Best . . . Oktoberfest . . . EVER.

See all those kegs above? Yeah, that was maybe one third of the beers we had on hand for this year's HOPS! Oktoberfest. My homebrew club's Oktoberfest rocks every year, but this year it rocked especially hard. Why, you ask? Well, in no particular order:

1. This was the first year in recent memory that we SOLD OUT. Like, had-to-turn-people-away-at-the-door sold out. (Actually, it kinda sucked that some people just assumed they could get tickets at the door like in years past, but we can't get in trouble with the fire marshal.) The crowd was huge but not crowded. It was beautiful.

2. We had donations from the awesome brewers at Flossmoor Station, Goose Island, Gordon Biersch-Bolingbrook, Half Acre, Metropolitan, Rock Bottom-Chicago and Rock Bottom-Orland Park. Each shared some incredible beer with us and I encourage anybody reading this to support them.

3. Our best friend Stephanie flew in from Lubbock, Texas just to attend (well, she also came in to see her goddaughter Dorrie and go to the Bears-Lions game and do a bunch of other things, but the bottom line is she was there).

4. The Polkaholics (right) rocked.

5. The beer and food were awesome. In all the years I've gone, I can't think of more than two beers that I didn't like.

6. I didn't feel like crap the next morning.

7. The VFW has turned into a great venue. We've messed around with the set-up since our first year there in 2007. This year I think we finally got the set-up just right. Even with intermittent rain, people managed to stay pretty dry.

8. Everybody in the club worked their ass off to make this a success. Well, maybe I worked half my ass off; others worked a lot harder than I did!

I think I had some other comments to make about Oktoberfest, but those are the ones I can think of right now. For those of you who couldn't make it this year, I hope you get there next year--once you go you'll never miss it again. Zigi zagi zigi zagi oi oi oi!


P.S. Thanks to Paul for the pictures; I completely forgot my camera yet again. [And a quick edit... according to Paul, fellow HOPS! member Brian Blaauw took the last picture.]