irregularities

It's not that I don't enjoy beer fairs, it's that I like to have some idea about when I can expect them.  They always seem to appear out of nowhere.  It seems like it was only a few months ago that Beermad was down at Caja Mágica, and here they are again.  Now, I can't let opportunities to go waste, so went down too, for one day at least.

I was thinking I could give myself a pretty good variety, alternating between light and dark beers.  Nómada was looking a little lonely when I arrived so I darted over and chose the pilsner.  A little something different.  Naturepils is unfiltered and unpasturized, so I expect something interesting.  It's dirty yellow, with a light head, not too aromatic.  The flavor is very soft, just a touch of bitter, and with a mild grassiness in the aftertaste.  It's unintrusive, a good sipping beer, could even be gulped at 4.2%.  The flavor is steady and unchanging from start to finish, harboring no surprises, what you start with is what you finish with.

The wind is a little unpleasant, although we're under a roof it seems like rain could easily be blown in.  I'm wandering a little deeper for the next glass.

La Volet was sandwiched in between a couple of busier stands with food and music, but the offering was attractive enough.  I went for Antiga, the old ale, hoping for my dark side to be fulfilled.  It is a nice chocolate brown, with a mild appley aroma, but the scent is pretty light too.  It's a little bitter at first sip, toasty, not so sweet as I feared it might be, just a little bit of apple flavor bubbles up in the end.  Mostly, though, the beeriness is in the forefront to be savored.  There's a bit of that left on the tongue after every sip, building up to a nice bitter over time.

I'm feeling the need for a nice black beer, and there is a coffee porter at CCVK.  It's the same color as Antiga, but with a creamier looking head.  I don't detect any aroma at all.  I wonder if the wind and food smells have something to do with that?  The beer is a little thin at first, but then a nice coffee taste wafts up.  It's very smooth and only slightly sweet, not tart like some, even coffee, porters.  It's a dort of afternoon beverage, to be relaxing in the garden with, hoping not to get rained on.  Ar 6.5% it's deceptively unchallenging in flavor and could get you to drink three or four before you know it.

Hmm, yeah

Maybe an IPA will have more character.  I stop by Cervezas Sanfrutos for one, and it appears it will do the trick.  It's kind of a dull yellow but bright and citrusy in aroma.  The taste is a little darker than I expected, slier, like the beer put one over on you.  I taste a smirk.  Besides that, it's a pretty standard IPA, nicely hoppy and with a good clean bitter flavor.  It's more energetic than the previous porter, sort of a sunny afternoon/warm evening sort of beer.  I personally would like it for conversation, although some might find it too distracting.

I found my beloved stout at Monkey Brewing, although I wonder if I've had it in the bottle; the name sounds kind of familiar.  (Yep)  It's a nice dark brown, with a fluffy kind of head, not a lot of aroma here either.  It's a very nice sweet and flavorful at first, but I get a touch of sour at the end of the swallow.  The sweet builds up but stays under control, nothing too syrupy.  I keep thinking it's a little bit coconutty, but maybe that's wishful thinking after seeing Galactic Nuts on tap.

Cotton candy?  It's a damn carnival!

To finish up, I think a light beer will be best,  I've already had an IPA, so maybe a lager?  Four Lions is just across the aisle with a Helles.  It's straw yellow, one of the beeriest drinks in appearance of the day.  It smells like a beer, with the typical graininess.  The taste is bitter, slightly grassy, and fizzy.  There's a weird kind of sting at the end of the swallow.  It's nice, but a little dusty, not as refreshing as an IPA might be.

Door wide open this year

So many beers, so many festivals!  Oh wait, so little time!

Gee, what are they doing here?

Beermas Day 12

On the twelfth day of Beermas I poured out for me
Twelve curmudgeons drumming (fingers)
Eleven roosters pipping
Ten kingly pilsners
Nine ladies sighing
Eight cream ales fizzing
Seven spicy mockswans
Six stones a-hanging
Five golden caps
Four calling birds
Three speckled hens
Two flightless non-doves
And a pear cider fresh from the tree

Aw, the last day and I slip up, huh?  Well, at least I can say I post on a holiday anyway.  To end my Beermas I have Founder's Curmudgeon, which I've actually had before on tap, although I didn't remember that when I bought it.  It's fitting, though, as it tasted like Christmas to me at the time.  Here's to a year of beer and happiness and everything else.  Don't you see his fingers drumming with impatience at all the young whippersnappers who think they're so smart?

Drum, drum, drum...

Just popping the cap releases some kind of holiday scent, sweet, spicy, inviting.  I get a little bit of apple with closer inspection.  It looks like a foamy apple cider in color and cloudiness.  But, it's much bitterer, with only a hint of sweet and sour apple as an aftertaste, then going more rum-sweet after a few sips.  Something almost smoky starts to develop, still with hints of fruitiness.  It tastes like a Christmas punch or spiced beer, heavy for the summer, which I thought in June, but very nice on a chilly winter night.

Supplier: La Tienda de la Cerveza
Price: €5.50

drinking with wolves

I had high hopes for the second German movie, high hopes.  I was sadly disappointed.  Possibly I'll think better of it later, but for now, I'm left with a not so positive impression.

Spoilers - I thought, when reading the description, that the story was about a young woman who decides that the wilderness is the best place for her and follows her journey and adaptation into it.  But no, Wild starts with a slightly unhappy introvert deciding what she needs is to keep a wolf in her apartment.  She sees the wolf one day before she gets on the bus and becomes obsessed with capturing it.  She is portrayed as a bit socially awkward, not wanting to party with her co-workers and not in a relationship like her sister, whose boyfriend comes off as kind of an immature dick.  Annia, the main character, is attentive to her grandfather, dying in a hospital, but not very friendly with anyone else.  She also seems to have a hobby of target shooting.  She manages to trap the wolf with the help of some factory workers and strips of cloth and sticks him in a room in her apartment.  Because of her grandfather's illness she is allowed to take time off from work and she spends the time trying to get to know her new soulmate through a hole she has smashed into the wall.  Eventually neighbors start complaining and she has to decide once and for all not to go back to work at all, which leads to her having sex with her boss on his desk, and when he leaves she takes dump on it and accidently sets it on fire by dropping the cigarette he gave her.  Meanwhile, the wolf has managed to escape the room, knocking out a suspiciously square hole in the wall, and she thinks they will run away and be wild lovers together in the wilderness.  Her boss actually tracks her down and finds her with her wolf on the roof of her apartment building.  He tries to convince her to return to work and normal life, but she lets the wolf loose, and her wild side kills her old conventional side.  She runs off with the wolf after calling an ambulance and they run through a sandy waste that looks more like a construction site without machinery than a space near a German city, and when she collapses in the sand in exhaustion the wolf lies down next to her.  As night falls, she drags herself into some weeds to sleep.  In the morning she is deliriously happy to see the sun, even though the wolf isn't around, and it is implied that she has found true happiness in her newly wild state.

I was hoping for something more in the wild, not just somebody trying to force the wild to fit itself into their lives.  Annia seems to want to keep living her normal life at first, but with the influence of the wolf to make her bolder and better.  She kidnaps the poor animal rather than go into the wild herself at first.  Her progression from wallflower to woman of the wilds is shown by her increasing sexual appetite, since only animals with no control actually want sex apparently.  In the beginning she seems embarrassed and bored by her co-workers' antics at the party, and disgusted by her accidental spying on her sister with her boyfriend, but by the end of the film, when she is "wild", she's ready to have sex with cleaners in her boss' office before she has demanding sex with him.  Her awakening of sorts comes when the wolf licks her face and she runs out of her apartment to slide down the banister and get off.  Then she comes back to make scrambled eggs for breakfast like after any hook-up.  I guess the movie is a message against the civilizing forces of our lives as unnatural, and a call to feel our true natures more keenly, although it also shows that we have to give up the comforts that we enjoy to be truly wild and free.

I passed by Cervecería l'Europe before the film, just to get a look at what they had for Founder's Week.  There was an old ale I hadn't tried before, that I recall, which seemed like just the thing.  It's something new, and a chance to take.  Just like going wild, right?  So, I got my Curmudgeon, and it was a nice nutty brown, with a healthy head, not very aromatic but maybe just a little sweet.  Oh my god, it tastes like Christmas.  Really.  It is sweet, but there's also a bit of spice lurking around, cinnamon or nutmeg perhaps.  Besides that, there's the sweetness, which makes me think of a rum mixed drink.  Eggnog, maybe.  It's a little bit heavy, with a feeling of something aged and concentrated in flavor.  Still, very tasty, and definitely something to try...before running off into the woods.

Supplier: Cervecería l'Europe
Price: €6.30/pint