Today begins the “official” (note inappropriate use of air quotes) start of our annual Oktoberfest celebration. We’ve been doing this for years and this is the one weekend a year that we carve out for ourselves. It has become harder over the years as each of us has gotten married, had kids, bought a house, et cetera. We’ve also gotten farther apart physically; the closest any of us are to the other is at least a two-hour drive.

Our general modus operandi is this: We each bring our computers and network them up for some digital mayhem. When we’re not doing that we’ll play cards or watch a movie, or even go out in the world to get some of the local cuisine (boy, I miss New Jersey pizza) or something crazy like tour a brewery. But—and this is why I’m writing this—we each bring four (or so) six-packs of some interesting beer (or some bombers, or growlers, or whatever) to share.

Over the course of this long weekend we’ll catch up on the goings-on of our lives, have a lot of laughs, and drink some pretty good beer.

Oh, this is also a meeting of the Hop Talk Advisory Council. They’ll be helping me with my Beer-a-Day project for the next few days.