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SMITHWICK’S ALE—What to buy with that government cheque

My Fellow Inebriates,

It came completely as news to me today that the Canadian government does not and has never had any plans to subsidize my drinking.

My parents were characteristically insensitive about the whole thing.


I was talking about the hundred bucks per child my mum gets each month in the mail. Little did I know, the money in question represents not a small beer fund provided to keep Canadians happy, but in fact the government’s laughable and deliberately blinkered estimate of what monthly child care might cost. The $100-per-child benefit is sent to all Canadian families with a child under 6, to help them “balance work and family life by supporting their child care choices through direct financial support.”

As of January, the cheque has been halved because only one of the kids is under 6.

I just assumed the money was for beer because such a paltry sum couldn’t make more than a 15% dent in child care costs. I figured most parents received the cheque, snickered at it, snickered at the government, then cashed it and headed for the liquor store.

Okay, so it would be a bit of a departure from the norm if my mum took the cheque and bought, say, eight six-packs of SMITHWICK’S ALE. But even if she were willing—how sad it is that, thanks to Miss P attaining 6 years of age, it would cover only eight and not sixteen half-sacks!

My dad has enjoyed SMITHWICK’S for years, although he occasionally opts for GUINNESS instead. My mum doesn’t mind it, and probably gives it a bit more allegiance than it deserves because she has some Irish genes, but finds it less interesting than other ales and a bit too hop-forward than it needs to be.

As you can guess, I love SMITHWICK’S. It pours a nice rich amber with lovely foam and a slightly earthy but mostly malty aroma. On the palate it is crisp and refreshing with a longish, hoppy finish. It’s a bit of a cross-over between a lager and an ale, which makes it perfect all year—refreshing in summer but heavy enough for fireside imbibing in winter.

Once you’ve been drinking SMITHWICK’S for a while, its lingering bittersweetness becomes an acquired taste. It’s true—we’ve had SMITHWICK’S more than any other beer in the house over the years and I do find myself desiring its refreshing hoppiness every single day.

I was only joking when I suggested 6-year-old Miss P should earn some money. She doesn’t even really like doing her homework, and is otherwise such an absurdly happy kid that I wouldn’t want to introduce her to the wicked work force too soon. That and the fact that they don’t hire kids to sweep chimneys any more…because to do so would be demonstrably more archaic than supposing that $100 can buy anything meaningful in the way of child care.

But I do think my mum should get cracking and find a way to replace Miss P’s monthly $100 government largesse so we can stay properly hammered while we’re helping her with her homework.

SLEEMAN FINE PORTER—Don’t forget to sip and enjoy (unless you’re an alcoholic)…ARE you an alcoholic?

My Fellow Inebriates,

I found an old blog I started months ago and forgot about because I was drunk at the time.

It was a Blogger blog. I’d filled out my profile information and some preferences, uploaded a background and selected some fonts, then abandoned the thing, presumably because we’d bought some gin or something.

If I hadn’t accidentally visited Dan Lacey’s Blogger blog, I’d never have remembered.

It worried me how completely the memory of starting a Blogger blog had vanished. Easy to forget, too—its stats showed one visitor in the past three months, two in its entire lifetime.

Now, you’re probably thinking this is a sign of advanced alcoholism, and you may be right. But OMG, what if it’s another kind of dementia? How would I know the difference?

Turns out it’s pretty hard to tell the difference. Common symptoms of both:

    • Memory loss
    • Difficulty performing familiar tasks
    • Impaired judgment
    • Language problems
    • Personality changes

I totally have memory problems. For instance, I almost forgot to mention the SLEEMAN FINE PORTER I tried over the holidays. SLEEMAN is a bit of a go-to at our house; during summer we buy the HONEY LAGER quite often because it has more body than a typical lager while still being crisp and refreshing. Safe to say: SLEEMAN would have some know-how about producing a porter.

Pouring it into a glass was difficult despite the familiarity of the task. These little paws of mine are no match for even twist-off convenience, lacking as they do any muscular or skeletal construction. Intelligent design, my furry ass! I should have been constructed with an opener built into my paw, but then I’d be such a robotic mutant that I’d freak myself out. Luckily my dad finally opened a bottle.

In the glass SLEEMAN FINE PORTER is a beautiful dark mahogany with a pillowy-soft layer of inviting foam. The smell is faintly nutty with detectable chocolate and caramel—not aggressively aromatic and in my judgment—the same judgment that prompted me to release my own porn video—just right.

Moderate carbonation makes this porter unlike the British cousins it’s partially aspiring to imitate; the crispness is a savvy move on the part of SLEEMAN and their best bet in terms of capturing mainstream market popularity. This brew will probably turn off ardent purists, but they probably don’t drive the SLEEMAN market anyway. I like the way the fizz balances against the bread-and-chocolate background flavors, mitigating the expected heavy creaminess, highlighting the hops, and settling down into a satisfying, long finish with just the right hint of bitterness.

After consuming an abundance of SLEEMAN FINE PORTER I certainly struggled with language problems, so I’ll borrow my dad’s pronouncement: “probably the best beer SLEEMAN makes.” But then his personality changed (OMG!) and he denied me another bottle. And then my personality changed, and I called him a dick.

It all feels a bit demented—but in an elderly way, a neurologically-impaired sort of way, or an alcoholic way?

There’s plenty of overlap between diagnoses, but luckily medical experts are on the job. In fact, recent studies show that brain impairment differs among alcoholics from that exhibited by Alzheimer’s patients.

One recent study compared 39 elderly detoxified alcoholics with 9 Alzheimer’s patients and 15 control subjects. I’d have liked to have been a fly on that wall, or even played bartender, but apparently it was all business. The subjects with alcohol-related dementia showed different types of impairment from the other groups, the former group specifically challenged by fine motor control, initial letter fluency and free recall. As you can imagine, these skill deficits make it awfully hard to write a coherent booze review, so my apologies.

Curious whether you’re an alcoholic? If you suspect you are, there are plenty of tests to help you confirm it. Go on, find out! In fact, here’s the Johns Hopkins University Test for Alcoholism. Add up your answers! And send me your comments 😉

Please answer yes or no to each question.

  1. Do you lose time from work due to drinking?     Y     N
  2. Is drinking making your home life unhappy?     Y     N
  3. Do you drink because you are shy with other people?     Y     N
  4. Is drinking affecting your reputation?     Y     N
  5. Have you ever felt remorse after drinking?     Y     N
  6. Have you gotten into financial difficulties as a result of your drinking?     Y     N
  7. Do you turn to lower companions and an inferior environment when drinking?     Y     N
  8. Does your drinking make you careless of your family’s welfare?     Y     N
  9. Has your ambition decreased since drinking?     Y     N
  10. Do you crave a drink at a definite time daily?     Y     N
  11. Do you want a drink the next morning?     Y     N
  12. Does your drinking cause you to have difficulties in sleeping?     Y     N
  13. Has your efficiency decreased since drinking?     Y     N
  14. Is your drinking jeopardizing your job or business?     Y     N
  15. Do you drink to escape from worries or troubles?     Y     N
  16. Do you drink alone?     Y     N
  17. Have you ever had a complete loss of memory?     Y     N
  18. Has your physician ever treated you for drinking?     Y     N
  19. Do you drink to build your self-confidence?     Y     N
  20. Have you ever been in a hospital or institution on account of drinking?     Y     N

Results

YES answers:

3—indicates a probable drinking problem.

4-7—indicates early-stage alcoholism.

7-10—indicates middle-stage alcoholism.

10+—indicates end-stage alcoholism.

——————————————————

How did you score? I got a 5! That means there’s plenty of fun left 😉

DUCHY ORIGINALS ORGANIC OLD RUBY ALE

My Fellow Inebriates,

Others have reviewed this nice organic ale much more thoughtfully than I, and even taken their own pictures. My mum bought it because it was $3.50 and she didn’t feel like using her debit card “to bootleg for animals.”

The label and marketing remind me a bit of Marks & Spencer; the bottle has that generic big-corporate-entity feel to it, like the beer you can buy at Trader Joe’s or Costco in the States. It’s not totally evil though—the beer is organically produced on land administered by Prince Charles as part of a charity project now 20 years strong.

I was a charity bear once, so I’m gladdened to know some of the profits get skimmed off to help people in need. And just as cool, OLD RUBY ALE is produced sustainably. Even a hedonistic bear with an apocalyptic bent can appreciate that no one’s raping the land to create beer.

It’s also nice to know that if I get a head-splitting hangover from OLD RUBY ALE it’s because I drank enough to get thoroughly shitfaced—not because of chemical additives.

But how does it taste?

My tastebuds are Canadian, so essentially they’re ADHD tastebuds—they need beer to crackle and fizz and spark in the mouth like so much microscopic bubble wrap. I can’t crack a beer without automatically anticipating fizz. So when our bottle of OLD RUBY ALE opened not with a burst but a sigh, I sighed also. But I still wanted to drink it very badly. I had some bad-ass DTs to manage or at least get down to a dull roar.

The low carbonation was less disappointing than you’d think. After all, a lot of Canadian swill needs to be hyper-carbonated to mask its offensive flavor, so you have to hand it to a less fizzy beer like OLD RUBY ALE for strutting its stuff without that effervescent crutch.

It had a lovely auburn color in the glass. It wafted malt and slight breadiness in nice harmony. First sips hinted initially at bitterness but morphed into sweetness—a bit simple on the palate. It felt thin in the mouth and, while never offensive, failed somehow to deliver much beyond those first impressions. And, of course, it was flat.