Portland Cocktail Week Four days of cocktails, food, and boozy jingoism

After two years of being open only to people with really cool mustaches/Brian Flanagan, PCW returns next week with a series of events that you, the lowly non-bartender, are actually welcome to crash. Along with a citywide network of 25 bars offering $7 specialty 'tails all week, barkeeps from every corner of the US (except probably Boring, TN) are converging for a series of boozy history lessons, food pairings, and a massive wrap party. Here are the happiest hours:

Monday: Beardless Beard Award-winning mixologist and The Craft of Craft Cocktails author Dale DeGroff hits Living Room Theater with a live jazz band to deliver a history of cocktails, tracing them from their current elevated status back to a time when men were shunned for drinking them, and so drank lots and lots of Champale. Get tix here.

Tuesday: The butcher boys at Country Cat are teaming with the boozer boys at House Spirits for a three-course dinner and cocktail pairing that'll include smoked steelhead with the aquavit/ sherry Cold Snap, fried chicken and a gin martini, and lamb "little smokies" with a mojito-ish gin & aquavit concoction called the Scandinavian-side, which was a big hit for Lou Reederssen. Make reservations here.

Thursday: All the bartenders stop learning stuff, cut off their sleeves, and start drinking at the Jupiter for 'Merica: Red, White, And Booze, where everybody will stay totally composed as DJs blast ironically jingoistic music and cocktail jockeys from all 34 chapters of the US Bartenders Guild pour craft drinks in a way that surely will catch the eye of super-rich Elizabeth Shue. Get on the list here.