End the War on Summer

The weather today is 81º and sunny. It is pretty much as perfect an August day as you can wish for and yet, forces are battling against summer.

Pumpkin beers have already hit the shelves. Even as one of the most wonderful summers in recent memory rolls on, friends are already bragging about finishing their first bomber of Southern Tier Pumking. But it’s August, why are we rushing towards fall? A trip to the beer store this weekend featured such a display of orange and black, I thought it was opening night for the Flyers at the Wells Fargo Center. I was looking to stock up for a sunny rooftop party, not a hayride. The summer’s hot selling Hell or High Watermelon was banished to a back corner, forgotten like so much Bud Light Straw-ber-rita. Only a single sixtel of Boulder’s Kinda Blue Blueberry Wheat kept our party in keeping with the calendar.

And now Starbucks is bringing back its Pumpkin Spice Latte a month earlier than normal. The spiced coffee drink will debut on August 26th. And people are excited, really excited. The drink has a Twitter account and had the studio audience screaming during a recent Jimmy Fallon monologue.

The pumpkin spice latte is Starbucks number one seasonal beverage, so it isn’t any wonder the coffee giant wants to stretch out its season but what does it say about us, the consumer? Summer was always something you refused to let go of. One last day at the beach. One last dive into the pool. Fall was to be battled, put off for as long as possible. Fall meant saying goodbye to sleeping in, summer flings and leisurely days.

But now schools reopen before Labor Day, football dwarves baseball in popularity and perhaps fall has become America’s favorite season.

But as for me, I’m hanging on to warm days, barbecues, heirloom tomatoes and the rest of summer’s bounty.

All I ask of those of you who are excited for pumpkins now, is save me a pumpkin beer, I’d like to have one on a cool crisp October afternoon. Thanks.