My Beer Thought...

Ah beer...the cornerstone of any good American meal...or Canadian...or Australian...or German...or just about anywhere else in Europe for that matter. Beer has been a staple of our economy, our night lives, and our very existance for hundreds, possibly thousands of years. And I plan to give beer its just do this evening.

Beer dates back to as early as the 6th millenia B.C., where it is recorded in the history of ancient Iraq. The first mention of beer in what is now Europe was way back around 3000 B.C. It didn't gain real popularity in western culture until about the 7th century A.D., when it was brewed and sold by monasteries. Today, more than 35 billion gallons of beer are sold every year (God bless us), producing revenues of $294 billion (2006).

My personal favorite beer is Shiner Bock, brewed in the little town of Shiner, Texas. It is delicious. I think I could drink it during a workout it is so good. My favorite type of beer in general, though, is wheat beers (Hefeweisen and such). Beer is so good, that people batter food with it to make it taste better (Beer battered chicken, pork, ribs, etc.). It has also driven musical artists to write songs in its honor (Beer is Good by Psychostick, for example). Beer is used to help celebate holidays (St. Patrick's Day, Cinco de Mayo, Independence Day, and just about everything else we celebrate here in America). And let's not forget all those wonderfully entertaining commercials provided to us by beer companies (hilarious).

As you can probably tell, I'm a big fan of the brew. I don't drink it quite as much as I probably should, but I can enjoy a bottle, or a pint (or a twelve pack) every now and then. Nothing goes better with steak, pizza, chicken wings, football, rugby, baseball, or sex than beer. So here's to you beer, I salute you and continue to cherish your existance now and forevermore...and anyone who doesn't love you, is crazy (that's for you, Heath).

Just to finish up, I'd like to throw in a few quotes by some gentlemen who know and love beer just as much, if not more than me:

"Beer makes you feel the way you ought to feel without beer." -Henry Lawson
"Give me a woman who loves beer and I will conquer the world." -Kaiser Wilhelm
"Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza." -Dave Barry
"Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder." -Kinky Friedman
"Beer, the cause of and solution to all of life's problems." -Homer Simpson
"I'm allergic to grass. Hey, it could be worse. I could be allergic to beer." -Greg Norman
"You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have some kind of football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer." - Frank Zappa
"From man's sweat and God's love, beer came into the world." -Saint Arnold of Metz
"It takes beer to make thirst worthwhile." -German Proverb
"He was a wise man who invented beer." -Plato

And my personal favorite: "Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." -Benjamin Franklin