Reeling in the Last Good Times of 34

Tomorrow is a big event. The WL team is going to have the summer Corn Hole outing, aka Cornholooza. Lunch at the WL so Ane Lyn and The Cruise Director can have a few more beers. They are kind of in stop motion on the tour. A beer here, a beer there, but not significant progress.

At any rate, we are having two corn hole events. One at Ane Lyn's, then we are going to move on to the evening session at Hollow Leg's. The significant part of this event for me is that is it my last blast in my early 30s. I am going to be turning 35.

Where the heck did it go. I still remember waking up hung over when I turned 25 and thinking it was slipping away. Oh the beers I have drank between now and then. I had never even had a wheat beer - what was a dunkel. It was around that time I started to explore the world of beer - and ironically the world at large.

I had never been to Paris where I drank Kronenberg from a dirty glass in some little cafe. I had never been to Oktoberfest and partaken of the beers from Munchen's finest breweries while listening to Ompa Bands. I hadn't been to London and enjoyed glass after glass of John Smith's Extra Smooth and Boddingtons.

I had no idea the Smithwick's existed . . or that I would even need a break from the black gold I know as Guinness. I had never been to Switzerland . . I can't even remember what beer I drank there - probably something German.

I wasn't that green. I knew about Abita beers - only the turbo dog though. I discovered those on a trip to New Orleans (one of the greatest cities in the world). I had been to San Francisco and tried Anchor Steam.

I remember drinking the lovely beers from Left Handed Brewing in Longmont, Colorado - the Saw Tooth was very memorable - just ask the guy who has his pants down in a photo with me. Going to Boulder and checking out all the brew pubs there.

I guess you could say that I could trace my travels around the world with the beers I have enjoyed in those places. It is a universal thing.

There's no I in team, but there is a ME

So I have been waning on the WLWTOB blogging. Part of the reason was that Hollow Leg was been out of the country. He has been getting drunk with associates in Korea and Japan.

At any rate, a very funny thing happened. As soon as he landed back in the states, he was begging us to all go out for a team event. As fate would have it, we are going to Happy Hour this Thursday. Here is the very interesting thing . . I cannot remember the last time all of the team actually had drinks together. I think it was the day of the previous Corn Hole tournament.

I think this is going to be a good trip to the Winking Lizard because I think we need to get reacquainted with each other as a team before we have our Corn Hole Fest in a week.

Bags aways! . . . and beers away!!

A Picture is worth a 100 beers

OK. I have always found a strange intersection between events in my life. Sometimes it is more than two things, that those would be intersections among things.

However, I have been diligently logging my experiences on the WLWTOB. One of the beers that we enjoyed was from the Czech Republic. It was call Staropramen. It is pronounced STAR - O - PRAY - MEN. As we made our way around the tour, we had a couple of verbal mishaps. The crack staff at WL was very happy to help us with learn the correct pronunciations.

As you might know, Hollow Leg always managed to add a Fraternity House level of humor to several situations and outings. For this beer, he coined it as Straponman pronounced STRAP - ON - MAN. Not quite correct, but it made it very memorable.

This name was not an isolated incident. On another occasion, Hollow Leg was drinking Arrogant Bastard Ale by Stone Brewing Company. Stone is located in Escondido, CA. The evening we realized this, he called pronounced it - ESCON - DIL - DOUGH. Close, but no cigar (no pun intended Monica Lewinsky).

Irony took a hand here. Hollow Leg happened to be going to San Diego - just down the street - on a vacation the next day. He called me to let me know he was in ESCON - DIL - DOUGH.

So that brings me back to Staropramen. I am checking through my e-mail and a friend of mine - completely unrelated to the beer tour - is in Prague. I asked him to send me a few pictures. Being the beer lover that I am, he sends me the following.















Unreal. I can't believe all of the beers. Of all the silly things.

It just makes me think about all of the intersections in life. It makes me think that a picture is not only worth a thousand words, but definitely makes the 100 beers well worth the journey.

Cheers or as they say in Prague - Na zdraví (to your health)

The Last Beer as a Swage

On my last day of work, Anne Lyn and the cheer leader went our for some wings and beer with me. The awesome staff at Swage got me some chocolate and a gift certificate to the Winking Lizard.

I got two pints of the beer of the month - Mystery Ale - which included the glass. I kept one as a momento and gave the other to Anne Lyn. She had been my trusty partner in crime over the past two years. It felt like old times when we were just staring the WLWTOB. In the days before the boys had to get super competitive about it.

Anne Lyn is in the high 70s now. She is making her way to the century mark!! The Social Director has been cheating, but I think Anne Lyn can make it there first.