[intro music]
Welcome in everybody, it's the Craft Beer Republic. Thanks for drinking, thanks
for joining. I am Greg,
and I am being joined by the maltiest fella on the fresh coast, and that is
Flexy. What's up big
fella? You know, just drinking and joining, or something. Yeah, a lot of malty
beers lately,
though. Yeah, which is actually, so you know me pretty well, not my thing. I
know, very supportive.
Not my thing. Right. But not my go-to. Sure, but usually it's a little hazier.
It is one of my
favorite times of the year, so. Yes. We'll get into that in a couple of few. A
lot to get to
today. I did a little extra curricular research, if you will. That was hard to
say for some reason.
Well, now I'm extra curious. We got a voicemail, we've got some booze news to
get to, and yeah,
so let's get right into it. Let's crack things off with asking a very important
question.
In a world where craft beer is king, a world where muscles are bigger than grow
lers,
only one tongue can guide us. One man. One tongue. One Tongue Jobber.
In this world, we must find out, what is Flex drinking?
Well, roll out the barrel.
That's the song we sing at brewery games. Oh, okay. Seventh inning stretch. Oh,
it's not taking
me out to the ballgame. So they do to take me out to the ballgame and roll up
the barrel.
Roll out the barrel. Sing us a song of good cheer. Roll out the barrel. Nah,
you're dumb.
Sorry. It's like a polka Polish thing. Yeah, it tracks. Yeah. Pretty South side
of Wisconsin.
Well, any weasels. We on that roll. We drink in that Oktoberfest. Can't stop,
won't stop.
I like the name. And today, so I'm doing the MKE Brewing Oktoberfest. I talked
about it last week.
I did not rank it in my rankings because I knew I was going to have it on this
show.
So this on the front of the can, first of all, this can art, it's simple. It's
great.
It is very German Oktoberfest. Yep. Gets the job done. It is great. And this
one does say it is a
Minertzen style lager. Says our Oktoberfest is traditionally brewed with pale
ale, caramel,
and toasted Munich malts that attribute a sweet, earthy, multi-flavor, toasted
aroma,
and a bright orange hue. So this beer, it's got that coppery, brown, orange,
classic.
Mm hmm. Mierten style color. The correct color. And the old sniffer, it's it's
kind of light.
Not a huge aroma here. Slightly malty, I would say. A little bit of sweetness
behind that,
which makes sense from the sugars. Mm hmm. So then we'll get the warm up the
old
Zungenjammer. Yeah. OK. OK. So comparing to last week's where I said not a lot
of carbonation,
this one's a little bit more carbonated. I don't know what does that because I
don't know how to
brew beer. Sure. It is. Add more carbonation. It has a lot. I shouldn't say a
lot. Last week's
beer, the Eagle Park, did not have a lot of that roasty toasty. This one, as I
dive in again,
it is there. It is like it's like perfect. Like perfect. I don't even know how
else to describe
it other than like perfectly balanced roastiness to the caramel flavor, like
the sweet. It's like
this is really good. I think I can help you describe this.
Dieses Oktoberfest schmeckt mir köstlich auf der Zunge. Yeah. Mm hmm. What
what she said,
she said, this Oktoberfest is delicious on my tongue, Jabber. Oh, Zungenjabber.
Yeah. I don't
know. This is really well done. It doesn't have anything imported German, it
says, but
it's fucking delicious. It's all you need. Like, it's absolutely classic of the
style.
And to put it in my rankings. Oh, yes. I'd say it takes the third spot. Oh,
time marks. Yes, because I never really talked about this raised grain beer I
had.
And I'm just going to dive into it a little bit. Sure. So I drank out of a can
and I usually pour
all my stuff out. You get more of it. Yeah. We're nerds. It breathes a little
bit. So I crushed two
of these 16 ounces and it was like the breadiness at the end. Like, you know,
when you drink like a
like a Pilsner lager and you got the breadiness, that crackery, it was like
full of that on the
end and I couldn't get enough of it. And I just thought it was such a great
flavor to bring into
the malts, the roasted malts and the caramel. And then you finish off with the
breadiness and it
just tasted so good together. And that's why it sits at number two of my list.
Pretty good. Yeah.
Remind everybody that Third Space was so far the worst. You don't get them out
there. They're
local to us, but it was just a lot. The worst with a U?
Well, then it's the versed. The versed, yeah. Oh, you the best too? Yeah? How
about the versed too?
Well, Verna, I too am drinking in Oktoberfest today. We'll get to that in a
little bit,
but 'tis the season. 'Tis been the season. Yeah. As we discussed with Erica a
couple of weeks ago,
as the season, which I'm still waiting for, happens to cool down a little,
you're in that perfect combination of like, let's have some Oktoberfest beers,
but also
some IPA, some pails, some stouts at night. Ah, it's fucking perfect. Perfect
beer drinking time.
That's where we're at now. See, not in California. Not yet. So it's like during
the day today,
it was like mid to high 70s. And let me just check the weather right now. It's
a balmy 60 degrees.
That sounds glorious. It is 843 here. As we record, the current temperature is
74 degrees.
That's not bad. That's not the worst. It says it feels like 58 right now,
though.
Oh, speaking of hot places, shout out to our top listing city of last week,
the new one for us, Decatur, Georgia. Oh yeah. What up, Decatur? Yeah. What's
up, dogs?
It's dog country. You sound like a Bron Breaker. Oh, gross.
Not a fan. Oh, not a fan. No, Bron. No. Yeah. He's whatever. Yeah. Not a
wrestling show,
but why don't they just package him as a Steiner? Why'd they have to give him a
whole new name?
Because Rick Steiner was canceled. He was? Yeah, like two years ago. Oh, for
what?
I couldn't remember if it was racist or misogynistic. Oh, I didn't know that.
Oh,
because they showed Rick and Scott at an event recently. Yeah. But yeah, Rick
Steiner was
canceled. Oh, who knew? Well, not a wrestling show. I was unaware. Oh yeah. So
that's why he
was not packaged as a Steiner. Got it. Makes a little more sense now. All right
. Back to the
beer stuff. So I did some traveling for work and was up in San Francisco. Spent
a few days up there.
We had to go meet with one of our clients and usually I'm up there by myself.
My boss was up
there too, which, you know, it's fine because, you know, we hang out, not hang
out, but we do
our work things and we usually go our separate ways. One of the days we were
coming back from
our work thing, he goes, Hey, you know what? I'd like to offer you the
invitation to go out to
dinner with, which means, you know, like free dinner, obviously. How awkward is
that? How he
phrases it? Not quite that, but you know, it's like, Hey, you know, we haven't
really gotten
to do anything. There's this great seafood place. Good, sir. My share of a
concern place with to my
who I pay be willing to. Well, the weird part is pressure. Well, that's what he
said. It wasn't as
awkward as I made it sound, but he did at one point, like no pressure. I know I
'm your boss.
I'm like, it's still pressure. Like no Bosco fuckers. You know, like what am I
supposed to do?
So I accepted. And then later on that day, he's like, I'm so tired. I'm just,
I can't go out to, I'm so sorry. I have to rescind my invitation. I was like,
Oh, shucks. Like thumbs up. Thanks. It's not that he's a bad guy. I just, you
know,
can I get your card though? Cause you kind of promised me, I mean, you know,
business expenses
are paid for because it's a business trip, right? You know, I'm not going to go
to a fancy place
without his card. Like he was going to take me to. Right. So anyways, I mean,
and he's not a
bad guy to hang out with so much, just, which weird. It's my boss. And you know
, I like to go,
yeah, maybe have a couple of beers and not be looked at like an alcoholic. So
have the night to myself, which is great. And I've talked about Blackhammer on
the show before. Yep.
Enjoyed them very much. Brought some back, all that good stuff. Great things
about them.
Yeah. Well, I found about two and a half miles from my hotel or a screwdriver.
What is that?
Oh, Blackhammer. You got me. No, it was called a Vilkeman, but the beer, it was
, it was owned
by Blackhammer. So the beer is all Blackhammer beer. Cool. And they have like
German food,
a bunch of sausages, you know, brats and worse and sauerkraut and all this
Germany things.
And so I, I walked two and a half miles to Vilkeman. So it's like a German beer
hall
kind of thing. Yeah. But they have all the, all the beers that Blackhammer has.
So, you know,
you get an IPA or, you know, whatever you want, you don't just have German
beers on town, but
there are German beers on town and, uh, had this fucking delicious sausage
plate. It was fucking
amazing. And, uh, I sat down to eat and had a beer with me and guy walks over,
Hey, you playing
trivia? I was like, no, man, I'm by myself. I mean, we all know that. Like we
go out with Deb and
Brian and play trivia all the time, but second place. Yeah, exactly. Second
place. We got first
place last week and it felt so good. Cause all the teams we hate were there and
we beat fucking
all of them. Not that we hate people, but I was like, no, I'm, I'm good. I'm
just, I'm by myself
having a couple of beers and some dinner. He's like, ah, just play. And you
know, if you gotta
go, you gotta go. I'm not going to hold you here. And I was like, yeah, all
right, fine. I'll play.
So I played by myself. Uh, my, my team in quotes name was, uh, last man
drinking, which apparently
he loved. He's like, Oh, that's such a great name. I was like, you are not that
funny of a person.
He's not. No, he made it very, it made us all very aware that he's a standup
comedian on the side.
And I was like, ah, okay. His level of humor was not very great. In fact, I got
him laughing so
hard that he's like, well, clearly I'm in the wrong business. You should be the
comedian.
I was like, wow, we were in San Francisco. The A's game is on the A's are still
in Oakland for
the rest of the season. And they're showing the game, not fucking anybody in
that crowd. I mean,
legit must've been like 300 people in the entire stadium. It was so empty. Did
you hear recently
about that Chicago White Sox double header where they had 98 total fans? Really
? Yeah. That's what
this looked like. I mean, there's nobody even behind home plate. And so he said
something,
Oh, the manager, the A's manager came out with Yano and the umpires. And he
said something about
like, Oh man, I guess he looks angry. And I was like, yeah, they just told him
what the attendance
count was. And he lost his shit laughing. He's like, that's, that's the one. He
's like, that's
the best joke of the night. You should be the comedian. I was like, clearly if
that's the best
joke of the night, yeah. Maybe take up trivia as a full-time job. Overall. Nice
guy. I had a good
time at trivia. I did not get last middle of the road, which was fine for being
by myself. I'll
take it. Uh, once again, beer was delicious. And of course the, uh, the sausage
plate was
chef's kiss. So good sausage, dude. It had, first of all, yeah, you do a couple
of different types
of sausage, a little mustard, had some cheese. It was like a protein plate kind
of thing. Like
had some cheese slices, had some pickled veggies. Uh, it was fucking good. So
good. Hell yeah. Yeah.
So, uh, what else? Oh, we went out. Oh man. We went out with Deb and Brian over
the weekend,
the wife and I. Okay. We, we, you know, we'd met up for trivia. Like, Hey, we
should hang out
Saturday and maybe go like Dave and busters. Do you guys have Dave and busters
out there? Oh yeah.
Yeah. It was like Chuck E. Cheese for adults. And, uh, so you know, we don't,
that's not something
we normally do. We went to Dave and busters and, uh, got absolutely shit. They
usually have good
drink specials. Well, they have horrible beer options. Um, but they did, as we
walked in,
we, we of course hit the bar first and they had this sign that they were doing
like Jell-O shots
two for one. So our old asses did Jell-O and they weren't just shots. They were
like the syringe
shooters, you know? Okay. So we did around a Jell-O shots, had some beers. The
girls had some
mixed drinks, played some games, had some more drinks, played some games, had
some more drinks,
got a little tired of doing all that. So we walked across the parking lot to E
ureka brewing,
each had a cup, more beers. And then they close it like 10. It was like, well,
what do we do now?
Mike, let's go back to Dave and busters. Cause they close it like two. Come on.
Went back to
Dave and busters, had a few more drinks. Brian ran into a former boss while we
were there. Uber
haul, like Uber was hard to get that night. It was like, you know, 1230 and
there were no Ubers
out in our area. That's cause nobody was at the A's game. That was up North.
There's no A's game
down here. This is back down here. Uh, and so we ended up having to do the
thing where like we
added a stop to ours just so Brian and Deb could get home. Cause like their
Uber kept going the
wrong way. I was like, just cancel your shit. We'll we'll add a stop and did
all that. I didn't
even know you could do that. Oh yeah. Once, once like they accept the ride, you
can edit it and
then add a stop that we, we do that sometimes. But, um, but yeah, so it was, it
was good times.
We got fucking chittered. Like it was one of those, you know, we didn't like
pound drinks
and the jello shots, but man, we just kept going. It sounds like I'd be dead.
Yeah. We just kept
going. It was like all night, you know, we had some snacks at one point, but it
was good times.
You got, got drunk and played some video games. Well, that's a, I mean, so it's
football season's
coming up, right? Not a football show, not a football show. Uh, had my big
fantasy football
draft though. And, uh, it takes place at a local bar. Okay. Cause we have a lot
of those here.
Yeah. Um, I drank a lot, like more than I drink in, I don't know, I would say
the last easily
before COVID. So let's say like five years, I woke up and I, I got home and I
was expecting
to feel like shit. I knew going to bed, I was expecting to wake up feeling like
a bag of dicks
and I had to work the next day and just totally like, I knew what I was getting
myself into.
I don't know what happened, what my body did. I woke up like a fucking champ.
That's the best, not one ounce of headache, no stomach issues. I was a little
bit tired
and I thought if I maybe just had one hour extra sleep, I would have felt like
100%. God,
that's the best. But it was like for, it was like six beers, six shots. Wow.
That's a lot of hooch
for me. Yes. Six shots. Six, six shots. That's the thing. Like six beers. No
big deal. Yeah.
But if you start adding that liquor into my diet, I'm horrible with liquor.
Same. That is when I get completely fucked up. Puking is the only option.
Resistance is futile. Right. And I don't even know what happened. It was like
my body would
just like kicked into like, we're going to go ultra metabolism and break
everything down and
you're going to have an awesome day. And I did, it was fucking great. Did you
want to buy your
liver like a gift on those days? No, it just made me want to do it again. That
too. Like, oh,
clearly I'm not in practice. Right. Like, oh, I guess I can do this now. Yeah.
I wasn't like the
worst after Dave and Buster's like the next day, but it wasn't the best either.
Like Deb was
fucking dead. She was like, I'm dying over here. I was like, I'm not dying. I'm
not thriving
either. I'm just, I got a decent headache. Needed some greasy food. Yeah. I had
a Dr. Pepper,
that kind of thing. Nothing too crazy. That was the day of my fantasy draft and
I napped through
it. So I auto drafted you. Yeah. Hey, I got your boy, Aaron Rogers on my team.
That's not my boy.
Used to be. I don't know. You're talking about your former boy. Oh, see what he
can blow out
this year. Everybody keeps saying, if he stays healthy, the jets are supposed
to be decent.
I'm not for it. I'm thinking neither of those things will happen. They were USA
today's pick
for the Superbowl this year. Not a sport show, not a football show, but just a
little fun tidbit
information. USA today. Apparently not a sports paper either. Not a sports
paper.
It's pretty, pretty convinced. They have no idea what's going on. Yeah, I'd say
so.
Well, speaking of my, uh, my romping around in San Francisco, we have a rombing
ass son of a
bitch, right? We do have a voicemail from psycho bear who lives up in NorCal.
So let's, let's check
in with him. No one is available to take your call. Please leave a message aft
er the tone.
Hello, craft beer Republic. This is psycho bear. I want to hear my message.
So now I find out not only is Greg for my next life at himself. Oh yeah. I
guess Erica.
I hear him. I'm hearing her on the latest episode. She just went to mindscape
fermentation
and that apparently is an hour North of me. My goodness. And to top it all off
flex. Well,
my niece and nephew go to Wisconsin, whatever the university, man, I was
destined to listen
to your show. Anyways, uh, just an update. I made a little trip to Seattle and,
uh, one of your
favorite fans deep Fontana gym was there. Yes. Me and Fontana gym were in
Seattle drinking it up
nice for a few days. Great time. You guys should get up there. I don't know if
you're sour fans,
but we tapped upon this one fantastic furry Mirage. They usually have two to
three people.
Well, actually I was there with about 25 other people from around the country.
It was pretty
stellar. Yeah. Good times. And, uh, Oh, I was actually down in Agoura two weeks
before that
for a little birthday celebration, made it to Rancho la Hill place, Greg. And
it was good.
Nothing ever great out there. I got to try this pedal in tight, but one day I
will. Oh,
when you're heading back up to the bay, Greg, uh, I don't know how to reach you
other than
this wonderful podcast platform. Anyways. Uh, yeah, that's it for me. Tycho
bear signing out.
Goodbye. So abrupt. I don't know when I'm, I know I will be going back up,
but I don't know when I'll be going back up to the bay. They spring this shit
on me at work. Like,
Hey, can you go up there in two days? Like, Oh, I guess. Are you trying to
cause a divorce?
Sure. She's probably happy to get rid of you for a couple of days. She claims
she's not,
but somewhere deep down inside, she's gotta be. I love having the bed to myself
.
I don't really. Yeah. I don't know if we've had this conversation, my wife,
then you know how
everybody's like, you talk up a big game about like, Oh man, I can't wait to
have the bed to
myself. And I lay in the middle of the bed and I like sprawl out. Yes. And then
after about two
minutes, I'm just like, wow, this isn't all it's cracked up to be. Oh, and I
get to my regular
side and I get my regular sleeping position. Like not me, man. All right. I
guess, uh,
I guess this is just how we sleep from now on. I'm doing bed angels in the
middle, just sprawled out.
Oh, it's glorious. So I like waking up like that to just be able to get that
good
morning stretch in, like you wake up and each foot hits a corner of the bed,
the hands get
corner of the bed, you're X'd out. And that's nice. But yeah, sleeping, I just
can't just look
like a chalk line murder. I always end up like back in my spot, curled up in
the corner, like
usual by the end of the night. But when I start, like I go to sleep in the
middle of the bed,
just sprawled out, nice and quiet. It's great, man. Isn't that bizarre? It is
weird. But then
I, yeah, like I said, I wake up like in the corner as if I'm being kicked or
something,
but Hey, never. Uh, what was psycho bear say? Oh, do we like sours? Fuck. Yeah.
like sours. Who doesn't like sours? Yeah. Sours are, they're super solid. Do I
buy a lot of them?
No, it doesn't fit the algorithm. Sure. Yeah. Usually pretty pricey, pretty
pricey, low ABV.
Yeah. If I go out to a brewery, I will try theirs, you know? Right. That's,
that's why I do my most
sour consumption is at the brewery. So, uh, I haven't been to Seattle in a
minute, but, um,
Seattle's always got a super, you know, like a real solid beer scene up there.
So I've heard
Seattle's really good. I've heard Portland's really good too. Um, but I've
never heard of
this Mirage. I have not heard of Mirage been to Portland, been in Seattle,
great beer, but yeah,
it's been, it's been a minute. Mirage must be a little on the newer side. I
hope they've been
around for like 30 years now. I know they probably have. I'm just being a dick.
I wonder if I can
Google this real quick. Mirage brewing Seattle. There they are. They have 40,
almost 4,500
followers on the grams. They're probably been around too long. Oh yeah. Maybe
they're new,
new adjacent. I mean, I haven't been up there in like eight years probably at
least. So,
uh, any people don't forget. Yeah. 805-538-beer. That's the number to call if
you guys want to
leave a voicemail. Yeah. Get on a voicemail. Yeah. Get on, get up on it. You
don't even have
to be drunk. It's true. We prefer if you were, but you don't have to be. Leave
us a voicemail.
Uh, all right. Ludicrous libation law. This one comes to us from everyone's
favorite place,
West Virginia. Okay. I was going to say New Jersey, so. Oh no. West Virginia
were,
what was it last time? They probably don't even have fax machines to listen to
the podcast on.
I think they do have more breweries than North Dakota though. I think we
figured out.
Yeah. Something like that. North Dakota was like 20. Yeah. Like 19 or something
like that. Yeah.
It's a weird small number. Yeah. Well, it was like 28. Yeah. It wasn't a whole
lot more
in West Virginia. Bars are technically illegal if they also don't serve food.
Food for them is just people though.
I was going to say street possum, but, uh, you know, cut them deep. Um, no, I
saw a,
there's squirrel eaters out there. Oh, this is a real thing. Yeah. I watched
back in the day.
And by back in the day, I mean like 10 years ago, bizarre foods with Andrew
Zimmer and used to be a
big show on the food network. Yeah. And West Virginia is such a bizarre place.
Like he
usually goes to countries like Spain and wherever and Japan and exotic places.
He did a fucking
episode in West Virginia because it is that bizarre. And, uh, yeah. One of the
places he
went to eat, they had like squirrels strung up by their tails, like on a
clothesline and, uh,
clothesline from hell. Yeah. So, uh, JBL, uh, yeah. They just eat a lot of
squirrels.
I don't think that would be very good. A bit nutty. Yeah. No, thanks. Yeah. By
the way,
Mirage beer up in Seattle, their first post on the gram was November of 2017.
So, you know, newish.
I feel like that was a great, great time for breweries. Oh, that was prime time
. 2016, 2017,
popping up around that time. You're probably doing pretty well. Yeah. That was
like peak
craft. I'd say, man, just the crew, the cream of the crops, the cream rising to
the top. Yeah,
there it is. All right. Before we move on. Uh, yeah. Before we move on West
Virginia,
they're fucked. Enjoy those fucking squirrels. Yeah. And your bars. I feel like
they have to
have like a roadkill restaurant too. We're like, there's no way they don't. The
restaurant just
salvages roadkill and that's what's on the menu for the night. Closing early
today. No traffic.
So gross. So, uh, all right. If you don't mind. I don't mind. I'm going to make
a call the pen.
He calls to the bullpen for still laughing about roadkill. Well, that's, it's a
real thing. I
guarantee it. I absolutely believe it is. And you don't even need like a catchy
name. It would just
be like the roadkill diner. Yeah. The roadkill cafe or something like that.
That's good. I like
the alliteration. Yeah. Uh, I'm drinking nothing to do with roadkill cafe with
a K
but just to sound, please drink your beer, but just to sound fancier to look
fancy to have the
little like lying over the little teal day. Uh, I'm drinking along with flex
and Oktoberfest.
This one is from Enneagrin brewing their Oktoberfest beer that they just
released a
couple of weeks ago. Five and a half percent, 23 IBUs has a three, eight, two
on untapped
because people don't appreciate good German beer. Really don't. They say on the
can here,
Enneagrin Oktoberfest is a traditional Bavarian Maritzen style lager brewed
with imported German
Munich, Vienna, and Pilsner malts. These malts give our Oktoberfest a beautiful
copper color
and a full bodied malty sweet flavor with hints of honey, nuts, and caramel. Pr
ost.
As you can see, I think it matches that description visually perfectly. Very,
very gray color. Very caramelly. Very clear. Here's the sniffer. Very roasty on
the nose.
Ooh, okay. A lot of roasty toastiness. Do you like your Oktoberfest
roasty? I don't dislike them roasting. Okay. It's an appropriate amount of ro
asty.
Right. Like chestnuts on an open fire. Right. Not burnt nuts on my ding-a-ling.
Sorry. Tongue jabber time. Zungenjabber. Zungenjabber. I nailed it. You really
did.
This is so good. Fuck you 382. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. People are crazy.
I'd say the Schnaz has more roasty toasty than the actual beer does. The beer
has just the right
amount. Okay. Fair amount. Very clean. Yeah. Very clean. Finishes very dry,
which makes you coming
back for more. I don't find it, and I actually enjoy this. I don't find it to
be overly sweet.
Sometimes the Marathons get a little on the sweet side. This one is not, and I
appreciate that.
I am not a huge Dunkel person because they're too sweet for me.
So I don't like a lot of Dunkels. I will like maybe two Dunkels, but I like
when they are buttery.
Yeah. The Dunkels I like are not true to style because they're just a little
too sweet for me.
Yeah. Not a big fan of that. I'm not going to lie here. Dunkels and Doppelbachs
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Just those are probably two styles that are not for me.
I'm with you, especially the Dunkels. Doppels, eh, they're hit and miss, but
Dunkels 95% of
the time I don't like them. They're just not for me. They're too sweet. I know
that's the style,
and I know it might be the perfectly created Doppel, or excuse me, Dunkel, not
my jam.
So like a black IPA over a Dunkel?
Oh, yes. I love black IPAs.
Red IPA?
Over a Dunkel?
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Honestly, most styles over a Dunkel. I just don't like the sweetness.
Well, I'm just trying to think red IPAs are very, very malty, sometimes overly
malty.
They can be, yeah. But in general, I would take the red IPA over a Dunkel. It's
just
too sweet for me. Too honey and caramel tasting. This is so clean finish. It's
so dry.
Leaves the tongue wanting more, which is, I mean, if you're making beer, that's
perfect thing. People needing to drink more and more.
Drinking and drinking and drinking.
As I'm doing. So, I mean, it's fucking anagram. We know they're going to knock
it out of the
park. It's a lager.
It's a lager. Is it a lager?
Yeah, it's a Märzen style lager.
It's very good on the Zungenjaber.
Zungenjaber. Every time I pull this up, it reloads.
Zungenjaber.
I just need to pull that out as a drop.
Drop it.
Drop it like it's hot.
All right, let's get some news in here before we get up out of here.
Cambridge Brewing Company to close in December after 35 years.
That's sad.
Yeah. This is an interesting story. So after 35 years, Massachusetts based brew
pub,
Cambridge Brewing Company has announced it will shut its doors at the end of
2024.
The brewery wrote on social media over the weekend, "To our dear CBC friends
and family,
our time is coming to a close. Our last day of service will be December 20th,
but what a time it has been."
Unlike common culprits behind craft brewery closures as of late, punishingly
high rent
costs, a distracted drinker base, a slowing industry, CBC is going out on its
own terms.
Founder and owner Phil Uff-Banateen told the Boston Globe, he goes on to say,
"I want to retire. There comes a time in everyone's life when what becomes
apparent,
and I think a time for me is now."
So he's just retiring. They're not getting shut down or...
Even with saying that things have slowed down and...
Yeah.
Huh.
So he says.
There's got to be something underlying.
Just old. You know how that is.
I feel ya.
I'm ready to retire. Financially, I'm not, but my body sure is.
Physically?
Yeah.
Stick a fork in me.
I'm done.
Well, West Virginians, please don't, because...
They might literally.
Yeah. Being figurative here.
Don't get any ideas.
Not roadkill yet.
Right. Give it time. We talked about this, I mean, probably close to a year ago
.
Fireball, you know, the disgusting cinnamon whiskey.
Terrible.
They're little like mini bottle shot things.
So funny thing here. So when we did, we picked the order for my fantasy
football draft.
It's like a tradition to get like shots before the start.
Sure.
So the guy went out on his break at work and bought like a 10 pack of fireball
shots.
Not whiskey.
Not whiskey. So I had to enlighten everybody by saying this is just a malt
beverage
and it is not actual whiskey. So funny thing is when you look...
You're going to tell him about the Beechwood aging process?
No, I didn't want to bore him to sleep.
But if you look at the little bottle now, they spell it whiskey, W-H-I-S-K-Y.
Interesting.
So it looks like whiskey, but it's whiskey.
Right. That's like we were at dinner one night with Deb and Brian
and this was not a fancy establishment. The drink on the menu was old fashioned
.
Well, that's weird.
Yeah. I was like, does that make it like a knockoff old fashioned or why is it
different here?
Maybe they think that's what it is.
Maybe. It's like, is this a typo? Anyways, so back to fireball.
It went to court. There's a whole class action thing because the little bottles
are fermented malt beverages. They're not whiskey.
And fireball maker Sazerac attempts to block the class action certification.
Sazerac isn't taking the heat for causing confusion between its whiskey-based
fireball cinnamon and its malt-based product of the same name.
After Sazerac was hit with a class action lawsuit last year for allegedly
creating
consumer confusion between the two products, the company urged a California
federal judge
last week not to grant class certification to buyers who claimed the single
serving fireball
malt beverages misled consumers into thinking they were buying fireball's
cinnamon whiskey product.
The spirits giant is arguing that the putative class's experts' proposed
surveys don't show
wide ranging deception, saying that neither of the two surveys are admissible
because the methods do
not properly target fireball buyers and ignore important factors like
convenience and supply.
I don't know why that matters, because if I want fireball, which I don't, I
want actual fireball.
The product in question, fireball cinnamon, is a flavored malt beverage that
contains
natural whiskey and other flavors and caramel color. According to its label,
the beverage is
16.5% ABV, half the strength of the spirits-based fireball at 33%.
It's all terrible.
Yeah, either way, I don't want to drink it.
It really is.
So this is interesting. I just googled, is it whiskey or whiskey? You know, EY
or no EY.
The tricky part is matching the right spelling with the right country of origin
. If you're
talking about a drink that's been made in Scotland, Canada, or Japan, they use
the spelling
without the E. When referring to drinks distilled in the United States or
Ireland, they use the E.
Whiskey.
I'm going to have to go to the liquor store tomorrow.
Yeah. So without the E is not technically wrong. It's just weird to see in
America.
So it's not produced or made in America or Ireland then?
Well, the other thing is if it says whiskey though, I mean, then it's a real...
Yeah. It says it right on the bottle.
Yeah. Then they're really deceiving the public.
Right. Then you think you are getting whiskey.
Right.
Yeah. That's messed up.
Either way, they're deceiving the public into thinking they're drinking
something
that tastes halfway decent. They're not. It's so gross. I can't. I've never
liked Fireball.
I did that shot at the picking of the draft order and it was the worst.
Yeah.
I can't believe you woke up okay after fucking Fireball.
Oh yeah. I woke up fine. I mean, it was just one.
Oh, that's good. What was the rest of the liquor you had then?
Oh, at the draft draft? Oh, so that was at the draft order.
That was a different day.
I see.
We just drank shots of Jack all night.
Ooh. I mean, much better than Fireball.
Right.
I could do Jack and diet.
To wake up fine after six shots of Jack.
Pretty impressive.
Yeah.
We'll end on this one. Take a trip down to Florida, shall we?
It's been a while.
It has been a while. Get your gator and your grenade. We're going to Florida.
And oh, Alachua man. Alachua is apparently a place in Florida.
Sure.
Alachua man arrested for driving his tractor on Main Street while drunk.
I feel like we've heard stories like this before.
That's very Florida.
Rance Edward Shannon, 60.
What was his first name?
Rance.
That's what I thought you said.
Yeah. Like France without the F.
Right.
Yeah.
Of Alachua was arrested and charged with driving under the influence
and driving without a valid license after allegedly
weaving across lanes in a tractor on High Springs Main Street.
That's that's the slowest weaving I can imagine.
Right.
Is that really a weave?
Like Austin, Austin Power is trying to do that U-turn and.
Right. Or the whole steamroller thing, you know, get out of the way.
Five minutes later at about 441 p.m. on August 19th,
a High Springs Police Department officer saw a green John Deere tractor
traveling north on High Springs Main Street.
He reported the tractor traveled across a double yellow line twice
and entered the opposite lane of travel to pass a line of cars.
How's the tractor passing cars?
That's impressive.
It must be stopped.
Got a turbo.
Turbo tractor does eight miles per hour.
The officer conducted a traffic stop and the driver reportedly gave him
a Florida identification card instead of a driver's license.
The officer noted that there were two beers on the floorboard of the tractor
and he noticed a strong odor of urine and alcohol while speaking to Shannon.
Shannon's speech was reportedly slurred,
and the officer reported that he had difficulty standing up when he got out of
the tractor.
Shannon was reportedly unable to perform field sobriety exercises due to his
level of influence.
They did a, they ran a report on him.
Shannon has 16 felony convictions, five of which are violent,
including two felony DUI convictions and 36 misdemeanor convictions, non-
violent,
including three misdemeanor DUI convictions.
He has served seven state prison sentences with his most recent release in
September of 23.
The judge set bail at $4,000 with the requirement for a transdermal alcohol
detection device.
He said, I've been out of this place for a year.
I'm itching to get me a tractor.
What do you think?
A year ago, he's just about to get out like, "Hey, Rance," with a weird name.
What are you going to do as soon as you get out of the joint?
Like, "I'm going to get me a tractor."
Well, I wish they would have reported how he got down from the tractor
because those things are fucking tall.
Oh, yeah.
Big, they're tall, they're high up.
You have to climb up in it just to get there.
Unless it's one of those knockoff yard tractors, you know what I'm talking
about?
Is it John Deere, though?
Yeah, it's true.
Big fucking tractor.
Yeah, I hope it was because that would be hilarious to see,
just rolling down Main Street in my tractor.
Passing cars.
I don't think they can go faster than 30 miles an hour.
I wonder what the top...
Let's see if Google will tell us what the top speed of a tractor is.
Because I live in a parkway, and we get stuck behind some tractors every now
and then.
And I think maybe they max out at 15 miles an hour.
Google says most modern tractors go roughly 25 miles per hour at top speed.
Okay.
At best, he's zipping through a school zone.
If he's passing cars, they are probably slowing down to get out of the way
because they see his zigzagging.
Or slowing down to watch the fucking idiot in a tractor.
That too.
Oh, here comes Rance again, his fucking tractor.
How many times is this now?
16, 17?
Rance, go back to West Virginia already.
Oh, I tell you, that kid will never learn.
Oh, fucking Rance.
What a guy.
Classic.
Classic Florida.
Hey, speaking of Florida, hi, Vanessa.
Hello, Vanessa.
Oh, slightly creepy today.
Gotta keep you on your toes.
Right.
Which I'm not into toes.
Oh, hard pass.
Hard pass on the feet.
Definitely not a fan.
No, not a fan of feet.
Certainly not paying to see feet pictures.
Don't hate, but I don't love.
Look, if you want to like feet, that's fine.
But it's not a feet hater show.
Also, not a feet lover show.
Let's make that clear.
Very clear.
Yeah.
So let's end things before we dig any deeper holes.
Are we digging with our feet?
Oh, God, no.
Hands, hands only.
Find us on the socials at craftbeerrepublican, of course, at flexmeabeer,
underscores in between.
805-538-beer, craftbeerrepublic.com.
Mail at craftbeerrepublic.com.
I think that's everything.
I hope everyone is staying very well hydrated out there.
And on that note.
Good night, everybody!