Funny thing happened on the way to Comic Con

Three female Loki's... tempted to join the dark Asgardians here

Actually, several funny things happened on the way to the 2014 Comic Con at the Toronto Convention Centre this past Saturday. Not to mention, more than a few funny things happening during Comic Con. But this, too, is Comic Con...

First of all, the other two members of the Three Beer Musketeers, Cat and Glenn, were already at the Convention Centre while I struggled to find parking. Eventually, I found some underground parking but instantly ran into a problem with the ticket machine. All of its instructions involved pushing either red or green buttons. I'm am actually colourblind by virtue of something called Red-Green Deficiency. I kept pressing buttons... and the machine (in a dimly-lit area) kept duly spitting back my money. Finally, a family of three passed by and the mother took pity and did the transaction for me. Father and son stood back, quietly snickering at the dude who couldn't make a simple parking ticket machine work.

Glenn holds up a plastic cup of Flying
Monkeys City and Colour Imperial Maple
Wheat. Yeah, we're trailer-trash, drinking
outside of a Comic Con... but we're drinking
good CRAFT beer... so class points for that.

I wish I could say it ended there. They pointed me to the nearest stairwell and once in, I couldn't get out. Every door in the stairwell was locked, including the one I came through. Yes, I was trapped in two-storeys of a stairwell... with Comic Con not 400 metres away. Finally someone came through a door and I was gloriously free from my little concrete prison. I felt like Tim Robbins in The Shawshank Redemption, except I had no Morgan Freeman to narrate my exploits. By the end, given the frustration I was feeling, Samuel L Jackson would have been a better choice. His choice of much harsher words would have been a little more exact to how I was feeling. Something like: "I am tired of the mother-loving locked doors in this Monday-to-Friday stairwell!!!" Well, something like that...

However, the day got considerably less frustrating and much more fun when I finally caught up to Porthos and Amaris... uhhh, Cat and Glenn, I mean. (Actual literary reference... enjoy, it'll be the last one for quite some time. Possibly, ever.) Seeing my nerves a bit of the frayed side, Glenn had the cure, having brought in his bag some elixir of the gods - an unopened 750-ml bottle of Flying Monkeys City and Colour Imperial Maple Wheat. I needed a 10% beer to make things better. I've had it before, talked about it here even but I tell ya, that went down nicely. Maple on the nose, even stronger, sweeter maple on the tongue and a perfect dessert beer to start the day.

Comic Con means ladies in eye-catching and
sexy costumes, such as Harley Quinn here...

And where did we drink it? Right out back in a parkette out of plastic cups. Like every rubbie and bum in Toronto does. Except our beverage was a craft beer. So upper-scale bums.

Once inside, Glenn scooted into the Con on the strength of a media pass he had wrangled weeks ago. Cat and I stood in the ticket line-up - about the length of a football field - and told him we'd meet him inside. Except the line-up didn't move... maybe one foot in 20 minutes tops. At some point, we decided we would be better served simply walking back out to the lobby and snapping pictures of the arriving costumed adventurers there. So we did. Dozens and dozens were pouring in from the streets and all were eager to pose. We justified it to ourselves as being present at Comic Con, if not actually in Comic Con. Also saved $40 each. Got tons of pics and eventually went back outside for a smoke break with Glenn still inside. While out there, I pointed across the street to Steam Whistle Brewery and noted we could be at their front doors before our smokes were done. We already had a few dozen pics each, as many as I took the last time I was, you know, actually in Comic Con. And frankly, Steam Whistle was calling to us. Screaming, really. In a Samuel L Jackson voice. "Get yer cracker asses over to that mother-loving brewery!!"

If this guy didn't win an award, there is no justice. A
combination of DJ Deadmau5 and Marvel character, the
wise-cracking trained assassin Deadpool. Just brilliant.

Hey, if you're at Comic Con and you hear Nick Fury's voice screaming at you, you obey like a good little Agent of SHIELD. So off we went. Once inside, it became readily apparent we weren't the only Comic Con folks there. Grabbing our Steam Whistle, one of Canada's best Czech-style pilsners, we joined two young dudes at a stand-up table. I was wearing a SHIELD t-shirt as was one of the two guys at the table... so y'know, instant buddies! SHIELD bros! Cat and I forget their names but I'm gonna call them Bill and Ted because they shared a Most Excellent Adventure with us. Turns out they had gone to the Fan Expo last Autumn (as had Glenn who got to sit in a room and listen to the legendary Stan Lee.) So they decided to wear the red ensign shirts from the original Star Trek series. Anyone who remembers that original run back in the 1960s knows exactly what the red ensign shirt means. It means your name will never show in the credits because you don't one word of dialogue. Also when you beam down to the alien planet with Kirk, Spock and Bones, you are gonna die. Automatically. It will likely be grizzly, too. Aliens will suck your brain out or stab you repeatedly with a funky alien spear. Maybe if you're lucky, they just set you ablaze with a nasty green alien fire weapon.

Dude, we told you not to put on the red ensign shirt...

So Bill and Ted go to Fan Expo and people are yelling at them, "You're gonna die!!!" Which they loved. However, they brought one knuckle-head friend, also dressed in a red ensign shirt, who decided that would be the perfect day to, ahem, drop acid. He says to Bill and Ted, "Everyone's staring at us!!!", which, of course freaks him out. Then this poor chowderhead had to deal with the fact that everyone was screaming at him that he was gonna die!!! But the topper, according to Ted, was being in a room when David Hasselhoff walked in. That put him over the paranoia edge. Despite my misspent youth, I have no experience with that particular narcotic (it wasn't really around much) but apparently, you do not want to see The Hoff when you've ingested it. I understand. I wouldn't want see The Hoff in a normal frame of mind, much less high as a kite. Cat and I could not stop laughing as Bill and Ted spun their tale...

HULK... SMASH... STEAM WHISTLE!!!!
Also Mr Hulk, sir, that's a very pretty bag...

Eventually, Glenn caught up to us at Steam Whistle. He had no signal in the bowels of the Convention Centre and it wasn't until he was outside that he got our texts. Ironically, he passed Bill and Ted as he was entering and they were exiting the brewery. Knowing the story of our lost companion, Ted looked him up and down and said simply, "Don and Cat are near the back." Bill and Ted can tell a lost Musketeer. Come back to the trio, Aramis... we have missed thy companionship.

Well, now is when the important part of the day's events kick in. The Comic Con was only meant to be a colourful preamble to a visit with the craft-beer-heavy C'est What eatery on Front Street. And oh man, did they have craft beer there. I started with a County Durham Brewing Hop Head, which, of course, I assumed was an IPA. Thought it was good enough but not very hoppy for an IPA. Turns out it's a 6% blond ale. Ooops, my bad for assuming. Well then, as a straight-up blond ale, it's pretty good. The nose was bitter, almost acidic but on the tongue, it did have a very lightly citrus hop to it. Very light. Then again, it's a blond ale so yeah, that's what they're meant to taste like.

Glenn and Cat both started with a Granite Brewery Hopping Mad Pale Ale, also 6%, and while the Hop Head scored 11 points better on RateBeer (95 to 84), I liked the Hopping Mad much more simply because I much prefer pale ales to blond ales.

How Cat and I spent Comic Con... drinking beer at Steam
Whistle Brewery? Why? Because it was there... that's why...

Because pale ales have a far greater latitude for the style, the Hopping Mad did have some citrus tanginess to it in the aroma (meaning Cascade hops, most likely) followed by a hint of orange in the taste. Very nice beer, really good! From there, I went to tried-and-true choices, Flying Monkeys Smashbomb Atomic IPA and Cameron's Rye Pale Ale, both of which I know, I've drank and I love. Why? Because I've never had them on draft tap. The verdict? Exactly as top-shelf as they are in the bottle except (yes, guy!) bigger serving. More Smashbomb in a glass? Sold!

From there, Cat went to the Wellington County Brewery's Terrestrial India Brown Ale, a surprisingly hop-infused 5.9% offering. Had a sample and was impressed. Brown ales don't tend to pack a lot of punch, often veering to blandness, but this one had tons. You could smell the hops (Amarillo and Sorachi Ace) while the taste was caramel and nutty. One of the best brown ales I've ever had.

The Steam Whistle St Paddy's Day Party where
they'll be breaking out these one-litre beer boots

Finally, and I'm not sure which Musketeer got it, was a sampler of Dieu du Ciel's The Alchemist Moralite, an outstanding IPA from the Montreal brewery that already bowled us over at the Bellwoods Brewpub with their Aphrodisiaque Stout, one of the rare 100s I've seen on RateBeer. They used Simcoe, Citra and Centennial hops in the Moralite so the nose is all hops, tons of grapefruit and mango on the tongue. Absolutely outstanding! I have got to get to that brewery!!! Summer road trip, Three Beer Musketeers!!

Okay, this Saturday (March 15), prepare your livers for the Steam Whistle St. Paddy's Party. My young Toronto beer-loving friend, D'Arcy, worships all things Steam Whistle, particularly their parties (which do rock) so I was sure to tell her that they would be offering their product in this one-litre (nearly 34 ounces) glass boot. Turns out she's already earned her boot, having bought one filled with Steam Whistle at the Pickle Barrel. The boot is tricky, she confessed. The trick, she says, is to "watch out for the toe air bubble (because) the beer will come ker-blomping at your face. The key is to drink (with the boot turned) sideways and slowly at mid-calf." I suspect she knows both Steam Whistle and boots, glass or otherwise, so heed her advice. It's $20 at the door and they've probably cleaned up after me by now. Well, by Saturday for sure... Party details are right: HERE! It's Steam Whistle, people... always a blast!

My Facebook relationship status. It's torrid between us...

Up next (and I'm writing them here so I don't forget) we have Collective Art's Rhyme & Reason Pale Ale, Founder's Pale Ale, Amsterdam's Autumn Hop, Anchor's Liberty Ale, Brewery Ommegang's Hennipen Saison, Double Trouble's Fire in the Rye RPA, Young's Double Chocolate Stout and anything else, I can shoe-horn in. People, it can be brutal researching all these beers on your behalf... but goddammit, you're worth it. All of you. Except for you...yeah you, the stoned dude in the corner who keeps calling me The Hoff. Here's a bag of Doritos Wild Ranch... go away.

Our Fourth Beer Musketeer, D'Artagnan, a.k.a. Stevil St Evil, now residing
in Wellington, New Zealand, was, as always, with us in ghostly drinky spirit

Shout-outs... well, Glenn and Cat recently visited Amsterdam Brewery and Pizza Dude gives us all the gory details in: Ooops.., Almost Went To Cleveland!! As for our adventure on the weekend, Cat offers up her version with this one: How To Do Comic Con Without Doing Comic Con

And Stevil St Evil... well, its the middle of the summer in New Zealand. He's doing what we all would... sitting on his deck overlooking the harbour and pounding down top-flight Kiwi IPAs.

Well, gang, that's it, that's all... and I am outta here!!! Next one is soon... I've already done the... *burp*... research. Until then, I remain, as always...