Wednesday, December 31, 2014

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With the end of the year upon us and the impending delight, surprise, drama, or doom of the New Year, I felt like this was a great time to drop a little wisdom on the ol’ family blog.  It’s been months since I’ve spun any tales here.  Mostly, this is due to timing, specifically a lack of it.  I’ve had the inspiration, tons of beginnings, but no endings on topics.  Well the end of the year is just that, an end to a ‘topic.’

My travel schedule is the complicating factor.  This got me thinking.  Travel is a pain and I have to do it a lot.  So when I do, I try to keep it simple, travel light, and just focus on essential things.  When traveling, I only require three things and if I don’t have these three things, the travel sucks balls.  The three things are:

1.  Internet – so I can communicate with the free world, more specifically my family
2.  Soft pillow – sleeping doesn’t come easy on travel so a soft place to drop your head is integral
3.  Cold beer – Comfort food.  When in a foreign country, you want comfort food.  For me that is beer

On New Year’s Eve, a discussion of beer seems incredibly appropriate and useful for my audience.  I’ve been reading this book. It was a gift for my birthday last month and it’s called “The Book of Beer Awesomeness.  If you haven’t read this fine literary masterpiece, I highly recommend it.  I’m’ not going to get into a deep thoughtful review here.  I just want to dig into a concept it proposes.  That’s the concept of proper beer drinking etiquette.  The book suggests that there are 15 Rules to Proper Beer Drinking Etiquette.

With the rules below and my interpretation, you should now be able to consume a healthy libations and not be mistaken as a crude and uncivilized heathen.

1.  Always perform toast when drinking the first beer of the day.

A toast is essential.  I read somewhere that the sound of glasses clanging during a toast was thought to ward off evil spirits and bring prosperity.  Tempting fate? Is that something you really want to do?  Toast to your health, family, friends, or whatever it is you appreciate.  The toast will be therapeutic to externalize the importance of appreciation.

2.  Never complain about free beer.

We all know ungrateful bastards like this.  If the sweet nectar of the Gods is being offered to you at no cost, why would you complain about it?  These are the type of people who ask for a favor and then critique how the favor is being delivered.  Basically, nothing is good enough.  Free beer is better than no beer at all.  Remember that and always be considerate.

3.  Always have at least one six pack in your fridge at all times.

If the Boy Scouts of America could drink, then this would be their rule.  Always be prepared.  It’s really pretty obvious.  Came home from a sick time riding your bike?  You need a beer.  Replacing some fence in the back yard? You need a beer.  Unplug a toilet from a family member’s granite-like fecal deposit?  You need a beer.

4.  Have a bottle opening apparatus on you at all times.

I have an infinite number of occasions where I was asked if I had an opener.  In my house, they are everywhere.  A bottle opener on the fridge in the house, a bottle opener on the beer fridge in the garage, a bottle opener on the wall hanging above the work bench in my shop, a bottle opener in the car (it’s only illegal if you’re drinking), even several drawers in the kitchen have them.  And now I have a credit card sized tool that I carry in my wallet for beer opening.

5.  At house parties, mark your beer so you know it’s yours.

There are scoundrels out there who will jack your beer at a house party.  Brand your beer so you know it’s yours to ward off the infiltrators who know no couth and will take your beer because they didn’t bring their own.  Yes, your beer should be left behind after the party has concluded and it will have your name affixed on it.  The host will then see this remaining inventory and knon two things: 1. You brought your beer to a his or her party and are not a free loader.  You in fact have enough respect for them and your beer to assert yourself and your beer in the community.   And 2. You understand Rule 8 below.  Beer gets left behind after parties as a token of appreciation and gratitude to the host.

6.  Never pooh-pooh another drinker’s preference, everyone has their own poison.

There are nearly 100,000 types of beers on this orbiting rock of a planet of ours.  Don’t be so arrogant to say that you’ve drank a sample of all of them and that you’ve been indoctrinated as the supreme ambassador envoy to the stewardship of beer excellence and proficiency.  Seriously dude, everyone has their taste.  Some like hoppy, some like stouts, and some like beer-flavored water.  If you haven’t noticed, beer is the one thing that all cultures and civilizations have in common.  Why not stop judging and start embracing the differences and similarities?  Beauty is in the eye of the beer-holder.

7.  At keg parties, only fill up two keg cups at a time per person.  Any more than that, get back in line.

Filling keg cups at a party is kind of like merging onto the freeway.  Everyone just wants to get going and not have their momentum impeded.  Equally, you don’t want to have someone stand in your way to sweet sweet libations, so why would you do this to another patron?  It’s kind of like the golden rule of beer distribution.  ‘Keep the line moving, keep the beer flowing, and keep the peeps drinking,’ I always say.

8.  If you bring beer to a party, you may drink it, but you’re not allowed to take any extra beer home.

This is one that truly annoys me about people.  They are the same ones who complain about free beer.  For once, they bring their own beer, use your fridge and conveniences, eat your snacks, disparage your preferences, and then take the beer home.  Your beer is a token of goodwill, an offering of prosperity, a gesture of thanks, not a yo-yo of libations.

9.  If someone buys you a beer, you must finish it.

This is a simple matter of respect.  If someone extends his or her courtesy to you in the form of a beer, you should drink it and thank them for such an action.  Now it’s not and hard fast rule for females.  If a dude buys a chick a drink and the chick choose to not drink it, whether that be because she dumps it on him or that she was using her girlish wiles to procure said drink for her friend is irrelevant, she is her accord to not drink it should she choose.  But if you decide to not drink it for some caloric or dietary reasoning, then you’re just a quitter and you suck.

10.  If someone buys you a beer, you must buy them the next round.

Much like Rule 9, this is a return showing of respect to another who has previously celebrated you buy purchasing you a beer.  Return the favor.  At times, pub logistics may not allow for neutral round purchases.  When this happens, keep a mental ledger of your unbalance beer book.  Make sure you pay it back in some way, shape or form.  Be a good beer drinker.

11.  If someone buys a round for the group, the group should toast to the buyer’s health.

This is the combination of Rule 1 and Rule 10.  Toasting is a sign of respect and appreciation, especially the buyer who bought a round for the group.  Celebrate this person’s supreme awesomeness.

12.  If you spill someone else’s beer, you owe them a new one.

This is what we call a ‘Party Foul.’  They happen.  Most of the time, they are accidents.  Their frequency increases proportionally with the amount of beer consumed.  So you can’t avoid them.  What you can avoid is being a D-bag and not acknowledging the incident and not rectifying the situation.  If you disrupt someone’s consumption of beer by way of spillage, be a Good Samaritan and apologize and fix the situation.  There’s nothing more sad that a spilled beer with no home.

13.  If someone leaves their seat to get a new beer, you must honor their claim on the space for five minutes.

Seating at pubs can be a high-value item.  Sometimes you’re the seat predator, and sometimes you’re the seat prey.  We’ve all done it, watched for someone to get up and buy another beer or hit the restroom, then swoop in and rest our tired ass on their seat.  But you must honor the effort of their claimed space as you don’t know the effort to which it was originally procured.  Honor thy time limit unless of course the person doesn’t claim the space then it’s yours.

14.  Never bring beer into the bathroom.  It’s just weird.

There are exceptions to this rule.  Bringing a beer into a public bathroom at a pub or restaurant?  That’s just stupid.  Bringing a beer into the men’s restroom at CenturyLink field during a Seahawk game? Absolutely acceptable.  That’s why there are folding beer trays above the urinals.  At home, this rule doesn’t apply.  There’s nothing more perfect than a beer in the shower.  Trust me.  I’m the theorist of the three greatest inventions of mankind: 1. Beer, 2. Running water, and 3. Toothpaste.

15.  Clean up after yourself.  You weren’t’ raised in a barn.

I mean, even if you were raised in a barn, you must know that you need to clean up your stall.  Seriously, don’t leave your bottles and cans strewn about your home or a host’s house.  At the very least, ask “Do you recycle?”  Most likely the host will tell you, “Let me take care of that for you.”  And just like that you’ve used the Jedi Mind trick to pick up after yourself.  Worst case is that the host tells you where to place the empties.  And then you’ve helped them clean up their abode and will look like a patron saint of drinking who will now be invited back due to your appreciation of personal space.  Yay you for continuing your beer prosperity.
In conclusion, rules are made to be broken but only in the most extreme or extenuating circumstances.  As I mentioned above, civilization after civilization and culture after culture, we have all shared in the commonality of beer and celebrated its unique taste and satisfaction.  Through its and our diversity, we’ve found harmony.  So listed above are the 15 Rules for Proper Beer Drinking Etiquette.  While I can’t take credit for this hypothesis, I can take credit for my biased interpretation of the rules listed below each.

While I may not be an expert on this, or anything for that matter, I do know I love beer.  Being that it is one of the greatest inventions of all time, one of the things I require for my travel comfort, and embodies the true definition of awesomeness, it seems incredibly appropriate to pen down some text about beer on New Year’s Eve.

Tonight, enjoy your beers, appreciate your hosts, toast you friends and family, and kick out 2014 for great start to 2015.

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