Here I thought I needed a new job, a new heart, a new mind.  But, in fact, it turns out that I just needed a beer. Seriously, just take a load off, woman.  You’ve done enough.

Alright, let’s get to business.  I am a fan of Deschutes Brewery, and I can not lie.  You other brothers can’t deny.  Their “Hop in the Dark” claims to be a CDA, which this idiot, your correspondent, interprets as a “C-Something-Dunno Dark Ale” but it looks and tastes like a really good porter to me.  When I was drinking it out of the bottle sober, it tasted light and fresh.  Not too hoppy, not at all caramel.  But then I poured it into a glass, moderately less sober, and suddenly all that dark hit me and I’m all, well maybe there is some caramel even though I didn’t notice it before.  Oh yeah, definitely.  Also, hand me thosh preshzels.

In my recent past, I had a conversation with someone, and I pointed out how nice it is to pretend I’m an educated consumer.  I can’t actually tell you what’s in this, but I can pretend.  I can say, “hm, ah yes, I see… orange-ish” and who’s going to argue with me?  My tastes are mine damn it, and this beer tastes of orange.  Sigh.  I think about that conversation, and the ones like it, often.  Such memories provide comfort.  I say, there was a time.  There was a time. Once upon a time.

Anyway, Deschutes’s Hop in the Dark CDA is not orange-ish.  I would go so far as to call it balanced.  Nothing leapt out.  The caramel didn’t hit me until I saw it and let’s be honest, I was pretty drunk by then.  But would I drink it again?  Pshaw, it’s Deschutes!  Everything they do is awesome, what are you even talking about.

Okay, I have to go back to work.