A Founders KBS for One

Tonight I drank a Founders KBS. BeerAdvocate ranks it a 100 FWIW. To be honest, I’m not sure if I’ve had it before.

I don’t seek out rare beers. If I’m in a new city I’ll check out a bottleshop and see what they have. But you’ll never catch me standing in line for some rare release only at the brewpub where I have to sleep in a tent in the rain in order to get it.

I actually didn’t even purchase this KBS. My wife did! While I was at my fantasy baseball auction of all things! She was even able to talk her way into buying two.

With these rare/special beers I usually share them. Beer is meant to be shared amongst friends IMO. Drinking with others is always better than drinking alone. Or at least most of the time. I should have shared this one.

KBS runs over 12% ABV and I feel it. Whoops. Guess that’s what it takes to get me back writing about beer.

That’s all I have for today. More soon hopefully.

– Josh

Unleash the Pumpkin Beers

Beer friends! What’s up?!

I’ve been cranking away at SOB 2.0, oh… wait… you haven’t heard? Earlier this summer I finally purchased shortonbeer.com and I’ve been writing there every single day. It’s not just about beer though. Actually beer only comes up every so often. It’s about me and life and being a creative professional and about anything I feel like writing about.

That’s not why I’m writing this post. I’m writing this post because I’ve had my first pumpkin beer of the year. I fought the season creep and held out to almost a week into September. Pretty good, right?

I’m helping my wife help my friend craft some paper for welcome bags for her wedding next weekend and knew it was time to break my pumpkin beer yearly seal. Since Starr Hill was so gracious to send me their Boxcarr Pumpkin Porter I felt that it’d be right to start with theirs.

Maybe it’s because I had it at the end of the season last year. Maybe it’s because I’m sick of crafting. Maybe it’s because it’s my first sip of pumpkin in months. Maybe it’s because they changed their recipe (I have no clue – I was bad and didn’t read the letter that came with the beer!) But this beer tastes leaps and bounds better than last year’s.

I have no hard-hitting or in depth analysis. I just dig this beer tonight. I’ll probably head into the garage and grab my other one soon. We’ve crafted 17 of the ~80 things we need to make. And we’re pushing close to three hours…

Time for another beer. Time for a pumpkin beer.

Before you go, what’s the first pumpkin beer you had this year?

The Root Beer Beer Thing

This weekend I had Small Town Brewery’s Not Your Father’s Root Beer, or as I like to call it: The Root Beer Beer Thing. It was…different.

Quick Info:

• Brewery – Small Town Brewery
• Beer – Not Your Father’s Root Beer
• ABV – 5.9%
• Style – Herbed / Spiced Beer
• BA Rating – 87%
• Untappd Rating – 4.19
• Where Did I Have It – Brazwell’s in Charlotte, NC

Can’t Sleep So I’m Writing This Post

Hey! What’s up? I can’t sleep.

It’s Friday night. I’ve had a good day including all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ and a trip to Lost Rhino. No complaints here. Still can’t sleep though. So I decided to fire up the MacBook Pro, grab a beer, turn on MLB Network and write a few words.

Moments ago Brian McCann hit a walk-off homerun for the Yankees. I’m not a Yankees fan but funny story. Last year when I was at a Yankees game sitting ridiculously close, I turned to my friend when McCann got up to bat and said, “How is this guy a professional athlete?” McCann promptly hits a homerun that at bat. Fast forward to this year. I’ve been fortunate enough to go to two more Yankees game and McCann homered in both of them. And tonight as soon as I turn on the TV McCann walks off Tampa Bay. Mr. McCann – if you want to keep hitting homeruns I might need to get a cut of your $17,000,000 contract for this season. And I’m sorry for questioning your athletic abilities.

What else is new? Hmm. I paid off my car! My 2010 Toyota Corolla is officially mine. Now about those 120,000+ miles I’ve put on it over the past five and a half years…

Tomorrow I’m headed over to my cousin-in-law’s for 4^th of July festivities. I’m bringing a growler of Lost Rhino’s Native Son. It’s my favorite Lost Rhino beer, even beating out the great Ice Breaker. It is made with 100% local ingredients. Kinda sounds like a project my buddy is working on… Speaking of Lost Rhino, has anyone been to the new Lost Rhino Retreat yet? Maybe I should do a quick visit and write-up…

I’ve had a couple ideas floating around in my head in regards to Short On Beer. I really want to get this whole email list/email marketing thing set up on my other site. But I pretty much never do anything over there unless I test it out over here first. Sorry, not sorry. You’re my guinea pig. First, I don’t even know if I can do MailChimp or another email marketing service for a .wordpress.com website. But if I can, I’m fairly certain I’m going to test it out over here. I guess that means I should probably write more… Hmm…

Another idea is to start a new YouTube show. I’m thinking it’d be called “An American Guy Drinking Beer and Learning Japanese.” And it’s pretty much about that. I’m headed back to Japan (!!!!!!!!!!) in a few months and want to speak enough Japanese to get around much better than the last time I went. And I figure the easiest way would be to have fun with it and learn Japanese words around things I like – beer being one of those topics. I’m thinking like a 3-5 minute show, drinking a beer, and talking about a couple Japanese words or phrases that I learned that week. IDK. What do you think?? Crazy? Dumb? Brilliant? I have no idea.

Alright. That’s about all the words I got left in me tonight. Time to finish this beer and force myself to hit the sac.

Leave me some comments!!

The Bloodline

By all means I wanted to have a post up last week. I have a solid draft and everything. Life, as it seems to always do, got in the way. And as I sit here tonight with a couple free minutes while I wait for a side project video I’m working on to render I feel like I can word vomit something of meaning. Let’s talk about the beer that I’ve drunk more than any other the past year.

There’s an empty bottle of Flying Dog Bloodline on my desk. I had it last night I was up late “hustling” on this side project that I’m still working on tonight (and will be working on the next several nights and weekends). Flying Dog Bloodline for those who don’t know, is a blood orange IPA. It’s a dangerous 7% and damn is it good.

I’m not one really for beer reviews anymore so I’m not going to go into mouthfeel and bubbles. I’ll leave it up to you to read the 1,000 or so reviews on BeerAdvocate if you want to know that stuff. I recommend you trying it for yourself and if you trust me, which you should, I think you’ll enjoy it.

I typically work from 7:00am-3:30pm (+/- 15 minutes). I work in a happening area of DC with plenty of bars and happy hours. But I live an ungodly distance away so generally I like to get out of town by 4:00pm. The thing is though most of the bars don’t open until 4:00pm. However there are days when I want a beer before walking to the bus and passing out for the hour+ trip back to suburbia. Thankfully there’s a little sports bar around the corner and I have a coworker I can usually convince to join me for an afternoon beer.

The sports bar though has a small selection – the usual BMCs, Sam Seasonal, usually a Shiner, Stella and … Flying Dog Bloodline.

Bloodline is $6 for a 16oz pint or $7 for a 24oz. Guess what I’m getting? Yeah. Bloodline. Tall, please. Which nearly every time the bartender thinks I’m saying “Bud Light” (and I got served it once). I’ve now added “Flying Dog” before saying “Bloodline” when I order it.

On those rare occasions my coworkers talk me into staying past 4:00pm to go to happy hour I still want to leave at 3:30pm and grab my usual spot at the bar while they all finish up their tasks before we go out and have fun. That 24oz Bloodline at 7% goes down very easily and I’m nervous one day I’ll wake up at the last bus stop some 25mi past my house in the middle of nowhere.

That’s Bloodline to me. That’s the beer I’ve drunk the most over the past year. What’s yours?