I am writing late at night from Washington DC, where I am not following the advice of my lawyer to retire early. Tomorrow I am being deposed as an expert witness in a lawsuit – an experience, so I am told, unlike any other. But I’m not interested in talking about that, nor politics, nor the various memorials to famous dead people that I visited today. Instead, I want to talk about a bar.

I have just returned from the Brickskeller, a fairly famous local joint that is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year (it’s been a fixture of Washington life longer than most, but not all, of the politicians that tend to hang out it much more upscale bars than this one). What’s so special about this bar? It’s a cool little dive in an interesting part of town, not too far from the action but far enough to be a true neighborhood bar. The bartenders are friendly, carrying on conversations and knowing the city in Wisconsin where the beer you are drinking came from.

Oh, and they have a thousand beers to choose from.

Not on the order of a thousand, but actually one thousand beers. The menu goes on for pages. The number of beers on tap, of course, is much more limited, but I was still able to enjoy draft beers from Lyons (Colorado, not France), Wisconsin, Vermont, Oregon, Canada, the UK, and Russia.

In case you are wondering, the Brickskeller does not own the world’s record for beer selection at a bar. That honor goes to the Delirium Café in Belgium, which is reported to have 2,500 beers available (and so has earned the pink elephant that is their mascot). The Brickskeller, however, holds the record in the US, and the record in terms of bars I have been to. It almost makes me want to visit DC again soon.

Almost.