Beyond January

Dry January is over, but my beer fast continues. Well, it continues until Friday. As a general rule I only drink at the weekend, thus my window of imbibing is open from about midday on Friday until Sunday evening. 

Said general rule has actually been part of my life since my early days living, and teaching English, in Prague. For most of my TEFL career I had lessons at 7am during the week, and as I was teaching people at their place of work, I felt it was bad form to turn up worse the wear for drink, a scruple that wasn't shared by many fellow teachers who would turn up to lessons pissed, or not turn up at all.

During the period of "the holidays" the rule becomes more flexible. I can't imagine Thanksgiving without cracking my first beer before the sun is over the yardarm. There is also this pandemic thing ongoing, so many a weeknight in 2020 saw a couple of litres of beer imbibed either side of the twins going to bed. Dry January is a reset more than anything else, and when you think of it that way, it becomes a 10 day beer fast rather than 31. If you can't stay off the booze for 10 days then you might have to acknowledge you have a problem.

As of right now, I really have no idea what the first beer of the year is going to be. I am fairly sure it will be had at Kardinal Hall, sat outside in their beer garden, suitably bundled for the anticipated low 50s Fahrenheit (9ish in sensible Celsius). What will be in the glass though...if the Rothaus is still on then it it is pretty much decided. You're shocked aren't you?

One of the recurring thoughts I have had during the month is just how little "local" beer I drank last year, and by "local" I mean brewed within 30 miles of my house. I can already hear the acolytes lining up to berate me for not supporting my local breweries, especially given we are in a pandemic and things are hard. Thing is, there is not a single brewery in that 30 mile radius around my house that I am aware of that makes a good desítka, dvanáctka, helles, dunkel, or even a best bitter, as part of their core range, if I am wrong please let me know.

(update: oops, I completely forgot about Champion Brewing's very respectable Shower Beer, d'oh!)

As such my money goes to breweries like Port City, Von Trapp, Olde Mecklenburg, or more recently Schilling. Even then, I am not getting a best bitter into the bargain, but I am happy to sate myself on these breweries' superb lagers. Sorry to be a truculent curmudgeon, but I am not about to start drinking an endless stream of identikit IPAs that I won't enjoy, and to be honest are likely as boring as the next IPA.

Support is a two way street.