Beer Works (for me)

In this winter from frozen hell we all need something to keep us going.

Beer works.

That’s what I kept thinking about Tuesday when our crew was fighting the latest blast of weather dished out by Mother Nature. We shoveled and salted, and then went back and shoveled and salted some more.

For an even dozen hours in fact, and I can tell you from much experience that 12 hours of that kind of work is grueling and physically demanding.

Especially for an old guy like me.

And in the last three or four hours all I could think about was getting Smashbombed.

We all have our carrots, our incentives, our pots-of-gold, to drive us to reach the finish line when our bodies and minds are telling us to quit. For some of us, it’s the simple task of taking off our boots at the end of the day, or the knowledge there is a child’s smile waiting when we return home.

Beer works, too.

The only time I lost my focus was when the J Man’s mom called me about seven hours in and reminded me I had promised to take Jake to the dentist, with the appointment scheduled for a couple of hours away.

Shit.

I had to tell her I wouldn’t be able to make it, which would have started a frustrating argument that would go nowhere back in the (married) day. On this day, however, I simply said that she would either have to take him herself or re-schedule. She said okay, and opted to re-schedule.

Two hours after that call I had to tell her the snow wasn’t going to release me in time to get Jake from school, either.  No problem, said Christian-Ann. In fact, she added to my utter delight, I should not worry about the J Man tonight.

“You get some rest,” is what she said.

That works for me. That works amazingly well. Thanks, Christian!

With that minor crisis out of the way, I could concentrate on clearing the last of the back doors, laneways and forgotten sidewalks, all the while thinking of getting Smashbombed on the glorious IPAs waiting for me at the end of the ordeal.

And then, half a day after it started, it was over and I was on my way home. After a stop at the LCBO, that is.

I got my Smashbombs, as well as a big bottle of Ten Bitter Years double IPA and some Lone Pine IPA, just to be sure.

And there I was, showered and de-salted and cozy in my apartment, finally hoisting a cold one and thinking that all that suffering was worth it.

Pretty skewed way of thinking, I know.

But it works for me.

***

So I’m hearing about these beer glasses that are designed for IPAs, with my pal Steve raving about them after he found them in New Zealand and the lovely Cat doing the Google search and locating them at The Bay stores over here.

The IPA glass, which is similar to the tulip glass but with a longer, ridged, stem, is designed to preserve a frothy head while offering a comfortably wide opening for the drinker to ‘nose’ the beer.

So says the ad copy on the company web site, anyway.

I’m explaining this to the clerk at The Bay store in the Oshawa Centre, though not very well, as she nods in agreement while declaring that “it’s good that it gets rid of all that foam.”

“No,” I respond. “The glass allows the beer to re-foam each time you drink, because you WANT a little head. A little head is good, isn’t it?”

I swear to God it was unintentional, but that was a classic ‘that’s what she said’ if I ever heard it. And her reaction was … nothing.

She didn’t get it, and I don’t know if that’s a reflection of her, or of me. But it turned a potentially funny moment into an awkward one because I wasn’t going to explain it any further.

So I took my glasses home and quickly put them to use, just to see if they worked.

Yes, indeed. That was good head. But that’s what SHE should have said.