Every year for the last fourteen years or so, I have gotten together around this time of year with Ron, Max, and Don. We all live far, far away from each other, and have our own familial and employment commitments, but for one long weekend we leave all that beyond (well, mostly) and catch up on our lives and drink some really good beer.

Well, I’ve just returned from the airport and it’s awfully quiet here. (We’ve waxed on about our Octoberfest weekends before, so I won’t tread over that same ground again.) I was glad to have the entire Hop Talk Advisory Council in attendance. Sadly, tomorrow is back to the old grind.

We had some really interesting beers this time around, and there were a lot that none of us have ever had before. In no particular order:

• New Jersey Beer Co. Garden State Stout ^D
• Flying Dog Raging Bitch
• Sierra Nevada Tumbler
• Smuttynose Brewing Pumpkin Ale
• RJ Rockers Bell Ringer ^D
• Schlafly Dry Hopped APA
• He’brew Genesis Ale
• Heavy Seas Peg Leg Imperial Stout ^M
• Flying Dog Dogtoberfest
• Brewer’s Alley Kölsch
• Mad River Brewing Steelhead Double IPA ^R
• Brooklyn Brewing Oktoberfest
• Great Divide Rumble Oak Aged IPA
• Avery Out of Bounds Stout ^{R A}
• Heavy Seas Märzen ^M
• Southern Tier 2XIPA ^R
• Starr Hill Festie
• Fegley’s BrewWorks Monkey Wrench Saison
• Dogfish Head/Stone/Victory Saison du Buff *
• Flying Dog Barrel-Aged Gonzo Imperial Porter (Wild Dog series) *
• North Coast Old Stock Ale (2009) (cellared for 14 months) *

Notes:

* We shared a 12-ounce bottle amongst us

^{A D M R} – Picked as a favorite by Al, Don, Max and Ron respectively

All good things must come to an end, and so our “O-fest 2009” celebration is over. It was good to see Ron and Max and Don again; it happens all-too-rarely anymore. We stayed up way too late, got up way too early, ate way too much bad food, and had way too much lots of beer. My eyes are dried out from not blinking while driving really, really fast in Burnout Paradise and shooting hundreds of monsters in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, plus a few other video games and a rousing game of Munchkin. These old bones can’t take sleeping on floors much anymore, but it was all worth it. Don’s friend Vic also joined us for an evening, which was fun and, in the spirit of things, brought four six-packs of his own.

Thanks guys. Let’s do it again next year.

We were only able to get through about half of the beer, so I left with about as much as I arrived with.

Here’s a (more-or-less complete) list of what we brought, in no particular order:

• Ithaca Cascazilla
• Green Flash IPA
• Victory Moonglow
• Lake Placid Ubu Ale
• Stone Levitation Ale
• Unibroue Trois Pistoles
• Brooklyner-Schneider Hopfen-Weisse
• Fort Collins Chocolate Stout
• Troëgs Dead Reckoning Porter
• Troëgs Java Head Stout
• Rogue Morimoto Imperial Pilsner
• Dogfish Head 60 minute IPA
• Flying Dog Canis Major mixed pack
  • Gonzo Imperial Porter
  • Kerberos Tripel
  • Double Dog Double Pale Ale
  • Horn Dog Barley Wine
• Oskar Blues Mama’s Little Yella Pils
• Goose Island Honker’s Ale
• Southampton IPA
• Newcastle Brown Ale
• Guinness Stout
• Guinness Draught
• Paulaner’s Octoberfest Märzen
• Blue Point Toasted Lager
• Morland Old Speckled Hen
• Smithwick’s Irish Ale
• Sierra Nevada Torpedo Extra IPA
• New Holland Ichabod Pumpkin Ale
• Arcadia Jaw-Jacker Ale
• New Holland The Poet Oatmeal Stout
• Captain Lawrence “Smoke from the Oak” from Apple Brandy barrels
• Southern Tier Crème Brûlée Imperial Milk Stout
• Great Divide Oak Aged Yeti Imperial Stout