Drinking Trappist Beer on Good Friday. Again.

Here I am, looking back four years, and it's so similar...didn't eat (I've got even less in my belly this year; a banana and one cup of coffee), did pheresis this morning, came home and cleaned, and I'm leaving to sing Good Friday services in about half an hour (warm-ups; services are at 3:00, of course)...and I'm drinking La Trappe Dubbel (a sample of the new stuff, provided by importer Artisanal Imports, thanks, Lanny!).

Because it's a fast day, and while I'm not drinking only beer through Lent like some folks (though my hat's off to him), I've built a little tradition around Trappist beers on Good Friday, and big beers tomorrow, before singing at Easter Vigil. The first is my own, the second grew out of the timing of Split Thy Skull, the pioneering Philly big beer event held at Sugar Mom's on Easter Saturday (and yeah, it's on for tomorrow)...well, actually, it grew out of one year when my wife's brother Carl showed up for Easter at the Trenton train station with a shoebox full of Dominion Millennium and we killed two of them on the way home...

Anyway! Here I am, on Good Friday, after the jumpstart I got from Palm Sunday and Holy Thursday masses (and Night Prayer last night...chant, it was marvelous, soothing, and left me floating on a cloud of faith and awe of my God and Savior), ready to go sing till I cry -- Good Friday is tough. And I'm banging through a 750 of La Trappe?

You bet. For one thing...it's really good. Fruit, chocolate, malt, spice, even a little hintsy bit of coffee in there, this is a stuffed suitcase of delicious -- and it's not fat or flabby.

For another? It's tradition. This is how you get through fasts. You don't eat, but you gotta keep going. If I tried getting through a music-heavy service like this -- we're doing selections from Stainer's The Crucifixion in addition to the regular stuff -- without food or big beer, well, you know. Probably nothing would happen. Ha! But I want this beer, this monk-inspired beer, and it's going to work for me. It always has.

Tomorrow? Any big beer will do, and I've got some cued up. Good Friday? Gimme monk beer. I need the spiritual inspiration, the beauty in my mouth and my mind. Off I go. God bless you all.