Beer Advent

http://2012.beeradvent.com/
http://2011.beeradvent.com/
http://2010.beeradvent.com/
beeradvocate.com/community/threads/beer-advent-calendar

I can't believe I never thought of this before.  365 beers just doesn't work.  Too hard to drink every single day.  Or more importantly, too hard to only drink one new beer every day and not go over.  So the natural progression was to just see how many different beers I could drink.  Forever.  I am well over 1000 now after a bunch in 07-08 and then starting again this year and trying to fill in some from memory the ones in betwee.  (you know, during the lapse of focused efforts for the few years after I lost my list in 08 and during the time I moved, and since we were blessed with a son and now a second one).  But now I am again focused on the task at hand.

Wow, I suck at transitions, and that was a rambling paragraph.  But where I was going with that was, I am going to turn my wine fridge that we aren't using (drink a lot of beer, wine and alcohol kind of get forgotten) into a Beer Advent Calender.  I could just doctor up a couple empty 22oz boxes, but then the beer isn't cold.  And you can't drink very many beers warm, at least I don't like to.  Hence a use finally for the wine fridge.  I am going to have Nate stock it with 24 of the 80 or so awesome beers I already have ondeck.  Mix it up a little, make it exciting.  And even go to the store for a few surprises that I haven't had before.

My hope is that I will forget about half the stuff I have in the fridge anyways, and that plus the new ones will make for some good surprises next month.  And A Very Merry Christmas.  Hopefully have the ends facing out with numbers.  I'll post a picture once I get it done.  Something like this.

brew brew brew

Nate has been hella brewing at the satellite office of L-Town Brewing, the L-Town Dogg Haus Brewery.  He finally brewed up his Peanut Cup Porter, and then went crazy and brewed a second batch and made it a Smoked Scottish ale.  Then he went even crazier and brewed this weekend too with an apple pie beer.  We should be fully stocked for the apocalypse next month.  Especially if we can get some Hef and IPA brewed this month too.

Meanwhile we are also going crazy trying new beers, I still have way too many in my fridge since I keep buying them, and he and Barb keeping buying crazy new beers in Seattle and Portland when they travel.  Plus he is hooking up some beer exchanging with some enthusiasts in the Midwest.  All that leading up to me hitting 1102 last night with new beers.  And considering I have 72 in the fridge I haven't had, another 20 at least I have already had, a few homebrews still and three kegs, plus a closet full of homebrew...wow, sounds like a lot when I say it that way...

On my way to 1111

I hit 1088 beers last night.

I just passed Tracy McGrady and Cuttino Mobley in 3s, and hope to catch Dana Barros tonight who has 1090 over his career.  That will put me at #51 on the all time leader board.

Also, if I can get to 1111 I can pass Kareem for all time defensive rebounds in a season and be #1 since they only tracked off/def rebound splits back to 1985 it looks like.  Before that guys like Wilt and Bill Russell used to get 1500-2000 every season and likely most of those were defensive, so probably would blow Kareem's record up, but I do what I can to be #1, even if its going off incomplete records...

It's Stout Day

25-must-try-west-coast-stouts-for-international-stoutday
Brewpublic is awesome.
Plan to get three badges on untapped tonight.  Stout Day.  Flying Saucer stout badge.  And 1000 beers.  That's right, I finally have almost all of my beers logged into untapped, and will hit 1000 with a stout tonight.  I actually have a couple new stouts to try in the fridge, but will likely go with the Elysian Apocalypse beer 10 stout.  It sounds sooo good.

Whiskey Barrel time

Gnate's Barrel Aged Gnarleywine going into a bucket to get re-yeasted if needed.  Turns out it was ready, and went into the bottling bucket instead, 4 gallons at a time to mix with molasses for flavor and sugar for carbonation.  It smelled wonderful and the gravity reading sample tasted great.  This beer is going to be awesome.  We got about 45 bottles (22s) so this should last us quite awhile.  Hoping to drink a little here and there and try aging it over the next couple years.

We also put half of the 10 gallons of stout into the barrel, so in a week we will bottle 5 gallons of Winter Ale (white russian stout) and 5 gallons of Barrel Aged Winter Ale.  So excited.

Great lines

There are some great lines, slogans, taglines, etc in the beer industry.  The most interesting man in the world is easily one of the best advertising campaigns in awhile.

But I just saw an awesome on in the newest Rogue Nation newsletter.  A Coors slogan, "Turns it loose," was translated into Spanish where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea."

I love Rogue.  I went online to order the 15,000 brew that I meant to buy last month.  And there are none available.  Whoops.  Limited releases are like that.  But they have the GYO pumpkin and the fresh hop in really cool bottles.  With us going to the beach this weekend hopefully I can get one of each of these.  They are having elections for Rogue Nation candidates, which it looks I missed the deadline to nominate myself, but there is a contest, and you should all enter.

Had another Widmer Nelson Imperial IPA while bottling last night, as well as tried the un-carbonated versions of our Dead Scotsman and new TriApfelwine.  As well as another Speckled Hen.  All excellent.

And lastly, Ashtown is getting closer and closer to opening.  So sweet.

Stock up for the Apocalypse

I hit 1062 distinct beers on my list last night after a successful meeting at Hop N Grape to plan an upcoming chamber event.  3 of 4 beers on my taster paddle were new and I picked up a few more beers (12) before heading home and had one of those while dealing with Fantasy Football league problems.  (Some unhappy.  Change rules to make some happy. Make the others unhappy.  You just can't win)

But it led me to a quick photo op this morning while checking on the barrel of barleywine.  The beer fridge is just about full of beers I haven't tried with all of the other beers I have already tried being in my other fridge.  I plan to be well stopped for the coming Apocalypse.  I hope you are, because when the water supply is suspect and you run out of bottled water, you will need something to drink.  Which reminds me, I should probably go buy some bottled water.
And toilet paper.

Hop N Grape also finally got a website in addition to Facebook.  Nice!