Here is the writing prompt for the month, given kinda late in the game but here goes for me…Thanks to Alan at a Good Beer Blog for hosting last minute!
So you are going to write about this: if we just “take the philosophical approach, that the Session has run its course” aren’t we really admitting that beer blogging is a massive failure? I say no. I say this is a fabulous way to cover up problem drinking with anti-social internet addictions. Maybe you know of another reason we should keep writing and try to make some sense of the beer and brewing world. Well, goodie for you. Write about it. Explain yourself. Because if you can’t you are really admitting (i) you’ve wasted the best part of the last decade or (ii) you live in a fantasy world where think you are a beer writer and not a beer blogger and that’s soooooo much more important… as if your friends don’t share concerned messages about you behind your back:
Linda? It’s Barry. Yes, I saw him. He still pretends he writes about alcohol as a job… she’s the strong one… poor things… where will it end?”
I was out on drinking beer on Thursday and missed the announcement for this month’s Session. Now I am playing catch-up with the pressure of a tight deadline. (Self imposed.)
And it is those two words that I believe have put the state of beer blogging on the wane. Without a supervisor looking over your shoulder, there is no one to hold the blogger accountable. It becomes so much easier to just type in the beer name on the Untappd app and call it night. Besides, the spouse is calling for you, the kids need disciplining, work beckons the next morning and what’s left of a California lawn needs to be mowed.
Luckily, no kids and no lawn for me so I can use that time to set my fingers to typing. I have no pretension that I am a “writer” though I am technically writing just without a net / without an editor. I also don’t think the title of blogger is a pejorative that some in the paid trade make it out to be. I think they are simply different beasts in the wild. One may be a lion but you need the jackals and hyena’s too in a Disney Circle of Life way. I will let you decide which is which.
I continue with my two posts a day because of one multi-part reason. I want to be heard and I have a passion for craft beer that I think I can curate. Being the selfish creature that I am, I love having my opinions heard be it about current events, movies or beer. Those listening can choose to use or discard that information but I want to be in the mix of the discussion when my posts are of the bulletin board variety. That leads into the passion. Without a passion for what is being made, I don’t know if I could sustain the day-to-day requirements. And lastly, I think that I can narrow the focus of craft beer to a manageable level so that a new fan can get a handle on this crazy world without going crazy themselves.
A beer blogger needs to get past that first “I want to be heard” phase because literally everyone on the interwebs, is reaching for that. And blogging probably won’t give you that jolt unless you are Donald Trump, The Food Babe or even louder and annoying. I think many people stumble on the passion portion too because they mistakenly believe that drinking is the only part of it. Not visiting breweries, not researching or reading books and not reading other beer blogs or magazines. The last part is finding your niche. The Sour Beer Dude. IPA Hunter. Brewer interviews. The places that the passion drives you to. For me, I enjoy curating. Taking all the information out there and condensing it into the short posts that I think are most important. I want people to see my site as a greatest hits album.
Sometimes I succeed and other times I don’t. But I keep at it because the alternative doesn’t seem as fulfilling to me.