Sailor Dad

Recently, I was informed of a significant schedule change at work. As bad as it was before (missing Halloween and my wife’s birthday) now it’s worse since I’m not going to be home for Thanksgiving either now. Where I’m going is not nearly as important as the fact that I’m missing the bulk of the holidays with my family until the end of the year. At this point, I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll even be home for Christmas. I used to think that skipping the surge deployment earlier in the year was a blessing, but since that time I’ve been away from my family more and more.

As I told me wife the other day, “At least I’m not on deployment…” She responded with, “You go away so often, it might as well be a deployment.” And she’s right. In April we left to go to Panama for escort duties; that trip took about a month and a half. Then in June we left again, this time for two months, in order to float around Hawaii for a multi-national exercise. September consisted of a few days each week spent out to sea for training. Earlier this month we went to San Francisco, and now I’m looking at a schedule that will keep me away from home for another month or so more.

If the current trend continues at work, I’ll either end up smoking again or having a heart attack, or both.

Part of being a sailor is knowing one’s libations, everything from hard alcohol to beer and wine. Lately, I’ve been enjoying more selections from the beer family than others, partially due to the exploration of the species. With the advent of micro-breweries becoming more prevalent in today’s society, we are no longer forced to choose from the bland and boring brews from America’s large breweries.

Now in the past, beer has been the vehicle that allowed someone to “get drunk” off of, and didn’t necessarily mean it tasted good. It was the easy and cheap way of partying, a staple among those in college. Now with beer made in smaller batches, beer has achieved a state close to wine with differing flavors and ingredients than previously used. You can actually enjoy a beer for it’s flavor, rather than a quick guzzling in order to get drunk.

If you’re a regular beer drinker, and you typically enjoy a mass produced beer, stop by your local store and check out the micro or craft brew section. And if you happen to live in California, you can stop by a local BevMo, since that’s where I go for most of my craft beer needs. And if you’re lucky enough to live in Northern California, you’ll be likely to find my favorite beer in the world currently, Great White, by Lost Coast Brewery.

Lastly, a bit of wisdom regarding beer:
“Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” – Benjamin Franklin