The Bar Towel

Good article:
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/drin ... e_and.html

This stuff doesn't bug me too much anymore since I've stepped back from the hype to just enjoy good reliable beer and kept the hunting to a minimum.

I do find the point in the second paragraph of page 2 interesting. I've always wondered what it is that pushes beer geeks to the more vinous offerings. My gut tells me it's a need for acceptance from wine geeks, but that's probably unfair since these styles (and barrel-aged offerings especially) don't really appeal to me anymore.

Bytowner wrote:Good article:
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/drin ... e_and.html

This stuff doesn't bug me too much anymore since I've stepped back from the hype to just enjoy good reliable beer and kept the hunting to a minimum.

but that's probably unfair since these styles (and barrel-aged offerings especially) don't really appeal to me anymore.

seconded

It is hard for me to care about this thing mostly because with most of these beers I wouldn't have a chance to try them either way.

Plus I wonder how long it will be before beer auctions become legitimized. I mean wine auctions have been a thing like forever. And collectors auctioning off rare and collectible bottles of wine is socially acceptable. So why do people freak out so much about auctioning off beer?

Bytowner wrote:I've always wondered what it is that pushes beer geeks to the more vinous offerings. My gut tells me it's a need for acceptance from wine geeks, but that's probably unfair since these styles (and barrel-aged offerings especially) don't really appeal to me anymore.

The best ones are integrated well enough that they don't taste "barrel aged" they just taste awesome.

This was pretty interesting for example:
http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/lost-abbey ... 09/114432/