Well, that's it

Over the last two days I've been presented with pints of perfectly good, traditional bitter-style beers:

1)  Theakston's newish paleish ale (it isn't pale - it's darker than TT Landlord).
2)  Old Dairy Blue Top  - IPA (it isn't an IPA, not really)
3)  Beachy Head Legless Rambler
4)  Harveys Victoria Ale
5)  Harveys Best

Either I've got a virus which has screwed up my tastebuds (which is possible but not all that likely) or I'm really not that fond of this style of beer any more.

They all taste too sweet to me.

All but one of the above taste like "proper" Sussex beers - that is to say there's a whiff of sulphur and/or damp-dog about them which places them in the landscape.

The other (Theakstons, obvs) tasted like old-fashioned Yorkshire and reminded me of our sojourn to Robin Hood's bay a couple of years back.

I want to stress, vehemently, they were in decent condition and there was nothing wrong with any of the beers.  I just didn't relish them that much...well, at all, really.

15 years ago I would have been in a state of ecstasy to have any one of those beers...

About 10 days ago I really enjoyed a pint of TT Landlord from a pub on the visiting margins (sometimes the beer's pretty good, other times not) so it's not like I don't like any old-stylee beers but I find myself sad that my range of enjoyment is dwindling a bit.

Best drinking buddy suggests that our standards are now almost impossibly high.  That doesn't really bode well for our trips and holidays which have a large element of walking a few miles to what promises to be a good pub...
...however, it does say an enormous amount for the British Brewing industry which presents us with a lovely dilemma of having far too many incredible beers available to drink that any slight deviation from our favour style leaves us a little disappointed.

Probably won't stop us heading out to the pub after work tomorrow, though...