[punatic]

i had an 85 yo diabetic patient. she already had a stroke, copd, chf, the whole shabang.  she was already on the Good Lord's borrowed time.  Her daughter wouldn't let her have chocolate because she was a diabetic.  I told her "your mother is 85 years old, she deserves to have what ever the hell she wants." 

+1 
Little joys are as important as anything in life.  A positive mental attitude has cured more maladies than any medicine.
What's the point of maybe eking out a few more days if you are just miserable all of the time?

[bo]

i had an 85 yo diabetic patient. she already had a stroke, copd, chf, the whole shabang.  she was already on the Good Lord's borrowed time.  Her daughter wouldn't let her have chocolate because she was a diabetic.  I told her "your mother is 85 years old, she deserves to have what ever the hell she wants." 

+1 
Little joys are as important as anything in life.  A positive mental attitude has cured more maladies than any medicine.
What's the point of maybe eking out a few more days if you are just miserable all of the time?

Please read the OP. Is this really what he described and did I suggest anything more than to be careful that the free beer could, repeat, could contribute to an addiction?

I have no doubt that there are many responsible beer drinkers on this forum, but the fact remains, alcoholism is a real problem. Maybe I'm blocking some of your precious Hawaiian sunshine, but we still need to be responsible brewers. If we can be caring about a turkey on Thanksgiving (other thread), surely we can show a little of the same with elderly folks that may have a money problem and possibly a drinking one as well.

I apologize to the OP. The direction this thread has taken is not what I ever expected and I'm very sad for that. My intentions were meant to be positive.

[euge]

These topics tend to meander from time to time.

Instead of just giving the beer away, which isn't such of a bad idea in the spirit of the topic; and if he is interested- how about maybe having this man pitch in say $10 for ingredients and he helps brew in some small way. Could be just interesting company around the kettle. Then he gets a case of the finished product and a say in what gets brewed. 

Then he (they) can say they are homebrewers.

[phillamb168]

What I'm hearing from you is that being poor = being an alcoholic, and I know some hardworking poor people that would mightily disagree with you on that. The 85 year old guy is probably just struggling to get by after (like a lot of people these days) seeing his pension or IRA ripped to shreds. That being said, of course you are absolutely correct that we shouldn't just go handing out beer to anybody, hence why I agree with the "sitting down and drinking one or two with him."

I'm not trying to start a fight, I just think you need to give us a little more credit in the intelligent decisions department ;-)

[punatic]

Thank you Phil.  I will take it a step further than that: 

Being frugal ≠ being poor ≠ being an alcoholic.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, Tim made his first post on this forum to share what I consider to be a very generous idea, and the thread gets hijacked by political correctness.  WTF?

I admire your generosity Tim.  Homebrewing and sharing go hand-in-hand.  See if your friend is interested in helping you make better beer.  Please keep posting here, and let us know how it goes.  Keep up your good works!

[dzlater]

I like the idea.
The home brew club I belong to collected food donations for a local food bank for Thanksgiving.

[bo]

What I'm hearing from you is that being poor = being an alcoholic, and I know some hardworking poor people that would mightily disagree with you on that. The 85 year old guy is probably just struggling to get by after (like a lot of people these days) seeing his pension or IRA ripped to shreds. That being said, of course you are absolutely correct that we shouldn't just go handing out beer to anybody, hence why I agree with the "sitting down and drinking one or two with him."

I'm not trying to start a fight, I just think you need to give us a little more credit in the intelligent decisions department ;-)

Sorry, but you never heard that from me and neither of us really know this man's situation. As brewers many of us probably would like to think that beer is the answer to all problems. However, when a person/family is struggling to make ends meet, I just think that something other than beer might be more helpful. I'm not knocking poor people, brewers or Tim, just offering up an alternative solution to helping a friend in time of need.

[kgs]

i had an 85 yo diabetic patient. she already had a stroke, copd, chf, the whole shabang.  she was already on the Good Lord's borrowed time.  Her daughter wouldn't let her have chocolate because she was a diabetic.  I told her "your mother is 85 years old, she deserves to have what ever the hell she wants." 

My better half is a minister and once dealt with a nurse who was refusing to let a 96-year-old man who was failing rapidly have a little ice cream. Seriously.

Regarding the OP, I took it as a situation where an elderly person on a limited income was fitting a little "beer joy" into his life by coupon-clipping for cheap beer, and the OP saw a chance to be charitable and upgrade the old man's beer joy with homebrew--quite an upgrade, by the way. I too have seen addiction at close range, but without a lot more detail I took it at face value. If you're struggling on a limited income (and I've been there), a libation can be a nice way to take the edge of of life harsher's realities.

[jaybeerman]

Regarding the OP, I took it as a situation where an elderly person on a limited income was fitting a little "beer joy" into his life by coupon-clipping for cheap beer, and the OP saw a chance to be charitable and upgrade the old man's beer joy with homebrew--quite an upgrade, by the way. I too have seen addiction at close range, but without a lot more detail I took it at face value. If you're struggling on a limited income (and I've been there), a libation can be a nice way to take the edge of of life harsher's realities.

nicely put

[tomsawyer]

My 94-yr-old uncle comes over for dinner on Wednesdays and he'll have a taste of my homebrew or wine.  This is a guy that made homebrew in a crock with cans of malt and no hops.  He also served in WWII in both Africa and Europe, and lived through the Depression as the oldest boy in a family of seven where the dad died young.  His stories are gold to me.

I think its a great idea to share the fruits of your labor.  We are having a retiree dinner soon at my place of work (not at the plant, its an offsite location that allows alcoholic beverages) and I'm going to bring some beer and wine to the event just in case anyone wants to try some.

[micsager]

A while back I posted about donating some of my beer for a charity auction at work. Well I decided to go for it and my colleague helped me make a "brew basket" with a six pack (2 Oatmeal Stouts, 2 JubelAle clones and 2 CaliCommons) a bag of Rolled Gold, can of beer nuts, 2 nice Pilsner glasses, a jar of Stout Dijon and some beer pads and stickers from local brewpubs; that and a bomber of each of the beers mentioned.  They went nuts for the stuff! Pulled in $347 from all combined. I'm a little nervous to hand out bombers that folks shelled out $30 bucks for!  We ended up raising $5277 in a little over an hour that we donate 100% to three different local charities that we select every year.  Felt good. 

I donate a case of 12 ounce bottle to two silent auction charities each year.  This year, a case of my American Amber went for $130.  It makes me feel good. 

[Slowbrew]

Sounds like a great way to brighten his day!  Go for it!!

On top of everything else that has been said, we have no idea what the man's financial situation really is.  My experience with folks his age is that many will pinch pennies and scrimp and save even when they have hundreds of thousands in the bank.  More often than not that's why they have so much squirreled away.  At 80+ years old, if he wants a beer and it isn't going to kill him, let him have a beer.

I have also known many more active "rich" alcoholics than "poor" ones.  The rich can afford the booze.  The poor are often limited to skipping the booze to get a little food.  Old poor folks with housing typically make pretty good decisions about priorities.

My Dad loved his beer and whiskey.  By the time he was in his 80 I would have loved to share my homebrew with him but he had advanced Parkinson's Decease by then and never got to taste a single drop of it.  Let you friend enjoy his twilight years and pray you get the chance to, too.

Be happy with what you have, share what you can, try to live like you're dying and you won't have any regrets when you come to the clearing at end of your path.

Paul

[rabid_dingo]

Regarding the OP, I took it as a situation where an elderly person on a limited income was fitting a little "beer joy" into his life by coupon-clipping for cheap beer, and the OP saw a chance to be charitable and upgrade the old man's beer joy with homebrew--quite an upgrade, by the way. I too have seen addiction at close range, but without a lot more detail I took it at face value. If you're struggling on a limited income (and I've been there), a libation can be a nice way to take the edge of of life harsher's realities.

nicely put

I like the spirit, the intent and the idea. Good job making sure it is not completely a  ME ME ME ME ME ME society.
Sharing and caring for others is good.
Worrying about what the consequences of a friendly gesture and how it will affect ME is bad...

Reading from this, reminded me, one of my coworkers organized a Charity Golf Tourney.
I have already volunteered to donate two brewing sessions. I'm sure I still have to iron out
details to steer clear of how it will affect me but I want to contribute with my hobby too.

[hopfenundmalz]

I'm doing this in a manner....I'm using the 3-4 kegs that SN will send me from Beer Camp to put on a fundraiser for our local food bank.  SN will donate the beer.

A very cool way to have your beer served Denny. 

Any feedback from the brewery on how the beer is maturing?

[denny]

I'm doing this in a manner....I'm using the 3-4 kegs that SN will send me from Beer Camp to put on a fundraiser for our local food bank.  SN will donate the beer.

A very cool way to have your beer served Denny. 

Any feedback from the brewery on how the beer is maturing?

Nope, haven't heard, Jeff.  I'm really anxious to taste it!