As I write this, I’m enjoy­ing a Hop Stoopid by Lagu­ni­tas Brew­ing Com­pany. But I’m not just enjoy­ing a 12oz. like most nor­mal peo­ple, I’m drink­ing a 22oz. bomber of this incred­i­bly hoppy adven­ture of a brew. Do you know why I’m drink­ing it (and at 4:31am, none the less)? Because I love hops, and I love IPAs. An IPA is a spe­cialty breed. It’s a members-only tent that only the most advanced palates can appre­ci­ate. No mat­ter how many times your friends try and get you to enjoy the newest Impe­r­ial IPA, you sim­ply can’t do it unless you’ve put in the time. Lit­er­ally, you can’t enjoy this sacred beer style unless you practice…and practice…and practice.

You know it, and I know it, but now the cal­en­dar knows. Father Time knows it. It’s offi­cial. August 4^th, 2011. Inter­na­tional hol­i­day, IPADAY!

Read on to find out why it exists, what it is, what you should do, and how this will make us all bet­ter peo­ple.

Who Did It?

First of all, who the hell came up with such a silly idea as a day devoted to a style of beer? The answer is not that sur­pris­ing: the one and only Ash­ley V. Rou­ton (@TheBeerWench) is involved, along with Mr. Ryan Ross (@RyanARoss). Don’t be mis­led, though. Ash­ley her­self will acknowl­edge that the idea to cel­e­brate a par­tic­u­lar style of beer is derived from the wine world. You heard right. Don’t think that just because your drink doesn’t have grapes in it that it’s not derived from some­thing fruity! In fact, the idea came from a series of won­der­ful ideas to help make peo­ple aware of the awe­some­ness of wine. I won’t go into that here, but you should if you’re into that sort of thing.
As Ash­ley points out on her web­site, the beer world has, for some rea­son, been lol­ly­gag­ging in the imple­men­ta­tion of full-fledged inter­net sen­sa­tion­al­ism. I think, if I may say so, the rea­son is sim­ple. Wine, unlike beer, is not often enjoyed by peo­ple that just want a sim­ple dis­con­nect from the rest of the world. Beer, on the other hand, is often mis­used and abused. As a reg­is­tered nurse in the crit­i­cal care unit, I have never seen or heard of a patient com­ing in that has been abus­ing wine. It’s always booze or a combo of booze/beer. So, beer has some hur­dles to over­come. It’s like the go-to drink for any­body and every­body. Well, Ash­ley and Ryan aim to put a stop to lack of appre­ci­a­tion of our favorite drink!

Ash­ley has said, and I agree, “ I love what social media has done for the advance­ment of wine and I wanted to see the same thing hap­pen for craft beer. Period. End of story”. The truth is, beer is on it’s way, we all know that. But what can we do to appre­ci­ate the intri­ca­cies of the bev­er­age we love so much? CELEBRATE IT!

I honeslty couldn’t have said this next para­graph any bet­ter, so I’ll let Ash­ley say it for me:

IPA Day is not just for craft beer enthu­si­asts. It is an ALL-INCLUSIVE event for any­one and every­one who can legally con­sume alco­hol. For many peo­ple, every day is NOT in fact IPA Day. Actu­ally, I am quite cer­tain that there are more non-IPA drinkers in this world than IPA-drinkers. And it isn’t nec­es­sar­ily because they don’t like IPA. Maybe they drink wine 95% of the time. Maybe they drink cor­po­rate beer and have yet to expand into craft styles. Maybe they don’t even know what an IPA is.

So, what is it?

IPADAY is a day for you, and I, and the rest of the inter­net to get together (even if only in spirit), and enjoy the beauty of real beer. It’s a sin­gle day that’s about beer, instead of about us. It’s a day to bring peo­ple together in the search for the per­fect pint. It’s a free cel­e­bra­tion of the free spirit of the craft beer world. 

So…What Do I Do?

You drink! How much eas­ier could it be! You invite your friends, fam­ily cowork­ers, ex-inlaws, and you drink! You toast to the weather, the all­star game, the Bears, or what­ever, just drink! Cel­e­brate a style of beer rich in tra­di­tion and his­tory. Cel­e­brate the awe­some intri­ca­cies of hops and their role in the mak­ing of great beer. IPAs are not the point here. Instead, we aim to pro­mote a com­mon bond, an inter­est to help pro­mote the super secret agenda of the craft beer world…to bring peo­ple together under the com­mon umbrella of BEER!

For those of you who know me, I will be tap­ping my keg of Hop­slam on August 4, 2011. I will also have my own very orig­i­nal IPA on draft. So please, join me in cel­e­brat­ing this awe­some and mon­u­men­tal day in the his­tory of craft beer.

Please, enjoy this day respon­si­bly. Share your love of beer, IPAs, and other malty bev­er­ages with some­one who wouldn’t oth­er­wise expe­ri­ence them. This is OUR world and we have to take hold of it. No one will win this bat­tle against the macro giants but us! Long Live Great Beer!

Be Socia­ble, Share!

• 

Dane

Dane Mentzer is a young man with a love for beer and a pas­sion for peo­ple. He prides myself on a well-established nose and palate, with a widely devel­oped vocab­u­lary. The only thing he loves more than beer is peo­ple, and that is where life gets excit­ing. In addi­tion to found­ing The Brew Bros, He has also estab­lished “Beer Into Water” a non-for-profit orga­ni­za­tion aimed at host­ing beer events in order to quench the thirst of chil­dren around the world. Stay tuned for more infor­ma­tion as that char­ity comes to fruition. His favorite style is the Impe­r­ial India Pale Ale, although it changes with the sea­sons. His favorite brew at the time is Arc­tic Panzer Wolf by 3 Floyds.

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