Imagine you are reaching for the door of your beer fridge (you do have a beer fridge, right? If not, this “book” is definitely for you!  If you do have a beer fridge this book is definitely for you too!)  You pull open the door and you hear the clinking of the bottles.  Pavlov!  Ha ha! Your response is probably to start drooling because you know the enjoyment that is coming next.  I would ask you to close your eyes for this next section but then you couldn’t finish reading what I’m writing. So read this first without closing your eyes!  You reach in and wrap your hand around the cool bottle relishing the feeling of the condensation on the sides as you pull it out.  You reach for your opener and anticipate the sound as you pop off the cap.  You grab your waiting glass and gently fill it to the brim again finding pleasure in the sound of the pour and the sight of the bubbles rising to the surface.  Lazily you check the color holding it to the light.  You bring your penultimate sense into play by sampling the aroma of fresh hops possibly or a strong malty character.  You lift the glass to your lips engaging the last sense into this love fest.  That is pure, unadulterated pleasure in a fantastic beer.

How does the Kama Sutra fit into this?  Quite nicely I might say.  Kama is the enjoyment of appropriate objects by the five senses of hearing, feeling, seeing, tasting, and smelling, assisted by the mind together with the soul.  The ingredient in this is a peculiar contact between the organ of sense and its object, and the consciousness of pleasure which arises from that contact is called Karma.  Hearing those bottles clinking raised your Karma … “music to your ears” as it were.  All your other “organs of sense” had this peculiar contact with the “object.”  I would assume, also, that your mind was also involved.  For many of you the soul probably was too—for the rest of you? Well, just wait!

Most of you, when you hear the words “Kama Sutra” already have an image in your mind of what that is … however, the Kama Sutra is actually aphorisms on love.  For the sake of the beermentor (me), it will be aphorisms on Love of Beer Drinking!

Now, as I was perusing the Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana, I noticed there were 36 chapters.  In honor of this I will be writing about 36 ways to maximize your enjoyment of beer.  Don’t be afraid to embrace all the positions I move you into as you build upon your beer drinking experience.  I will start easy … trust me.  You will move from beginner all the way through master beerdrinker when you finish AND put this “book’s” concepts into practice.

Are you ready?  Chapter 1: “Beginners should begin at the beginning.”

Enjoy!

Beermentor