When I think of California – the 31st state to join America - my thoughts are drawn to Disneyland, Hulk Hogan, Silicon Valley, the Los Angeles Lakers of lore,

By my reckoning, New Zealand just endured its longest night of the year. This insightful reckoning was based on the actual calculations of experts in the field of astronomy who are much smarter than me, and the fact that I read about it on the internet so it must be true. In retrospect, the information was posted on the New Zealand Herald website which is frequently the exception to that otherwise inviolable rule.

It has been a wee while between drinks as they say, so we've got a super special lineup coming your way this weekend.

As a professional beer writer, I have visited a lot of breweries around the world (New Zealand, Australia, China, United Kingdom, and the Czech Republic) but few, if any, made a greater impression than Lagunitas Brewery in California, USA. I was there for literally two hours literally ten years ago, but I loved the place then and I still love their beers now.

Malthouse is celebrating 25 years in business with a yearlong series of monthly beer launches and tap takeovers from some of New Zealand’s finest breweries. This mammoth saga has been dubbed “Project Silver” after the metal traditionally associated with said anniversary. It has been described variously as “awesome”, “incredible” and “a little bit nuts, to be honest”.

Just as it has every single year since the invention of the Gregorian Calendar (1582 – Patent Still Pending), April is upon us again. This month has already brought people millions of chocolate eggs and/or chocolate bunnies, erratic coverage of the Commonwealth Games and footage of Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull caught live on camera butchering the famous but over rated Ozzie glam rock anthem “The Voice”.