Lately, my writing has taken a nose dive into the dismal abyss of meritocracy. But this time, instead of moaning and groaning, snapping pens in half, popping keys off my keyboard, or setting my manuscript on fire, I’ve decided to take a different approach, a more calm and religious path to my latest self-loathing. I’ve decided to sit back and have a beer. Now I know that’s not very lady-like but at this point, I don’t care. Besides, I don’t always drink beer, but when I do… I make sure it’s a great tasting beer. Name that meme! ;)
Anyway, this is an IWSG post, not a beer tasting post and yet… I will find a way to transition this in into a beer post, so hang on.
Have you ever tried describing how something tastes in your writing and gotten stuck?
No.
No? Well, humor me for a second. Geez.
I like drinking all kinds of different beers. One of the things I enjoy is reading the label before I start peeling it off into little strips and making a mess on the table. On the back of one of these labels, I read a short, highly pretentious description of the beer I was holding. Luckily, the beer was a good one and it prompted me to look up some beer tasting reviews. This is where things got interesting. Beer and wine tasting reviews are some of the most imaginative, colorful, sexy, flowery, BS descriptions you’ll ever read. Here are examples I pulled from random beer descriptions online:
“. . .candied sweet hops pucker the mouth; pear and apple make for a perfumed blend, supported by a surprisingly hearty malt base.”
“. . . dark cumulonimbus, Everest-like white climbing head--”
“The foretaste is very prolonged because of its rich and unctuous development throughout the mouth.” I swear this is talking about BEER.
“Bitter and sugar tendencies compete and come back together to the taster's great satisfaction.”
“It confirms the initial impression in the first mouthful, with a sharp body that is balanced with a certain fruitiness.”
“...malty caramel aroma, with obvious cherry and floral notes...”
“Some traces of burnt wood are detectable, but never scorched even if it contains this kind of malt.”
It's not easy describing something as subjective as taste. But even if some of these are laughable, if you keep digging, you'll find wonderful imagery and many creative ways for describing taste through beer and wine tasting reviews.
So there you have it.
My writing sucks.
Cheers.
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Many thanks to Alex Cavanaugh our IWSG host and his super co-hosts this month. If you'd like to know more about the IWSG monthly bloghop, feel free to click the IWSG button on my side bar.
