I’m somebody that has always felt a bit overwhelmed by the prospect of homebrewing.  I’ve never taken the plunge, but it always seemed like an expensive and impractical hobby.  From a distance, it also always seemed to tilt toward the gravity of “work” more than “fun”.

Oliver Gray over at the wonderful Literature and Libation blog wrote the first piece I’ve read that made me feel comfortable about that view point.

I realized that homebrewing is a high risk, low reward venture. It requires a significant start up cost, large swaths of free time, and until you’ve done it for a while, results in pretty mediocre beer. It requires a lot of study, a lot of patience, and sometimes, a light sprinkling of luck. It’s clearly not a hobby for everyone.

I’m going to try it at some point at a small level to see if I can appreciate the process and extract some personal reward, but this guy seems to understand my hesitation.

 A subconscious malignant trend whispers mean words to the dark, suggesting that people who love to drink beer aren’t “real beer people” unless they frequent every brewery in a fifty mile radius, and homebrew every weekend.

I’m here to tell you that’s all nonsense.

Give this man a medal for courage.  It feels weird to finally be inspired to not do something.

I implore you to read the whole thing.  The guy is a heck of a writer.