Yeah... the quality of beer you can get at a liquor store has gotten pretty awful.

So many of the better small brewers sold out to big corporate brewers who switched to crappy ingredients, as well as an increase in good hop prices, and just a general trend to make beers more "citrusy" (grapefruit/skunky) has really made it tough for fans of ales and pale ales.

The nitrates (nitrites?) in wine hit me pretty hard. I get pretty vicious headaches from it. Most beers don't have them anymore, but when I was younger, way back in the `70-80s, they all did.