For us old codgers, the world constantly becomes, umm, different. We used to have crafty beers behind mum’s laundry, or we could recall entering the CRAFT state after too many beers (Can’t Remember A Flamin’ Thing), but now we have carefully hand-crafted beers … and isn’t the world better for that?

Sadly, we didn’t get to last night’s brewers’ dinner at the Gold Mines Hotel.

It was billed as The Craft Beer Degustation Dinner.

We suspect we’ve been a tad degustated in the past.

Actually, it’s an honoured cooking term, meaning “a tasting”, from the Latin degustare, to take a sample from.

Considering it’s beer we’re talking about here, you’ll be nodding in agreement to find it’s closely related to gusto. (That’s gusto, not gutso.)

Cheers to that!

Beer backdown

Here’s a story which got lost in the fogged memory of our city.

Just on 100 years ago, Bendigo miners were up in arms, revolting even.

Not over pesky miner’s licences or stuff like the Eureka uprising.

The Bendigo Miners Association was degustated, no, that’s not right, disgusted that a pony (about five ounces or 140ml) glass of beer was going up to four-pence and they decided to boycott beer until the price dropped. They also vowed to ask other organisations to join the movement.

Happily, an expansion of the revolt wasn’t needed, as just two days after the boycott, Bendigo publicans dropped the price to threepence, the same as Melbourne.

Destiny determined

DTM is often amazed at the likelihood that people’s names commit them to certain paths in life.

This week we were reading a fascinating report how an ancient asteroid impact west of Winton in Queensland 300 million years ago probably changed the course of history.

It noted that the space rock smacked Australia with “a force equivalent to more than 650 million Hiroshima atomic bombs.”

The comments came from Geoscience Australia’s Richard Blewett.

Not to be overlooked

We also fear that sometimes a plain name can really make a statement.

Such as years ago when talks were being held in London on the future of the then national of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).

We actually heard with our own shell-likes the precise and formidable BBC newsreader Angela Ripon announce that the talks at London’s Lancaster House were between “Mr Joshua N-ko-mo, the Reverend N-dub-an-ing-ee Sit-hol-ee, Mr Robert Mu-gar-bay … and Ian Smith.”

Poor Ian, a monosyllabic footnote in an otherwise tongue twisting blender.

It happened again this week, in Australia, when The Australian newspaper reported that Mr Alberto Calderon Zuleta was the new boss at explosive-maker Orica, replacing … Ian Smith.

Dry days

Ahh, Beautiful Benders, delightful one day, desiccated the next.

As we cruise to the end of March (how did THAT happen?) we note we have officially had nine millimetres of rain, less than one-third what we could expect. 

At least it’s making it easy to clear away the early autumn leaves.