjoy vacation with a clear mind.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Yeah right.
You should've known from the beginning of this blog post that I couldn't do it, because I have a problem (not to mention that the title of this post has more than one beer's name in it). I went a few hours without drinking, back from the beach, the kids napping, all showered, everyone relaxing, and... I just felt this fucking darkness inside of me.
I don't think it's necessarily that I feel that way every single sober moment of my life. There have been plenty of times this year when I chose not to drink and it was fine. But there are other moments, moments when I could be drinking and during which I'm normally drinking, it's those types of moments when I feel like a ship lost at sea. The prospect of drinking a seltzer during a happy hour when everyone else is relaxing and boozing at a shore house makes that hour feel like an eternity in front of me. It's like I'm on the edge the Grand Canyon and I can only look down and hope I don't fall.
So mental gymnastics leads me to this thought: I'm not really standing on top of the Grand Canyon; there's a 99% chance I can take the plunge and not get hurt, or hurt anyone else; five more drinks won't hurt me.
I know I'm on vacation, and I know that maybe I'm putting too much pressure on myself. But also, I've had a lifetime of reasons to prove to me that maybe I should put some pressure on myself, and that if I can't go one single fucking day of any family or friend gathering without drinking less than two beers, then maybe there's a fucking problem here.
The beer wasn't the problem. The beer—Dank Hill, a play on the cartoon character's name—was pretty good. It was a double IPA, with a plethora of "dank" hops (i.e. strong, earthy hops that remind one of marijuana). I had a four-pack because I was planning on drinking it later in the week, but Dank Hill got moved up in the schedule because I can't control myself.
And no, I didn't get hurt, or hurt anyone else. I didn't black out. I didn't fight with my wife, or drop a baby, or anything else like that (i.e. the type of stuff that happens in my nightmares and makes me wake up in a cold sweat at least once a week). Everything was fine. It was a fun night. We all just kinda hung out at the house and spent time together, shooting the shit and playing parlor games. And drinking.
Drinking because I know now that I am very broken in this specific way. I can't be truly happy in these types of environments unless I have a cold beer in my hand. It's kinda scary to be so dependent on something.
NOTES (Beer #1)
BEER: Salt and Sea
STYLE: Sour Gose
ABV: 4.3%
BREWED BY: Flying Fish Brewing Company
LOCATION: Somerdale, New Jersey
PURCHASED AT: Tioga Beer Distributors
PAIRED WITH: turkey and cheese sandwich out of the beach cooler
GRADE: 2 pukes out of 5
NOTES (Beer #2)
BEER: Dank Hill
STYLE: Imperial IPA
ABV: 8.8%
BREWED BY: Neshaminy Creek Brewing Company
LOCATION: Croydon, Pennsylvania
PURCHASED AT: ABV Port Richmond
PAIRED WITH: sloppy joes / Name Five
GRADE: 3 pukes out of 5
BEER COUNT: 293 (had another paloma too)
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