Fuck It. Beer.

OK, I can take a hint.

The last several posts I've tried to toss up here of an intellectual nature have fallen flat.  Perhaps we're all stressed-out and tired from shennanigans at the national level.  Or perhaps the depth of these topics takes along time to research and form an educated opinion.

Or, perhaps, it's way over our heads and we just want to talk about beer.

If we want to be all intellectual, we can go to Streak's place and wax philosophical with a dude like Streak who's qualified to actually be intellectual.

Here, for now, let's stick with our true qualifications and discuss beer.

It's official!  The winners of the 2011 Great American Beer Fest Pro-Brewer competition are in!  And this year, the Big Winners didn't include a brewery I've heard of (beyond Firestone Walker Brewing Company in CA, which is a damn fine brewery).

I was a bit disappointed this year, in that for the past several years, Michigan has had a very strong showing.  Maybe The Man is worried that Michigan's surge in breweries is gonna topple the almightly Californians  from their top-of-the-heap roost, or maybe we just didn't bring our A-game this year.  But the few Michigan beers that won include:

• GOLD! Mangalitsa Pig Porter, Right Brain Brewery (Traverse City); Category:  Experimental Beers
• GOLD! Expedition Stout, Bell's (you better know where Bell's is); Category:  Aged Beer
• BRONZE! Pin-Up Blonde, Bastone Brewery (Royal Oak); Category:  Belgian/French-Style Ale
• SILVER! Cream Stout, Redwood Brewing Company (Flint); Category:  Sweet Stout

And that's it for the Mitten State this year.

Check out these fine beers at your local beer mecca; all but Right Brain enjoy pretty wide distribution, and Right Brain, though rare, can be found.

Congrats to Michigan's breweries, and though it seems Indiana, Illinois, fucking California and Colorado ran away with medals this year, we'll be back.