Independence Day

Well, the 4th of July and Saturday night have come and gone, which of course means I drank a whole bunch of alcohol again. I started the evening out at a park with some friends and, after a delicious Jimmy John's vegetarian "unwich", I opened the last of a 6-pack of Smithwick's (4.5% ABV, Irish Red Ale) I bought a few weeks ago.
It's pretty good, but it's definitely better on tap than from a bottle. I think you'd say that drinkability is high but complexity is low...something like that. Anyway, next on the agenda was Pyramid's Audacious Apricot Ale (5.1% ABV, fruit/vegetable beer), of which I had purchased a 6-pack.
I sincerely wish this beer could've been purchased by the bottle so I wouldn't have had to endure so many of these. This is one of those quirky beers, one of which is fun to drink. It tastes exactly like apricot, with a beer aftertaste. Having one of these bottles around is great because everyone around you will want to take a sip and say shit like, "Mmm! It really does taste like apricots!" and then either, "ew and then it has a bad aftertaste," if she's not a beer drinker, or, "Ah, and then it has a good aftertaste," if he's a beer drinker who is trying to sound like he has sophisticated taste but really doesn't. Anyway, the point is that it seems to me that this is generic "meh" ale with apricot flavored syrup poured in.

I had 2 of these at the park (bringing my beer total to 3 and my CLBV* count to 3.5). Then my girlfriend wanted me to go swimming with her and some friends. I ended up walking about 3 miles in flip flops while having to pee really badly (3 beers!) trying to make it to my girlfriend. At first, there were complications with the directions, so I had to double back, after about a 1/4 of a mile, to re-ask for directions. Then, it turned out that all entrances to the park were blocked, so I walked another two and a half miles to where I could find her parked. Anyway, after getting home, peeing, and eating the last 3 bites of her Jack-in-the-box something or other, I attempted to have another audacious apricot thing, as did she. I only got half way through mine, then put it in the mini-fridge (as if I'm going to want to drink the rest of it in a few days?), and asked if we could stop at the beer store on the way to the pool.

I always forget that I have to have cans at apartment pools because they all have no glass policies. That shit severely limits my choices. Besides the domestic, lite swill, it came down to Modelo, Tecate or those big Fosters cans (I couldn't find a good enough picture to convey the size of the kind they were selling). I'll try the Fosters one day, but I'm always afraid that they'll just get way too warm before I can make my way through them, and I'm just not at the level of beer connoisseur where I can appreciate utterly warm beer for all it's worth. So I wound up with a 6-pack of Modelo Especial (4.4% ABV Mexican pilsner).
It just kind of tasted generic to me, but I was tipsy and swimming. The dude at the counter told me beer salt was a good idea, so I had some of that with my Modelos, but I accidentally bought the lemon/lime kind instead of regular. Oh well. I ended up drinking...probably 3 of these and playing water volleyball and football with some friends and their 2 kids.

Then I had more Jack-in-the-Box, took 2 ibuprofen, and passed out watching a DVD of Designing Women. Happy 4th!


*Coor's Light by volume is how I keep track of how much beer I've had. That is, until I'm too drunk to do that kind of math and just keep drinking. It's just a conversion into how many 4.2% beers I've had.