Good afternoon.
Today could be the perfect day to start a new journal; a journal of my life through beer. I am at an interesting point in my life currently, and I wanted to document in print some of my most prized experiences and share with (potentially) a public audience my day-to-day goings-on, specifically in the world of great beer.
I have pretty recently fallen into obsession with the world of craft beer. I very seriously began collecting and 'cellaring' beers in late 2011. This all started with experimenting with a few Belgian quads and Christmas beers stashed in my linen closet; to full-on beer-trading, frequenting bottleshops, making friends and establishing connections, ordering and reserving beer through distributors, and overall hoarding beer. It's the first week of April, 2012 and my linen closet is at max capacity, my refrigerator looks like a beer cooler, and there are a few stuffed beer case boxes scattered about the apartment.
Yesterday alone saw the arrival of another case of beer. My friend Jeremy and I trekked on down to a local distributor to go halves on cases of Sixpoint Resin and the newly-released Weyerbacher Insanity. At least in regards to the Insanity, my intention was to add more bottles to the ever-growing collection of 250+ beers that I already have in my possession.
In all honesty, I don't know when or how I'll be able to drink all of these great beers, ranging from vintaged limited release offerings, aging lambics and sours, highly reputable imperial stouts, barleywines, old ales, barrel-aged beers, and other fun experiments. I have been able to inventory everything that I own currently into a GoogleDocs spreadsheet, which I update often and accordingly. Just taking a gander at the spreadsheet (which tracks all possible information from each beer including bottling dates, purchasing dates, prices paid, and general information like style, strength, and brewery location), it hit me as to how difficult this 'cellar' will be to deplete. The beers that are being held or laid down to age alone have enough alcohol in them combined to equal over 32 cases of Miller Lite.
It would be just fine and dandy if I only resorted to drinking from my personal supply each night and sharing brews with my girlfriend and buddies. But, I can't seem to fight the urge to get involved in all of the fun of hunting down the latest release of the latest hyped beer, or just buying more delicious beer to drink from six-pack shops, the bar, and our prestigious local grocery store.
In the past two or three weeks, it was Founders KBS (Kentucky Breakfast Stout) that had me scurrying to different bars and shops asking questions and scanning cooler shelves. I was making phone calls to close-by and not-so-close-by beer distributors, adding my name to reservation lists, waiting in invisible queue for the chance to land and pay $115 for this delicious and rich barrel-aged imperial stout. When my timing suffered and was late to make the cut, I scoured around looking for single bottles, not wanting to miss out trying this year's batch (having enjoyed it so much in previous years when the bounty was much more plentiful). I went above my best judgment and scored my first bottle at a local bottleshop for a semi-outrageous $12.99 a bottle. Seemingly willing to settle on the fact that only one more bottle would fall into my lap after that (I supposedly was on-hold for a bottle elsewhere), I started to give up and feel a bit defeated with potentially only one bottle to show for my efforts. One beer that I could drink, and know that I may not enjoy another until this time next year.
The plot thickens...
As a beer enthusiast, I keep a profile on beeradvocate.com. I comb through the forums, looking for promising trade offers, reading about releases, talk beer with fellow users, and acquire information about the availability of certain beers in my neck o' the woods. I stumbled upon a forum thread about the availability of Founders KBS in my local Pittsburgh. A tip from one 'Beer Advocate' mentioned bottles of said beer were seen at a local bar/restaurant in town. $9 a bottle was the going rate, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity. At work the next day, I decided to give the pub a call and inquire as to how many bottles they had left. The hostess who answered the phone informed me there was still more than a six-pack still in-house, and I quickly and politely ended the conversation and started to devise a plan snag a ride down there after work to score their remaining stock. Public transportation would have gotten me there and back (I bus to work, as I work downtown), but being that this was particularly last Saturday night and the lost time could have fallen me out of favor with my girlfriend as we had plans to go out to eat, I wanted to jet straight down there and jet back home as quickly as possible.
A 20-yr old college student that I work with came to my aid, offering me a ride down to the bar to get my KBS. How could I repay them for the favor? Well, it seems that all I had to do was purchase her a case of craft beer. That's right, I had to supply alcohol to a minor just to satisfy my own obsession. Sure enough, after work found me on my way to picking up the last eight bottles of KBS in the cooler. The bar's six-pack special even cut the price down a bit from what I was expecting to pay, so I left $5 gratuity to the barkeep. On my ride back home, a quick stop was made as was the purchase of a case of Victory Storm King for my accomplice. Sure enough, I shared the story with my girlfriend when I got home with my haul, and out we went for more beers that evening.
It can be argued that the girl was 20 years old and not any younger. It can be argued that the beer she purchased was quality craft and not the typical request for garbage light lagers or malt liquor. However, I still broke the law just to score some limited release beer.
These are the kind of stories that could end up filling this blog--stories about my life and how it is affected by beer.
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