I Went to the Beer Fest and All I Got Was...

...slightly drunk.

Imagine a place where you pay $30, they give you a teeny glass and 10 tickets and then let you in.  It's hot, totally crowded and so many people have terrible tattoos.  Welcome to Beer Fest 2014!  You take your tickets around, stand in a long line and get your teeny glass (4 oz.) filled with the beer of your choice.  One of these can set you back as many as four tickets.  I stuck to the 1- and 2-ticket beers.  Everybody was there with everybody else, and people seemed really super into it.  Luckily, my first beer was nearly 11% ABV, so things weren't completely unpleasant.  But it was hot.  I couldn't do much about that.  Except sweat.  Which I did.    

They had a band.  These guys played surf and rockabilly.  They weren't bad at all, but they only mentioned their name once and I didn't catch it, because I forgot to eat lunch and all previous beers were hitting me at that exact moment.  I was quite the cheap date.

So yes, people everywhere.  Somewhere along the line, I lost my last ticket.  That of course was a tragedy.  I had enough presence of mind to get some poutine (a poutine?) from a truck called Skillet.  It was fantastic.  I feel like I'm still carrying it around with me.  Anyhow, with my tickets gone and the poutine settling into a permanent lump in my stomach, I walked back to Belltown.  I've always wondered what a beer festival is like.  Now I know, so I don't have to ever go back.