This article was originally published by The Hard Times.

Okay, let’s cut right down to business here… is this divorce hearing BYOB, open bar, or (ugh) cash bar? It’s not a big deal either way, but I just need to know if I have to pack my cooler or not. I have some high end beers I’ve been saving for the occasion, so if it’s BYOB I just gotta get them in the fridge and cool down some ice packs.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d love it if this were an open bar affair, like the affair my wife (oh, excuse me… EXXX wife) had with her “yoga instructor.” I mean, it’s easier for me to just slip the bartender a 20 spot at the beginning and tell him he’s my guy for the rest of the night, but the options are just so limited.

And don’t even get me started on the cash bar at the last hearing we had at her lawyer’s office. Come on… how tacky can you be? At least put out a bucket with some ice and crispy bois or SOMETHING. I told them from here on out don’t invite me to these things unless the alcohol situation is very clear prior to scheduling. I shouldn’t even have to be asking this question.

Funny, she never seemed to care about how much I was drinking when we were together. Weird how that works, right? All she cared about was money. “You’re spending too much on non-essentials, blah blah blah, the kids can’t afford any extra curricular activities, bitch bitch bitch, where does all our money go?” You get the idea. Now all of a sudden I show up ready to divide our assets with some fresh Alchemist and it’s an issue?

Speaking of our assets, if she thinks she’s getting even ONE bottle from my beer cellar, she is in for a rude awakening. I’ll open them all with a sabre before I let her get her greedy little hands on my hard-earned collectibles. I’ve got 500+ bottles of some of the best sours, stouts, and lambics in the world; I’m lucky she has no idea how much some of them are worth on the secondary market. She only knows what cost was… but since I paid for the majority of them with our joint checking account, she is going to claim she is entitled to at least half of them. My ass!

Maybe I need to treat this like a good old fashioned ISO:FT negotiation. She wants custody of our kids, Porter and Stella, so maybe I tug on those heartstrings and say “Alright, you want the kids, I want my beer collection… even swap.” She will have to agree, unless she’s willing to risk looking like the worst mom in the world. But she has no shame anymore, so it wouldn’t surprise me if she called my bluff. What happened to the woman I married?

On second thought, I’ll just pack the cooler and bring it anyway. If I have to leave it in the car, so be it. I’ll just keep taking breaks with an empty coffee cup for refills. Let this be a lesson to all you divorcees out there: any event can be BYOB if you try hard enough.