Seven Sons

Terry Gross, the host of NPR’s Fresh Air radio show, interviewed Tony Judt yesterday. He is a historian and a professor, and has been living with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease) for the last few years.

Photo credit: Salon van Sisyphus (in Dutch)

I enjoy listening to “interesting” voices on the radio – somehow it is easier to concentrate on what a person is saying if they sound different from the prescribed neutral mid-western accent of most TV anchors. Mr. Judt’s voice, strained from the disease and accented by a respiration machine is certainly an interesting voice; but his thoughtfulness, wisdom and the fluency of his explanations were amazing and would have held my attention in any voice. He had a great answer to each of Terry’s questions, and seemed to have thought through all these answers over the years. One of the most compelling was his answer to Terry’s question about whether becoming sick had changed his faith in God.

“I don’t believe in an afterlife. I don’t believe in a single or multiple godhead. I respect people who do, but I don’t believe it myself. But there’s a big ‘but’ which enters in here. I am much more conscious than I ever was — for obvious reasons — on what it will mean to people left behind once I’m dead. It won’t mean anything for me. But it will mean a lot to them. It’s important to them — by which I mean my children or my wife or my very close friends — that some spirit of me is in a positive way present in their lives, in their heads, in their imaginations and so on. So [in] one curious way I’ve come to believe in the afterlife — as a place where I still have moral responsibilities, just as I do in this life — except that I can only exercise them before I get there. Once I get there, it will be too late. So, no God. No organized religion. But a developing sense that there’s something bigger than the world we live in, including after we die, and we have responsibilities in that world.”

Amen to that.

Don’t get me wrong- I actually like Texas and Texans.  Just not the moronic group that chooses the state’s text books.  Unfortunately, the state’s text book board is the nation’s most powerful because of the number of students they serve (California apparently does its own thing) so Texas has huge sway over what the rest of the country ends up using; publishers for the rest of us tend to follow their demands.

So in this context, it’s fair to ask about the heights of erudition achieved by the members of this remarkably powerful group.  Let’s hear from the chairman:

“We are a Christian nation founded on Christian principles. The way I evaluate history textbooks is first I see how they cover Christianity and Israel. Then I see how they treat Ronald Reagan — he needs to get credit for saving the world from communism and for the good economy over the last 20 years because he lowered taxes.”
– Dr. Don McLeroy, chairman of the Texas Board of Education, which recently approved a controversial new school curriculum

Excuse me?  “The way I evaluate history textbooks is first I see….”?

Hmmm.  The way I evaluate text book board chairman, among other ways, is how well they manage to put a sentence together.

I won’t even go to his sub-third grade logic regarding Reagan, low taxes, and 20 years of “the good economy”.

Have at it, Texas.  But please- if you’re going to choose textbooks for the rest of us, go ahead and make good on your threat to secede.

I’m a home brewer and beer lover. Today I’d like to list some specific issues that seem to come up frequently in conversation among those who are similarly inclined.

1. Are we beer snobs, afficianados, connoisseurs, lovers, advocates or geeks? I have seen each of these terms and more used with derision and affection. The bottom line on this one is easy – call yourself what you will, and develop your situational awareness. In the press, beer geeks are lovable and interesting. In conversation, calling yourself a beer advocate gives you an air of authority. A beer lover can be a Coors-shotgunning frat boy or a wine eschewer, depending on the context. Choose carefully.

2. What is the difference between a porter and a stout? This debate has probably gone on as long as these beer styles have existed. There are a few conventional answers. (a) Stouts are made with roasted grains, and porters are not. (b) Stouts are darker than porters. (c) Stouts are from Ireland, porters from England. Here’s the real answer – it is whatever the brewer decides to call it. Seriously. There is so much overlap in the style that beer judges would find it impossible to differentiate the styles.

3. What makes a beer a double IPA, and what should I call the style? Again, very subjective, but here’s the general guidelines. A beer that approaches or exceeds 8% (the traditional starting point for “strong ales”), is dry (i.e. not sweet, with no lingering malty flavor after you swallow), and has “hop forward” character (meaning you can smell copious amounts of grass, grapefruit, and other fresh scents before you take your first sip) is a double IPA. There are better names for the style, in order of my preference: West Coast IPA, San Diego Pale Ale, Imperial IPA, Double IPA.

4. Why are IPAs so popular among beer geeks? Same reason bourbon-barrel-aged beers are popular, sour beers are popular, and Russian imperial stouts are popular. They have FLAVOR. Never forget that beer has the potential, the capacity and the birthright to be an exceedingly flavorful creation. Celebrate and revel in those flavors – all of them. Beer advocates like to say that beer and cheese go so much better together than wine and cheese, the more popular pairing, since the flavor and variety of ingredients in beer can match and stand up to even the strongest cheeses.

5. When I go to a beer bar, what should I look for? Three things: Selection, draft quality and information about the beer. The selection doesn’t have to be huge, but variety (a mix a different styles, including light pale ales, IPAs, a stout or a porter, Belgian style brews and a mix of rare or specialty offerings like casks, barrel-aged or sours) and a good theme or focus across all the handles are always appreciated. Tap handles that highlight local brewers are a plus. Draft quality is usually apparent over time; is the flavor and temperature of a particular beer consistent? Are the tap handles cleaned regularly? Do some handles sit empty (or worse, unsold) for days on end? And as for information, a large format board listing the beer selection is always appreciated, and the more information on the board (style, brewer, alcohol percentage, IBUs) the better chance I have of making a decision that I’ll be happy with. Whether or not there is a board, the servers should all be well versed in the tap selections and be prepared to make a recommendation after a short conversation with a patron.

There are more topics to cover than this, but a friend convinced me to let this draft fly without picking at it for too long. Filling in the gaps is what the comments section (below) is for.