The last beer I had before I took this photo was riddled with diacetyl. And yet after I sipped it, I did not feel compelled to send it back. With the warm glow of a few beers in me, snapping gleefully from the passenger side at every mountain we passed on the way home, I considered the shit bartenders have to deal with, especially these days. Honestly, I might never return a bad pint ever again.
I’d spent the day with family in Crested Butte, a chocolate-box tourist town on the western side of the Colorado Rockies. The drive over from where we were staying in the nearby city of Gunnison was beautiful; rust-brown and straw-pale plains giving way to gray peaks capped with the first snow of the season, occasionally pockmarked with the faded green of a pine grove. The otherworldliness of the landscape made me feel lightheaded with awe (as did the oxygen deprivation you’d expect from an elevation of 8,900 feet).
It was the day after Thanksgiving, and while some doors remained shuttered, others opened with a warm welcome. We snaffled pizza and pints of Left Hand Milk Stout at The Secret Stash before making our way to Irwin, the town’s local brewery. Though it didn’t have a taproom, we managed to convince the member of staff in attendance to generously pour us a few samples, and left with a couple of six-packs in hand. Finally we arrived at The Eldo, a local bar and music venue that a few early skiers had found their way to after a day on the slopes. I ordered a pint of the aforementioned disappointing glass of beer, an IPA, seated myself in a booth, sipped, and winced.
But at that moment, surrounded by family and with the buzz of a couple beers already in me, I considered the disruption of taking that beer back to the bar. Everyone else around me seemed to be enjoying their own pints, and I didn’t want to put a question mark above that experience. The bar itself was busy, with a single server looking after thirsty customers. It wasn’t worth complaining, just as it’s not worth me telling you what the beer in question was. Sometimes you need to accept that, for every few delicious pints, there will be the occasional duffer you need to quietly bolt down. Embrace the chaos; life is just too damn short to do otherwise.
