Is 2012 going to be a good year for spirits?

So 2012 is finally upon us, dear readers. Some of us approach the coming year with trepidation, because this is when the Mayans said it’s all going to end. Some say it will be in a fiery doomsday cataclysm. Others prefer the sunnier New Age prophecy that a great spiritual awakening is in store. I guess we’ll find out soon enough which of those fates awaits — or whether the Mayans and New Age dudes just have their math wrong.

This also happens to be the time of year when people ask me to consult my oracle (or my divining rod or tea leaves or whatever) and suggest what cocktail spirits trends we’ll be seeing over the next 12 months. Will 2012 be a good year for spirits or a bad one?

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(Bigstock photo/BIGSTOCK PHOTO) - HANDOUT IMAGE: Glasses of whiskey with ice. (Credit: Bigstock photo)

I must admit that what I’m seeing so far has been inscrutable. Some days, goodness is all around — delicious new experimental American gins, for instance — and I feel positive that the Mayans are wrong. Other days, when the growing popularity of whipped-cream vodka and cherry whiskey is evident . . . well, I feel absolutely certain the apocalypse is upon us.

With that in mind, I’ve rated my five drinking predictions for 2012 according to how much they sync with the Mayan prophecy whose last-calendar day of Dec. 21, 2012, has been interpreted as an End Time.

The continued infantilization of flavored vodka. I would never have believed that Pinnacle Vodka’s whipped-cream vodka could become so god-awfully ubiquitous. But when a good friend (whom I formerly described as having “good taste”) recently served me her Creamsicle “cocktail” of whipped-cream vodka and Tropicana orange juice, I was seized by a sense of dread. That dread grew more profound when I tasted Pinnacle’s cake- and cotton-candy-flavored vodkas. Then, a couple weeks ago, I tasted Pinnacle’s Gummy vodka, with a red Swedish fish on the label. (Yeah, Pinnacle, you hit the mark. It tastes like “authentic” Swedish fish, all right. Congratulations.)

Flavored vodka is not new. The number of flavored vodkas on the market has more than tripled since 2003. I’ve certainly railed against them, completely unsuccessfully, for years now. But this trend toward childhood tastes is a new low. I thought sweet-tea- and espresso-flavored vodkas were bad enough, but they are XO cognac next to gummy candy and cherry whipped cream. “Grow up!” I want to scream.

Verdict: Yep, the Mayans were totally right.

Flavored whiskey. Piggybacking on the popularity of flavored vodka, a new heresy has been gaining steam. American whiskeys are often named after old-time distillers, whom I imagine to be grizzled and irascible and committed to tradition: Elijah Craig, Pappy Van Winkle, Old Fitzgerald, et al. I also imagine that those men roll over in their graves when they hear about products such as Red Stag (black-cherry-flavored bourbon from Jim Beam) or Tennessee Honey and American Honey (honey-flavored whiskeys from Jack Daniels and Wild Turkey). This month, Jim Beam will roll out Red Stag Spiced and Red Stag Honey Tea.

I know; these products are supposed to draw in an audience that does not usually drink American whiskey. But it still feels like pandering to the lowest common denominator. I want to say to Jim Beam and Jack Daniels: Why not just skip straight to the whipped-cream bourbon and save us the agony?