A return to form

*cough*

Pardon me while I sweep out a few electronic cobwebs.

Once upon a time, I started a small beer blog, partially as a escape vent for the desire to write something, partially as a justification for a simply enormous amount of beer-swilling. And, I suppose, partially because beer was such an easy subject to write about.

Things went well; rather better than I expected, and soon there was what you might loosely call a readership. By my tally, I even got one free beer out of the experience. Then, as so often happens with hobbies, life got in the way. The return from Island living to the bustle of Vancouver pretty much nailed the coffin shut. What's more, I now got paid to write, thus scratching that particular itch, and providing the spondulix that is required for food and shelter, and all those other little vagaries that are vastly inferior to beer, but apparently necessary.

Worse still, I then had a kid. No, no, no, that won't do - one can't be intimating that fatherhood is an inconvenience that gets in the way of drinking. That's a good way to have any chance of further fathering cut short by a swiftly aimed kick from one's spouse.

Ahem. I was *blessed* with a little girl. Sweetness and light. Warmth and joy to my soul; urine and regurgitated milk to my physical person. I kid, but it's the best thing ever.

I've had some pretty amazing beer in the intervening time. Switchback became my go-to 6'er, American bombers crammed my fridge like they crammed the skies over Germany in the early 1940s (with pretty much the same attrition rate).

Meanwhile, I let the domain name lapse and yetanotherdamnbeerblog.com was taken over by a company that, as far as I can tell, sells powdered Kermode bear scrotum.

And now, back at the beginning again, through the wormhole of a Singularity; the beer that started this whole shebang. I've been out of the scene for some time, but have been following along: the attempted trademarking of CDAs, the relaxing of BCLDB laws in theatres, the emergence of a fair pint, and the rise of CAMRA as much more than just a way to get a break on your Brewery Creek purchase.

Craft beer is far beyond fad, beyond hipster affectation and beyond grassroots groundswell. BC is a brewing powerhouse these days - we're practically spoiled for choice.

Writing about cars is enjoyable - I plan to do a great deal more of it towards the latter half of the year. But it's work, to be taken seriously and methodically: writing about beer is far more fun.

So, here we go again. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars.

Dear Christ in Heaven - it's like used engine oil made from sexy dinosaurs!