Yes, A-B WILL Be At the Super Bowl

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Ah. Finally. The answer to a question that I've been pondering for months: Would new, leaner, meaner Anheuser-Busch InBev scale back A-B's traditionally, ahem, major presence during the Super Bowl?

The answer, apparently, is no. If you watch the game, you'll see 4.5 minutes of A-B IB advertising. Worth noting, if only because television ads, especially during the Super Bowl, are the main flaw in the main event of what is otherwise a months-long, televised, guaranteed cure for insomnia.

Tip o' the mug to a number of sources, some "free," some not -- but my (free) favorite is Jeremiah McWilliams at Lager Heads.

1982 Handbook of American Brewers [Minor Correction]

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Well, here's a surprising and unexpected historical treat: a handbook of American brewers and beers from 1982. It was compiled by Susan Edmunds and Lowell Edmunds. (He's a professor of classics at Rutgers and the author of Martini: Straight Up. ) [Correction to original post: I'm assuming that the Lowell who co-compiled the handbook is the same Lowell who wrote Martini. Martini-Lowell acknowledges Susan Edmunds in one of his other published works. So presumably he's the same person; otherwise, what an odd coincidence. Not great factual evidence, but .....]

I skimmed through it and it's astonishingly complete and accurate. I "tested" that by zipping to the "n" and then "s" (it's in alphabetical order) -- and sure enough, both New Albion and Sierra Nevada are listed. I know nothing about the circumstances under which the handbook was compiled.

But, again, worth a look. Tip o' the mug to the great folks at the Daily Register of the Alcohol and Drugs History Society.

Jay Brooks Looks at Beer In Art

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Jay Brooks is running an occasional series that he calls "Art & Beer." The images span the centuries and include a variety of artists working in different mediums. This is a link to the series up to now. Presumably he'll be adding more. When you land at the bottom of the first page, click "next" page" to see more entries. Jay never does anything by half, so each image is accompanied by plenty of background information and commentary. While you're there, take a look, too, as his predictions for the beer world in 2009.

Enjoy!

Kudos to Shawn Connelly and The Aleuminati

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Speaking of comments functions malfunctioning, the other day I tried to post a comment at Shawn Connelly's blog, Beer Philosopher, and his comments function was also haywire. (What's up with this anyway? That meteor shower is over with, and there's no full moon, so what gives?)

Anyway, I wanted to comment on his post summarizing and surveying the 2008 traffic at his blog and his site, Aleuminati. The stats are impressive. They're even more impressive when you know that Shawn has a fulltime "real" job, and running his blog and Aleuminati are sidelines. Labors of love, you might say.

But as I've noted before, the beer world is full of people like Shawn: decent, generous people who are passionate about beer, and want to share that passion with others. (And yes, the Aleuminati site breaks my rule of NO BLACK BACKGROUND, but I gather that Shawn is in the process of giving the site a facelift, with the intent of shifting to a easier-on-the-eyes appearance.)

So three cheers for Shawn, and for Alan (see this post), and all the other folks out there who work to make the enjoyment of beer a communal venture.

As always, one way to find many of those other beer-lovers and their sites is through Jonathan's really simple BEER syndication.

My Absolute Last Comment on the 2008 Yule Photo Contest

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But this is worth mentioning because it's (a) cool; and (b) relates to my previous post about beer folks being good folks: Alan of The Good Beer Blog, who co-hosted the contest, told me that Lew Bryson, wh

o had offered a copy of one of his books as a prize, offered to deliver the prize to the winner in person at a nearby pub. The winner was, as Alan put it, "gobsmacked." (That's one of those pricelessly descriptive British words. How come we don't have an equally juicy equivalent in American English?)

But I wasn't surprised: That's precisely the kind of generous act that beer folks are prone to commit.

So -- one more contest "hoooorah," this time for Lew. (Who, by the way, helped me out when I was writing the book: When I was unable to track down a copy of an interview he'd done with Fritz Maytag in the 1990s, Lew sent me a copy of the document.) (You can find all of Lew's books at Amazon.)