Another year, another opportunity to be insufferable. Let's do this.

Another year has passed and, yes, another year has arrived. And, if you’re a lazy beer geek like me, you’ve already let a few days pass in 2015 without scribbling some New Year’s resolutions on the back of a coaster or bar napkin (due to that massive hangover you’ve been nursing ever since New Year’s Eve).

Now, it goes without saying your top resolution is to finally get rid of that (craft) beer gut. Yeah, right. You try to get rid of it every year. But, of course, “ticking” 50 different beers a week is somewhat anathema to washboard abs and an iliac furrow. Instead, try to conquer some achievable resolutions this year. Here’s a start:

Start strictly using hops-infused toiletries and bathroom products.

Even your pores and follicles should have a palate as sophisticated as the one in your mouth.

Wear logo t-shirts from breweries so arcane, no one has actually heard of them.

Everyone has a Hill Farmstead and Toppling Goliath shirt. But you are the only one with an Ampersand Artisan Ales t-shirt. And, yes, their shit is goooooood.

Finally organize your beer “cellar.”

That beat-up Cutty Sark box at the back of your coat closet ain’t cutting it any more. And your roommate needs more room for his action-figure collection anyhow.

Befriend a new, local retailer to the point he holds rare stuff “in the back” for you.

Just don’t befriend him to the point you ever have to have a conversation with him regarding anything besides new beer releases.

Insist on using only proper glassware for every single beer you consume this year.

If you don’t have a logo-clad Teku glass from Carton Brewing, you are not allowed to drink that can of 077XX a trading partner sent you. It surely wouldn’t have tasted as good out of your New York Jets shaker pint.



Always sprinkle your beer conversations with indecipherable abbreviations and slang.

“Anyone know why FW18 is shelf-turding in PNW?”

Hoard beers for so long that by the time you finally drink them they have “fallen off.”

Then excoriate them on Beer Advocate. Rare beer is for displaying in your home, bragging about on the Internet, and dangling as trade bait for other beers you would likewise display and brag about.

Trick a loved one into going to some podunk town on “vacation.”

“I hear Tillamook is lovely this time of year. Oh! What’s this…a highly-acclaimed brewery?!”



Spend literally every single weekend standing in industrial district parking lots, waiting for beer releases.

There will be nothing more worthwhile to do on Saturdays in 2015. #FactsOnly

Devote more Internet time to looking at #beerporn on Instagram and Imgur than actual porn.

Consider an image of some stranger’s massive Lawson’s Finest haul more erotic than even the most salacious gym selfie.

Redefine what you consider a “fresh” IPA.

Ten days is now out-of-date in your opinion, and you wouldn’t dare pour that malty swill down your throat.



Interrupt all private conversations you overhear at the bar to correct minor misstatements.

“Actually, that’s a gueuze. Lambics aren’t blended. (Idiot.)”

Become really into an obscure style of beer that hardly any American breweries make.

Gruits, gratzers, and/or kvass should work nicely. Saisons and bière de gardes have just become so basic.

Boldly proclaim a highly-acclaimed and highly-coveted beer is officially not good anymore.

Pliny? Weak. Heady? Pshaw. Zombie Dust? Garbage. Declare even harder-to-get beers are the only ones worth a damn nowadays.



Review all 75 beers you drink at a beer festival.

Even if you only had a one-ounce sample of each and can barely remember most.

Proudly “drain pour” beers most people would give their left arm to try.

Give the beers a 3 on Untappd just to show you didn’t even hate them. You’re just so awesome you will drain pour average stuff in the year 2015.

Drink every beer at a brewery’s total tap takeover.

Spend the next morning having a total yak takeover with your toilet bowl.



Continue insisting to people that, despite drinking a couple bombers of high-ABV beer a night, you are not an alcoholic.

Because an alcoholic would drink Blue Moon in a pinch, and you would never dream of touching that shit.

Actually kiss someone on New Year’s Eve 2015 at midnight.

It’s surely better than splitting a rare bottle of Cantillon Don Quijote with 20 other pasty basement dwellers. Or is it?

Aaron Goldfarb (@aarongoldfarb is the author of The Guide for a Single Man and The Guide for a Single Woman.

RELATED: What Will Be the Next Heady Topper?

RELATED: The Beer Geek Self-Improvement Guide