A very Rib Eye Jack's Christmas

I am including this photo of me and my buddy, Steve, for
two reasons. Reason #1: Because I have way too many
friends named Steve. Seriously, like dozens of 'em. And
Reason #2: Rib Eye Jack's Ale House's general manager
"Another Steve" once pointed out that if you are going to
drink a lager, make sure it has some colour to it. I'm not
sure what fine Molson product Steve is drinking in this
picture but compare its colour to the Samuel Adams'
Boston Lager I am drinking at our high school reunion.
Deeper, darker, more deliciouser. That's a word. Now.

Three weeks ago, I stopped into Rib Eye Jack's Ale House on my way home from work simply because the bar is stacked to the rafters with outstanding craft beers and has the dubious geographical misfortune of being, well, on my way home from work.

Once there, I saw my buddy, Steve, the bar's general manager, looking somewhat haggard. Now because males are not hugely empathetic creatures by nature, particularly with other men (though we will convincingly fake it for women), I simply looked at him and said, "You sick?" while I was actually thinking, "So, what should I start with?"

No, as it turns out, he was simply tired because he and a few of the ladies had spend hours prior to that getting the bar's Christmas decorations up. "Oh yeah?" I said, still pondering my opening beer selection, "Where?"

Shooting me that "If we were in a back alley, I would beat you to death" look, he simply pointed up. Because I'm excellent at following simple directions without the use of GPS, I looked up. Well, sonuvagun, if there wasn't little green bells and colourful tinsel and other Christmas-y stuff up there. Very festive. Unfortunately, it was also about two feet north of the bar taps so well out of my sight-line. Of course, I would like to say the story ends there. But it doesn't simply because it became my Christmas Story for 2015.

My little "butt plug" Christmas tree. I promised wee
Cara that I would make this my actual Christmas
tree. I did. There's no rules at Donny's Bar and Grill

Within minutes, young Cara, a wide-eyed, pretty pixie of a girl, came out and said all-too-happily, "Did you see the butt plugs?" I had no idea what she was talking about so off she hopped into the kitchen before returning with the deep blue, cone-shaped, tree-like Christmas ornament you see in this picture. "Here you go," she said, enthusiastically presenting me with one. Well, as it turns out, when they were putting up the festive decorations, one of the ladies jokingly referred to this ornament as a butt plug. Seeing that made Steve wince, well, of course, they all piled on, debasing that poor little ornament. "I thought they'd get tired of saying it before I got tired of hearing it," sighed Steve. "I was wrong." I once worked in a municipal politics office with just me and 15 women between the ages of 30 and 55 so I feel ya, bro. The things I heard from that group of raunchy ladies? Well, I can't even go there. A therapist would, no doubt, tell me to let it go, that it's only words. Dark, disturbing, twisted words. Eventually, Steve had heard enough and the ornament was relegated to the storage room, never to be seen again. So I happily took mine and told Cara that I would make it this year's Christmas tree.

Just when I thought I couldn't be more screwed,
Santa Claus ups the ante. Rat bastard, I hate you!

That seemed to delight her. Except in one of those all-too-frequent male moments, I decided to carry everything in from the car at once (rather than make two trips) when I got home and butt plug Christmas tree, tucked under my arm, slipped and went one-on-one with the pavement. It lost that battle, shattering into a million pieces. That lead to perhaps the strangest message I've ever sent when I texted Steve instantly and said, "My butt plug Christmas tree hit the ground and broke. Don't tell Cara! I promised her I would use it as my Christmas tree. Can I get another?" If the NSA is monitoring my texts, they must think I'm one sick son of a bitch. (But for their sake, I do try to keep things entertaining.) So, as if by magic, another showed up in front of me the next night at the bar. Cara saw it eventually and said, "Are you carrying that around with you?" I replied, "Oh yeah, it's my touchstone." I have no idea what a touchstone is but it sounds like an Oprah word and it seemed to work so...

This is the beer that launched me right
onto Instagram - Life Sentence IIIPA, a
hop bomb created by Great Lakes and
Amsterdam Breweries. Hot damn, this
was 12 kinds of delicious. And deadly.

Please understand of all the bar staff I've known over the years, this particular group at Rib Eye Jack's are probably the most consummate professionals I've encountered but a chance to mess with the boss? Best. Christmas. Present. Ever! (When I stopped in on Christmas Eve after a brutal Beer Store shift, poor Cara was running around like crazy. Looking over at Steve, quickly preparing beverages for her, she turned to me and said, "He's the best." So lots of respect there.) And when I told my son that was our 2015 Christmas tree, he looked at it and said, "Oh, okay... cool" so win-win.

Since this is supposed to be about beer, not festive fun (although they do go hand-in-hand... or perhaps hand to mouth), here's a beer story that has an Instagram twist. My co-worker, Jay-Dawg, has been pushing me to go on Instagram for a while. "I think most of my beer purchases are based on the cool pictures the craft breweries post," he noted, cinching the deal. So I created my Instagram account. At one point, it asked me if I wanted to follow my Facebook friends with Instagram accounts, I clicked yes because that seems easiest. "The path of least resistance" has always been my credo. At that exact second, phones around the world were beeping. Jay said he was with a group of friends and all their phones beeped at the same time. Looking at it, he chuckled to the others, "Well, Donny's finally on Instagram."

But being a noob, I was uncertain how to use it. I finally gave it a test-run the same night Rib Eye Jack's got their keg of the Great Lakes/Amsterdam Brewing's collaborative Life Sentence Triple IPA.

A Mill Street Brewing employee puts the final touches
on their super-sweet Keg Christmas Tree at the popular
brewpub. It's beginning to taste a lot like Christmas...

I took a picture of the beer, shown above, and somehow managed to post it to the site. I noticed a ton of photo filtering options, none of which should ever be used by a colourblind man, and just put a caption underneath with my location (it popped up too). Granted I called it Life Essence IIIPA so my first ever Instagram post was a *facepalm* factual error. "Why am I not surprised?" chuckled Steve. Not knowing how to edit my caption, I simply put a correction underneath. But, just as instantly as I got dozens of "likes" (or whatever the Instagram equivalent is), I got a text from Jay, asking if I was staying put. Turns out he had returned from a family dinner and wanted to continue his night but no takers. So he turned on Instagram and my picture was the first thing that popped up. Instagram has finally accomplished what my ex-wives and girlfriends tried to do for years - it has GPSed my destination-uncertain roving ass. Living mere minutes away, Jay joined me at the bar before I had finished my first pint.

So how was that Life Sentence IIIPA? It was a 10%, 100-plus IBU (international bitterness units) car bomb, though not in that Northern Ireland way... in the good way.

Finally!! I actually managed to find beer technician Kylie
and GM Steve an IPA they've never had for Christmas!
That's a lot like finding a unicorn. It just doesn't happen!

I'll let Beer Bro Glenn take it from here with his descriptive prose on RateBeer. "Smells of mango, grapefruit, orange and tropical fruit goodness. Tastes of powerful citrusy hops and goes down very smooth with only a hint of booze. Excellent stuff!" To which I'll add with my usual erudition, "Yeah, what he said!" Hands-down, one of the best beers I've had all year and I have had many. In fact, while one sip was enough to convince Jay that maybe he should stick with Great Lakes Swamp Juice 19 (a concoction joining their Thrust and Lake Effects IPAs with their Canuck Pale Ale), I would have happily drank that Life Sentence keg dry, having declared it a Taxi Night early on. However, I was wisely halted by lovely beer technician Kylie who Smart-Served me after a couple and steered me to milder fares. Keep in mind, each pint was nearly the equivalent of four regular beers. Had I kept going, I would have been a babbling puddle at the end of the bar. As Beer Store employees ourselves, Jay and I certainly get that.

That fat bastard finally gets it right. And you know
what, Santa? I was on the Naughty List by January
2nd at the latest so I was gonna do this anyways...

By the end, that beer was whispering in my ear, "You know what would be fun? You should drunk-text that old flame you still carry a torch for and tell her what a great kisser the girlfriend after her was! Do it! She'll think it's funny!" So like I said, dangerously delicious. But while that keg is now Magellan (history), Steve managed to pop a couple more cans of it into my Christmas stocking, as well as a big-ass bottle of Great Lakes Brewing's The Imperial Bout Vanilla Bean Coffee Porter. Plus I have some goodies from returning student and total sweetie Sassy Cassy straight from Thunder Bay's Sleeping Giant Brewing - their Beaver Duck American Pale Ale as well as their delicious Vanilla Coffee Porter (had it and reviewed it last Christmas, courtesy of Cassy). So lots of Christmas cheer coming! But I have to clean this place before my boy lands here today. And as I was emptying out the dirt container on my vacuum cleaner, it dawned on me. I had become the vacuum cleaner! (Deep Thoughts by Donny.) So Merry Christmas, guys and dolls, because that's it, that's all and I am outta here! Until next time, I remain...