Welcome in everybody. It's the craft beer republic.

Thanks for drinking. Thanks for joining.

I am Greg and I am being joined by my own little Louisville Slugger.

And that's Flex. What's up, big fella?

Hey, man, I survived a. Family road trip.

I am very proud of you. I'm pleasantly surprised and I

can't wait to hear about it. Literally living proof.

Quick spoiler, quick teaser for the listeners. Did you murder anybody?

Uh, not a single person. Okay, the story is gonna suck,

then. No. Just kidding. Oh, those fucking family road trips.

Uh, thank you all for listening. Thanks for joining all that good

stuff. Find us on the socials. @CraftBeerRepublic @flex_me_a_beer

underscores in between. Apologies up front if you hear

some sirens or the people next door to me fucking or whatever.

I am in Orange County in a hotel room.

The internet is quite garbage and the walls are quite thin.

So we will see how this goes. Might turn into a porno show

quite quickly. I was just gonna say not a porno

show, but I wouldn't hate the latter. Well, give it some time.

Give it about 30s. We'll see what happens.

I closed all the Blue Owl it takes. Me too. I mean. Yeah.

Not a 32nd joke. Good night everybody.

I've closed all the blinds and curtains. Anything I can close.

I still keep hearing, like, loud cars driving by.

So, uh, apologies in advance. We'll see how this goes.

Um, all right, before we get into some things,

I really need to get into this beer because, uh. Well. I'm thirsty.

I Love My Beer. I Love My Beer. I Love My Beer. I Love My Beer.

Well, because I am in the county of orange.

And that's California, I thought I will go hit up their

finest bottle shop and see if I can find something local.

I found it was literally called fine liquor and spirits.

Nothing but. The finest. Only the finest at fine liquor

and spirits. The name like that. Bound to find a winner.

So I found Bottle Logic Brewing's Recursion IPA.

It is 6.5%, has 85 IBUs and a 3.9 and untapped with almost 11,000 ratings.

So I'd say that's pretty impressive. Wow. From the brewery, they say.

The culmination of our recursion. West coast IPA experiment brewed

with El Dorado, Simcoe, Mosaic and Columbus.

Then just dry hopped with Mosaic and Simcoe.

As you can see, I don't know the colour of this

because I'm in a hotel and don't have a glass to pour this into.

Yeah, it is in a can, I can, I can see that I can co-sign a can.

Pretty colorful can. I don't uh, I don't hate the can art.

Yeah. No, that's a really neat can. Yeah, that's kind of cool.

Uh, the schnoz is fairly piney. A lot of dank. Lot of pine.

I feel weird putting my nose in a can hole.

Let me stick the old, uh, Tongue-jobber in here.

Ooh, don't cut it. Had enough injuries this weekend.

Uh, the flavors really follow suit. Hold on. One more sample.

He's thirsty. I'm thirsty. Boy. Uh. Lots of dank, West Coast resin.

A little bit of, I want to say, grapefruit.

Something citrusy and pithy in there. Has a nice light body to it.

Not overly malty. Fairly light and crispy for a

for a Westie. Which we all know I appreciate.

And, um, you know, I'd drink again. I think this beer came out to be,

uh, a single. I think it was like six bucks

for the single. Would I spend $24 on a four pack?

Probably not. But I'm enjoying this one. $6 worth.

I like this new rating system we have. Me too.

It's kind of growing on me. Yeah, and it's pettier than

normal rating systems. And if it's kind of like a,

it's like a put up or shut up kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah, it really is.

And if nothing else, I'm definitely petty.

So this this works out quite well. Uh, all right, let's let's, uh,

jump into it here. Flex had a little birthday road

trip last week. You know, it wasn't because of

the birthday, but. But the timing worked out nicely.

But the timing worked out because. Just because it's the week I

take off every summer. Sure. Well, how'd it go?

Um, best drive to I've ever had. Wow. It was wildly smooth,

so I just wanted to start there. Only had to stop once. Halfway.

The kids had to go to the bathroom. Sure.

My wife wanted to pass on all the roadside gas stations,

and she looked at one that was like, seven miles out of the way,

which I was fine with. You know, I,

I it's a reputable stop, so. Um, but aside from that,

it was a very wonderful drive. Ohio, like the southern part of Ohio,

is shockingly beautiful. And I can't say I'm surprised to

hear that northern part, because I've never really I

don't remember driving through. I did it once,

but I don't remember it. Uh, a lot of, like, rocky formations

on the side of the highway, which you would never think.

I just think flat. You just think flat, right?

Midwest. So it was nice. It was surprisingly enjoyable.

Uh, drive. Hot as balls. Um. And, you know,

anywhere southern south of Wisconsin. It's hot in here in the summer,

so it's going to be even hotter. You know.

Down there wasn't the South having, like, a heat wave this last week

or something? Yeah. I mean, it was really anywhere

from like 90 to 95 all week. So the heat was brutal.

It rained a little bit, checked out Findlay Market in

downtown Cincinnati. It's, uh, from what my wife said,

supposedly the oldest public market in the the country,

which you can fact check that I didn't look into any of this at all.

But then the trip had it started off on the highest note.

I had the best meal of maybe my entire life.

There was a restaurant, I believe it was called French Krust and company.

And it was this cutesy little French themed restaurant at the

end of the market. And I got a French dip sandwich.

Because, you know, when in France. Right? Oui, oui.

And just everything from the bun. It was on the beef. The cheese.

They had not like a traditional aju to dip it in.

It was like this homemade dip. And it came with, uh.

I don't know if I'm pronouncing this right. Bechamel. Bechamel?

Bechamel. Yeah. So I would take a slab of that,

put it on the bite I was gonna dip. Then I would dip that into the dip,

and I dip, you dip, we dip. And I was rock hard.

Hand on your hip. Yeah,

I was rocked up the entire meal. I could not shut up about how

delicious it was, and I didn't care about anything else in the world at

that moment. Nice. It's phenomenal. And then, to boot, I had a phenomenal

beer. Funny story about that beer. Um, which I wouldn't mind diving

into it right away if you don't mind my beer.

Oh, you know, let's just fucking do it right now.

In a world where craft beer is king. A world where muscles are bigger

than growlers, only one tongue can guide us. One man, one tongue.

One Tongue-jobber. In this world, we must find out

what is Flex drinking? Okay, so anyway,

anytime I take a trip, travel outside the state. Whatever.

Um, I always look for local brews, right? That's what we do here.

OC you're looking for some OC shit? We're researchers.

Um, they had some rhinegeist on the menu.

They had some Sonder brewing, which I've never heard of Sonder before.

And then they had a rotating tap handle at this place.

And I said, I asked the lady what the rotating tap handle was.

She was kind of quiet. The music was the people were kind

of loud, the music wasn't loud, and all I heard was IPA.

And I said, yeah, I'll take that. It sounds wonderful.

And it came in a fretboard brewing, glass fretboard brewing like a

guitar fretboard. Sure. And it was that pale yellow hazy

color. Mhm. And I got my sandwich. I'm already rocked up.

Now I'm getting this beer and I'm looking at this beer and I'm like,

I'm at the brim, man. I'm filled up to the brim.

And I took one sip of this beer and it was like I entered the

gates of heaven. It's like I just splooged everywhere.

It was top notch. So I asked the lady again.

As I left, I said, hey, what was that beer called again that you gave me?

And she said it was Bootsy IPA by Fretboard Brewing. All right.

What are the odds I'm gonna find this fucking beer in the wild here?

Well, we went to this grocery store called Jungle Jim's.

It's a tourist attraction. Okay. They have a section for, like,

every country in the world. Food. Uh, they have an entire corner of

the store devoted to hot sauces. Their spice aisle, I heard,

is I didn't enter it, but is. Everything is alphabetical order

for spices. Oh. Which is kind of brilliant. Yeah.

Uh, they had, like, a 32 foot section of just Kraft bottle sodas.

This place was overwhelming. It had a collectible store in it.

It had a toy store in it. It had a tiki bar in it.

It had a, uh, like 20 taps of beer that you could

get and just buy the beer and then shop around and drink the beer.

They had a candy store department in it. Jesus.

And then, you know, they had, like, the normal produce and

dairy and meat and. But this place, if you've never

heard of it, you've never seen it. I'd highly recommend looking it

up just to see what it's about. They have, like, the world's best

bathrooms or something like that. Like cleanest. Or they're.

They look like porta potties on the outside.

Like you open the door to a porta potty, and then it's like you walk in

and it's one of those bigger on the inside than it looks on the outside.

Apparently it's like world renowned. I've never heard of it,

but I would definitely recommend it. All right, so back to this beer,

right? Fretboard Brewing Bootsy IPA walk

into their liquor department, which again, very overwhelming.

So much stuff. I didn't even look through half

of it, but lo and behold, I find Bootsy IPA from Fretboard Brewing.

Daddy, it's got this Jimi Hendrix looking character on the can.

He's got a guitar Our fretboard brewing right on it and they got

the name Bootsy. It's all like disco star.

It's really fun. Can and it's a 7% IPA, 21 IBUs.

Uh, it says in collaboration with the Bootsy Collins Foundation.

So I guess I'm not really too sure what that is. So skip ahead.

Get home from the trip. I said, you know what?

I'm gonna have one of the beers. That beers is fucking phenomenal.

And I poured out Greg. And this is what it looks like.

Clear. It's clear. It's amber. Copper. Um, it is not hazy.

It is an American IPA. It looks very old school.

Very, very old school. So whatever beer I had in this

restaurant. Was not the beer that the lady

told me I had. That's fantastic. So now I have absolutely no idea

what beer that was. Don't you love when it's like,

the time that somebody swore to me they'd had poured me a hazy little

thing, but it was the clearest beer I'd ever put in my mouth.

I love that story. It never gets old. Uh. So then, you know.

So here, you know, this is a pretty classic American IPA.

You know, it smells like. It smells like white pine.

A little grapefruit hoppy, a little hoppy.

Yeah, that's what the old nose buds say.

Then I guess, without further ado, I'm gonna tell you guys what a

traditional American IPA tastes like. Never had one of these before.

Oh, yeah. That's, uh. Super. This one's actually super light

and crisp. Okay. Real low. Like I said, 21 IBUs. Very low.

It's not lingering. Hardly any bitterness.

Real clean finish. But you get that hint of pine,

you get the hint of citrus pith, and it's a good beer.

Don't get me wrong. Not what you're looking for.

This isn't the beer that changed my life.

And then, you know, just because I kind of skipped all this because

I'm telling this long story. Uh, 4.7 thousand check ins.

It's got a 3.71 and untapped. And they say.

So this this is kind of big news here.

Uh, in collaboration with the Bootsy Collins Foundation.

This award winning IPA is full of fruity flavors but low in IBUs.

Get this three time gold medal winner at the US Open Beer Championship.

Wow. 2019, 2021 and, uh,

2019 through 2021. And then a silver medal winner in,

uh, 2022. So impressive. Yeah, I guess, you know,

I'll take it. This is a wonderful beer,

but it's not the beer that changed my life. What?

What was the restaurant you got that, uh, life changing beer from?

Let me just make sure of it. I'm pretty sure it was called

French Crust and Co. Oh, it's just called French crust

Cafe and Bistro. I'm sorry. I'm gonna see if I can find

their tap list. But it would be difficult because,

uh, it was a rotating tap handle. It doesn't say they only list

three beers and then rotating. Yeah, yeah. So not helpful.

Yeah. Mine was the rotating. Should we call them right now and ask

them what their rotating handle? I honestly almost thought about doing

that. I'm not even kidding you. When I got home and I poured

this and I really just wanted to know what I actually drank.

I was like, I wonder if I could just call them and be like, hey, I visited

you this past week and I would like to know what this beer really is.

Should we do. It on the air? Yes. Are they even open? I don't know.

I'm looking. Oh, no. Because it's gonna be almost 11:00

there. What are their hours? Oh, yeah. They close at 3 p.m..

Yeah. Their time? Yeah. Damn. I was I was getting ready to

dial some numbers. That's so fucking great. But, yeah.

So that was the highlight of Cincinnati. Really?

Um, next day, we caught a Reds game at Great American Ballpark. Nice.

Had a couple beers there, and I did make a list of all the

different beers that I did try there, except for the one I'm drinking now

because, you know, um, but I and I did buy a beer and jungle gyms.

I bought, uh, Bodie IPA from Columbus Brewing.

It was like a regular, like, traditional double IPA.

Uh, I think untapped has it at like a four, two one. Let me tell you what.

If that was A421, then Stone IPA should be A421

because it had that same rough, super bitter enamel shattering.

Uh, every time I took a sip of it, I kind of had to, like, grind my

teeth. And, um, it was a lot. Uh, then I had a truth IPA from

Rhinegeist at the Reds game. Uh, I had a operatic from Brink

Brewing, and that was another classic American IPA, uh,

gavel banger from Taft Brewing. I like the name again.

Just a real A classic. They had a lot of like American IPAs,

and they had a red IPA on tap that the guy tried to sell me.

I said, I'm sorry, sir. Those are usually really malty

and I'm just not that into it. Hashtag beer snob.

So that was all the beer I had in Cincinnati.

Caught the Cincinnati Zoo. What a phenomenal zoo.

Oh, really good. So the Cincinnati Zoo is phenomenal.

That was Cincinnati in a nutshell. Really.

My final thoughts on Cincinnati. Super old city. Super dingy city.

I did have a friend who told me it was like, uh, when he found out I

was going, he said, Cincinnati is kind of like a lesser Milwaukee.

Why would you go there? And I thought he was just kind

of being overdramatic about the whole situation.

Uh, and then we went there and it was just old everywhere.

Um, which. That's fine. Like, old can be cool,

but could also be gross. You know, when you're driving with

your kids on the outskirts of downtown and they have these tennis

courts that don't have nets anymore, and they're, you know,

puddled over and there's growth, you know, going on to the courts.

And then you kind of start looking around and you're like, oh,

I don't know if this is a very reputable area. Minus one star.

Yeah. We made it out alive. The hotel was decent.

Uh, they had a bar on the second floor and on the roof,

and it was. A rooftop. Bar. It was cool, but it was raining

the day we were gonna go up there. Lame. So then we actually went up.

We were still gonna sit inside, and I saw the beer menu because I saw

the beer menu at the on the lower level bar. Like a day before. Sure.

So I assume they would have the same stuff at the roof.

They had like all A and B stuff on the roof, and they had all

local shit on the second floor. So I took one look at the menu and I

said, yeah, let's just go downstairs. And I forgot I did actually have

an urban artifact beer down there. And it was, uh,

like a fruit punch start, uh, fruited ale, like a tart ale.

And that was very wonderful. And I forgot that they were in Ohio

as well. So that was I. Did, too. And I was looking up their building.

I wasn't able to make it there. I didn't make it to any breweries

in Ohio, but their facility is in like an old church.

That's kind of cool. Yeah. So I thought that was kind of cool.

Kind of wild. Um, then we made our way to Kentucky,

which all along the Ohio River. Um, just gorgeous, by the way,

like big rolling green hills. I never thought Kentucky was

hilly or scenic or any of that. You just always think like.

Or anything good. Basketball and white trash,

right? Exactly right. I mean, you say Kentucky,

what else crosses your mind? And, like, horse racing, I guess

bourbon, but that's it. Okay. Yeah. But the first two easily, you know,

basketball but gorgeous scenery. It was probably my favorite

drive Five scenic wise I've ever had in my life.

Second to the Ozarks in Missouri. That was gorgeous.

Uh, but, you know, Kentucky was fun. We did, uh, there was a, like,

a public market in the hotel next to us.

So he caught that, uh, there was actually a brewery in there as well.

So that was kind of neat. Caught some dinner there, had some

solid pizza, some pretzel bites. Uh, had an IPA there,

and I had a gosa. The gosa wasn't great,

but that's too bad. You know,

when in Rome you gotta try gosa. See? Then, uh, we hit up the Louisville

Slugger Museum and the factory tour. That was amazing. That's cool.

It was one of my favorite parts of the whole tour.

You get to learn all about, you know, how they grow the trees,

how they cut the trees. And, um, I got to hold the Christian

Yelich bat. I got to hold, uh. My hometown boy. Yeah, I love him.

Uh, I got to hold a Brice Turang bat for the Brewers as well.

Uh, because they had all these cubby holes right at the start of

the factory, and there was a a cubby for each team in the league.

And then they had a players name plate for each team.

And the Brewers just so happened to be Christian Yelich.

And uh, again, I got to the brim. You know, I was I was ready to blow.

Right. Uh, yeah. So I just that whole tour to see

how they do everything and just fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.

Uh, checked out Churchill Downs, the Kentucky Derby. Uh, Derby.

Very fancy. That was immaculate. I couldn't believe how large

that place was. Uh, 80,000 people, they say,

fit in the grandstands and another 40 to 50,000in the infield.

Holy shit. That's a lot of people. This place is absolutely enormous.

And you could look at pictures of it or videos or anything,

and it just won't do it justice until you actually get in there.

And it made me think, I don't know if I could ever actually

go to a derby that many people. So many people. So many people.

And can I, um, can I be blasphemous for a second here, please?

Horse racing. Don't give a shit. I don't really either. Yeah.

You know, but if somebody said, hey, I got an extra ticket to

the Kentucky Derby, it's almost like a once in a lifetime thing.

Yeah, like I'd go for the spectacle, but. Right. Just to say you. Ben.

Yeah, but I'm not paying all that money to go sit amongst

200,000 people or whatever. No. Yeah, and I wouldn't either,

but it was really cool to check it out. Check out the history.

You got to walk through the museum as well. So that was all super neat.

That was day one. Day two checked out Kentucky

Horse Park. You know,

that was like more for the kids. Um, just kind of where they

people donate money to have their horses kept there for like,

the year and taken care of and, uh, did some horseback riding.

That's really what the end goal of that was.

Uh, I checked on a Buc-ee’s. Greg. I was waiting for Buc-ee’s. Um, okay.

I want to know about the beer situation.

So the Buc-ee’s the horse park we got to early in the morning first.

Uh, like, they opened at nine. We got there at 940,

and the first available horseback riding tickets left were 245.

They were like, all right, we'll hang out here for like an hour.

Buc-ee’s was still 40 minutes away, so we're gonna drive out,

get some lunch, check out Buc-ee’s, drive back and get in our horseback

riding. So I was unaware of this. There is a whole separate lane to

pull into Buc-ee’s to wait in. Like the gas pump line.

They had a 150 gas pumps. Holy shit. Every single one of them was

taken and about half the world's cheapest gas.

Half of them had a car behind the other cars waiting to fill

up and gas. Sure. So we said fuck that,

we had a half tank. We don't need to wait in line

for gas. It's like going to Costco for gas.

Yeah, it was crazy. So then we walked into the store and

the way my wife described it was Disneyland or Disney World because

we've never been to Disneyland. It was like Disney World on cocaine.

So like bigger. Chaotic. Oh fuck that then. Like people.

It was like everybody was shouting and like, everybody was running to

grab something because they didn't want somebody else to get it,

even though there was a shit ton of everything.

It's like Black Friday at Buc-ee’s. The food lines were absurd.

Like a line of people just waiting for more chicken tenders

and French fries. The only place that didn't have

a line was the bakery. You know, they did, like,

some cookies and some other stuff, but, uh,

they have this circular island in the middle of the Buc-ee’s where they,

they do the brisket sandwiches, the pulled pork sandwiches,

the chicken sandwiches. Um. Other barbecue stuff.

I think they have one more sandwich. They'll chop up the sandwiches,

and they get all the sandwiches prepared and wrapped.

And then every time they put out new sandwiches, they, like,

yell something. I couldn't tell what the fuck

they were yelling. And then they yell something.

And then every other employee in the store yells it back. Oh, God.

Um. Extremely chaotic. Delicious. Though I will say I had a

breakfast burrito. The smoked brisket,

breakfast burrito. Brisket, potatoes, beans, maybe.

Cheese, I don't know. That rocked my world.

And I had this regular smoked brisket sandwich as well. Oh my God.

It was good, but it wasn't burrito good.

Oh, well. I mean, what is right? But yeah, I fucking filled up hard on

food there. Um, no Buc-ee’s beer. They did have they did have a few

local breweries, and by a few, I mean two. And then they had come on.

Fine spirits and wine has more local breweries than that.

They had that Rhinegeist truth IPA, which is like their flagship.

And then it had one other like Ohio beer.

And I was kind of disappointed in the selection. It's pretty lame.

And the fact that there was no Buckeyes beer, I'm disappointed.

Buc-ee’s I expected more out of you. But so here's the thing.

So this was all for the kids, right? They see all their videos and

all their YouTube influencers and shit go there.

And so the kids got, you know, stuffed animals and water

thermoses and stickers and this and that and blah, blah, blah.

You know, I got a t shirt, I won't lie. Nice.

They have all this own branded food and candy and we got some

gifts for other people. We ended up spending like $250

at Buc-ee’s. Jesus. We got a lot of stuff though.

We really did. So as the cashier is ringing all

this stuff up, I was that dad. I was like, oh,

can you tell we're first timers? And he said, oh,

this isn't even bad. Oh. I said, really? And he said, yeah.

He said, we'll get people that have come in here 15 times over and

we'll spend $700 every time. Nope. What the fuck? That is unacceptable.

That is like you. Everything in your house is Buc-ee’s.

Everything you eat is Buc-ee’s. Everything you wear is Buc-ee’s.

That's crazy. That's nuts. I can see Flex spending that much

money on their breakfast burrito, but not on Chotchkie's. I would.

$8 for a breakfast burrito. I would buy $800 worth of

breakfast burritos. They were giving 100 burritos, stat!

So we spent about an hour in there, and then we had to book our ass

back to horseback riding. And then here's another funny

story for you. Before we get away from Buc-ee’s

my last Buc-ee’s question. Yes. Were you able to to drink inside

of Buc-ee’s? No. There's no, uh. I don't think so.

Damn it, I just thought, because, like, you got, like,

breakfast burritos and whatnot, maybe grab yourself a beer to

have with your breakfast burrito. I could have got a six pack.

Like they had the beer cooler. Sure, but nothing.

Nothing you could drink right there. Correct. Okay. Got it. Sorry.

I'll shut up now. No, that's fine, that's fine.

That was a good question. So the whole plan for the day

was horse park. Buc-ee’s. And then to stop at a couple

distilleries. My wife was actually the one who was

like, hey, let's stop at places, pick stuff up.

Yeah, we talked about this. She wanted you to hit a couple

bourbon spots. Yeah, she was like. It was shocking.

I almost didn't think it was real. I didn't so little did my wife know,

which I knew, but she did not. And I don't blame her for it.

All the distilleries are only open from 9 to 5. Oh, sure.

Just like wineries, right? Yeah. So 9 to 5. That's it.

And I'm not a selfish guy. I am a family man.

I would never take fun or experiences away from my kids.

Mhm. The trip was not about me. Horseback riding finished at 4:00.

Oh no. Then the kids wanted to go into the

gift shop and buy a few things. No. And I was okay with it.

You know, it's all about them. It is. So we walk out of the gift shop at

about 415, and my wife says, hey, where do you want to go first?

Like hotel. And I said, I don't even think it's

worth it. She said, what do you mean? Said, well,

everything closes at 5:00. She said, well, what time is it?

I said, it's 415. And she was actually like

legitimately shocked. And she said, I expected to get back

to the hotel at like ten tonight. Whoa. She's like, I thought we would.

She was ready to party. She was ready to just let me go

at it because we were gonna originally stop at Woodford?

Sure. So we were gonna do a tour. I was gonna have a drink or two.

You know, buy a bunch of shit and head on our way.

Maybe stop at another place. You know, not tour, but.

So she said she's like, no, she's like, we're going to one.

She said, pick one. So daddy picked Buffalo Trace. Oh.

I figured it was the same distance away, time wise as, uh, Woodford.

And I think they were on the same exit as well.

But we pulled into that parking lot, Greg, at 451. Just in time.

We walked into the front office where they card you,

and they put a wristband on you because they scan your wristband

and shit to make sure you're, you know, 21, in the gift shop.

So we walk out of the office, and the gift shop is about

a hundred yards away from the fucking check in office. Oops.

So we was booking it and we entered the gift shop at 456 and

I panic bought just two bottles of Buffalo Trace. Oh.

I got a bottle of Eagle Rare. Oh, Brian.

Intern Brian likes himself some eagle rare.

But my wife was wonderful enough to do a separate transaction

because it was one bottle of rare per customer. Mhm.

They do some root beer there that I got to try in my

four minutes of being in there. So got some of the root beer.

Uh bought a couple gifts, I got a shirt and uh that was it.

And the entire time on the drive home the next day,

all I could think to myself is, why didn't I just buy, like, ten

bottles of trace? Why didn't. You? They were something stupid,

like $27 a bottle. It's like, why didn't I just buy,

like, ten bottles and there's no limit on it?

That's all I thought about on my way home.

But I had four minutes to shop and then check out, and I completely

panicked. Oh, buddy. Yeah. Well, I'm sorry that your your

whiskey or your bourbon tasting got cut short. That's all right.

It, you know, maybe we'll end up there again,

but at least I got something out of it. Chalk it up to a fun trip.

The ride home was abysmal, but, uh, you know, all everything.

All business. Tons of traffic, tons of Tri-State

traffic between Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin. It was, like, seven hours.

It was terrible. Mm. No, thanks. So. But. Yeah.

All in all, super solid trip. I'd say like, eight out of ten.

All right, a great time. I had a really great time.

Had some good beverages. Yeah. Long story. I'm sorry about that.

Yeah, a lot of talking. I'll tell you and the listeners, uh,

we did have a little bit of technical difficulties earlier. Hopefully.

I did a good job of editing that out. But while Flex was reconnecting and

then picking his story back up, I emailed the French place

asking them what beer it was. So I'm really hoping they respond.

That is amazing. We shall see. I just said hi.

We were there last week. One of your rotating taps,

I believe it was some sort of hazy IPA I saw in Alaska. Hello.

We were at your establishment last week. I am not drunk.

I am not drunk. Nor was I then. You should not remember me.

Well, fantastic. I'm glad you had a good trip.

Nice. Yeah. Birthday week? Yeah. It was, uh, the perfect mix of

activities and then rest. You know. Because with the kids,

we'd still get back to the hotel between, like, seven and eight.

There's one night we went to the baseball game, got home like,

after ten, but. Sure. But yeah. So it was enough time to get

home or to the hotel and just lounge for like,

2 to 3 hours and then go to bed. That's nice. That's always nice.

Yeah. Very wonderful. Good. Um, before I forget, because I kind

of did top listening city shout out Chicago again. Whoa, Chicago.

Yeah, that's very nice of you. So, uh.

All right, a little news to get through before we get out of here.

Haven't done this in a while. We're gonna do the news flight.

And if you guys are new to the show, The news flight is just a few

random stories that I'm gonna rip through real quick.

Just like a flight of beers. No one savors that shit.

Get the paddles. Clear.

So, uh, another day, another brewery sells Seattle based

wine centric platform Ackley brands has acquired Silver City Brewery,

based out of Bremerton, Washington. Silver city marks Ackley's second

foray into craft beer following the company's acquisition of Mac

and Jack's Brewery in 2023. Also, Urban Chestnut acquires

O'Fallon Beer brands. Urban Chestnut Brewing Company

has acquired the beer brands of O'Fallon brewery,

which ceased operations after 24 years at the end of last year.

The move comes at the heels of Urban Chestnut emerging from chapter 11

bankruptcy, with Brian Traverse as a key as a key investor.

A 15 year old brewery was mirrored in lawsuits in recent years.

And then finally, and I've been to this one.

Denver's True Brewing closed last week.

Heavy metal craft brewery True Brewing out of Denver shut down.

Founder Nick nones announced that on Facebook on July 3rd.

They closed July 12th. He said it hasn't been an easy

choice, but this brewery has run its course and for a huge number

of reasons, it's the right time to send this thing off into the lake.

Trial trailed by a fiery arrow. And also Davis sent that to me.

So shout out to the homie Davis, who, by the way,

is going to be in your hood pretty soon on vacation. Oh, really?

Coming up to Wisco, I was like, well, enjoy those cannibal sandwiches.

He's my wisco guy, right? Yeah, he's your wisco guy.

He's he's the one that corroborates all your weird Midwestern shit.

Love that shit. Love that guy. Yeah. Cannibal sandwiches.

Need more Davises around you. Don't we?

You guys should go out for Sammy. It's not really a real sandwich,

but, you know, he can come to my butcher shop.

I'll grind him up some meat. Whoa, that sounds like innuendo.

I'll grind your meat, big boy. Uh, a little booze news.

Hulk Hogan's real American beer concept swiped by former executives.

According to a lawsuit, the parent company of Hulk Hogan's

Real American Beer is being sued by a licensing firm that alleges

the concept for the lager brand was swiped by its former executives.

Chicago and Vegas based branding house Kama Holdco filed the lawsuit

July 8th in US District Court against its former president and

board chairman Chad Bronstein, former chief of legal and

licensing officer Nicole Crosby, Real American Beer and 25

unnamed Dough's Kama alleges Bornstein and Crosby. Excuse me.

Crosby breached their executive agreements by taking plans developed

in 2023 while working at the firm to start the real American beer brand

with former pro wrestler Hogan, the racist asshole, last year.

Karma alleges the defendants actions breached their executive

contracts and violated federal and state trade secret protection

laws by misappropriating Karma's intellectual property,

including business plans, concepts and marketing strategy for Hulk

Hogan's real American beer brand. Karma is seeking at least $10 million

in damages, as well as attorney's fees and costs at a jury trial.

Additionally, the firm is after restitution of 348,000 from Bronstein

and 231,000 from Cosby. Brother. So I saw that beer on vacation

when we were at that jungle gyms. Did you know?

I think they were in six packs and I'm talking it was like a

3 or 4 pallet display. And they was on they was on sale

for something like 2.99 or 3.99. For a six pack. Yeah.

It's so bad. It's $0.50 a can. Yeah, I'm not even kidding you.

It was like I saw the price, and I'm just like, that can't be real.

And then I saw what beer it was, and I was like, oh, yeah, okay,

this makes sense now. I mean, all Hulk Hogan hate aside,

I can't imagine it's good. Uh, first of all,

the guy had stopped drinking up until he released this beer brand.

I would probably, I don't know, I'm assuming it would have a Busch

light over a real American beer. Yeah, I feel like it's on that level.

Busch? Uh, a motorist in California

found with open containers. A motorist in California wine country

suspected of driving under the influence. Multiple containers.

Containers. Plural. Got it. Suspected of driving under the

influence last week and had an open container of alcohol in the

cup holder. And you want to guess how many empty

cans of Bud Light in his vehicle? Oh, I'm gonna go with an even 14.

Okay. You are so off Often it is so

many more than that. Like an unrealistic amount.

Like 9670 Jesus. 70 empty cans of Bud Light in

his vehicle. The driver,

who has not yet been identified, caught the attention of police while

struggling to stay in the lane in his lane in the Sonoma County town of.

I have no idea what this is. Sure. Who knows?

About 45 miles north of San Francisco, while conducting a field

sobriety test, it was determined that the driver was more than

three times the legal limit, with a BAC of 0.27, almost 0.25.

Placed under arrest for suspicion of DUI, suspicion of DUI,

and driving on a suspended license. Once he was arrested, a search of the

inside of his car was completed and over 70 empty beer cans were located.

I feel like a lot of people drink in their car.

Like more than you would expect. Probably.

We had this guy two years ago. We do, uh,

venison processing into, like, steaks and sausages at work. Sure.

After the first of the year, if anybody's listening after the

first of the year, and this guy came in to pick his

order up and it was a big order. So I said, hey,

do you need help taking this outside? He said, yeah, sure.

So I pulled the cart up to the side of his truck,

and he opens his passenger door, and the floor of the passenger seat

is just littered with empty beer cans. Oh, Jesus. I'm just like, uh.

And he, like, he just acted like it was fucking normal. Ain't no thing.

He said, oh, yeah, just toss it right there on the seat.

And I'm just staring at these empty beer cans like, this isn't.

Good for. Anybody. Right? But, yeah, I'll take your money

for your sticks. Thank you. You're right. That sounds dirty.

I kind of I'm a dirty guy. Taking money for sticks. Yeah.

You are a dirty guy. Uh. All right. That feels like a great place to

leave. Oh, by the way, there was a

picture of all the beer cans that they laid out on the guy's hood.

It was pretty great. Maybe I should post it.

Or story it or something. Check the gram.

Laid out on his hood like the cops took him. That's funny.

Yeah, they must have just taken him. Probably counting them,

because I'm sure every beer can has another charge of something,

so hopefully. Yeah. If you're that dumb to do that,

I hope. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So anyway. All right, that's it. Uh.

Follow us. Like I said, on the gram. Maybe I'll get that picture posted.

@CraftBeerRepublic and @Flex_me_a_beer underscores in

between. Hi, Vanessa. Hi, Vanessa. Make sure you call us at

(805) 538-2337. I hope everyone out there in the

world of drunkenness is staying very well hydrated. And on that note.

Good night everybody.