I went pheasant hunting for the first time this weekend. I shot 3 of the 9 birds we took. I cooked up two pheasant and 1 chucker for dinner tonight. I just pan fried them with a flour/egg/bread crumb coating. Very good. Like chicken only better.

The picture above is near the end of the hunt and we were trying to look for tracks. The dog did an amazing job of sniffing them out.

Here is the Toyota page where you can enter your VIN number to see if your car is included in ANY recall or service campaign.

I had a tough time reading the one on the windshield in my poorly lit garage. It is also on an easy to read sticker with bar codes in the driver's door frame.

My Toyota is in the clear!

I already had that edgy look at four years old.

Note to self: If I needed to replace my GPS today I would probably get the Garmin Nuvi 1450.

Amazon has it for about $310.

Update 2/24/10: I think I've changed my mind and I still would get the Garmin Nuvi 755T I mentioned last month.

I've been practicing using GIMP to correct the green eye effect dogs get when you take their picture with a flash.

Before


After


You can't just use the red eye removal tool that a lot of image manipulation programs have, like Irfanview, because the reflection from a dog's eye isn't red, and the program is looking for red color in a person's eye.

One of the big reasons I stayed home for Christmas finally happened this morning. The sump pump hose outside froze shut and when I woke up this morning the pump was running continuously. It has happened a few times before when we have really wet weather followed by a few days of really cold weather. It takes a few days for the excess ground water to dissipate.

So before I even had my coffee I was outside in 2 degree cold trying to remove the frozen hose so I could bring it to the kitchen sink to thaw it out with hot water. Of course little bits of dirty ice got on the kitchen floor and counter. I think it took me a little more than an hour before I finally got the thawed out hose reattached.

The dirty ice bits on the floor were not as big a deal as they could have been since I bought my Hoover Floormate. I just used it in wet vacuum mode and it sucked up everything. I use it quite a bit. I mostly use it in dry vacuum mode to pick up dog hair and crumbs on the floor. I've used it a few times with just hot water in the tank for spot cleaning little messes, and I've used it once with the cleaning solution to do the entire floor. I pull it out at least a couple times a week. The wet vacuum mode is great when Mitch tracks snow in from the backyard. Even when the floor looks clean I'm always surprised by the grey color of the water in the waste tank.

I watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine last night and recommend it if you want a fun mindless popcorn movie.

We tried Five Guys burgers a month or so ago. The hamburgers are some of the best out there and the portions are HUGE. I rarely order French fries, but we split an order just to give them a taste. Even splitting them we couldn't finish them without jacking my blood sugar sky high. Amy had a great idea: I froze the rest in a zip lock bag to use later for hash browns. This morning I did just that and it worked out great! I put some Smart Balance in a hot pan and then the fries and cooked those for 10 minutes or so, and then moved them to one side and cooked my eggs. The fries reheated better than I thought. The outside crisped up really nice and the inside was nice and hot.

Even though it is only 4 degrees outside Mitch is panting from getting overheated laying in his sunbeam. The cloudless day has the temperature in my southern-facing family room up a little over 4 degrees.

I thought Mitch napping with his head on Bella's butt was great.

Mitch playing with the squeaky sock monkey Shawn and Kate sent him for Christmas. He LOVES squeaky toys! I love it when he tosses his head back with the toy in his mouth.

For Christmas I planned on driving to Ohio on Christmas Eve morning but at the last minute aborted because of the big ice storm over Illinois and Indiana. It was a huge bummer, and I also missed out on the 5+ gallons of fresh IPA Tim had on tap from Original Gravity Brewing.

Amy was flying to her Mom's on Christmas day and was going to kennel Bella, and since I was going to be here the whole week I saved her some money and am dog sitting. For the most part she is a good guest. When the neighbors' dogs are out I have to put her on the leash in the backyard because she will just run back and forth along the fence and bark.

I didn't have any food in the house because I wasn't planning on being here, so the first thing I did is went to the store to get some fun Christmas Eve food as well as some staples. I also swung by a Redbox and picked up three movies. Amy came over in the late afternoon and helped me make hummus and baba ganoush and then we watched District 9.

Christmas Day I purposely did nothing except lay on my couch and watch movies all day and eat hummus and baba ganoush. It wasn't the same as being with family, but it was kind of a nice change of pace.

I ended up watching seven movies over the Christmas weekend:

District 9
Inglourious Basterds
Angles and Demons
Wrong Turn at Tahoe
Maiden Heist
Tyson
The Hangover

It was a short and quite week at work. Friday is New Years day and I took off New Years Eve day, so I only had three days of work.

Last night I got the movie Up, made another batch of hummus, had a wedge of Roquefort, and a bottle of really good sparkling wine (Gloria Ferrer Sonoma Brut).

For New Years Day (today) I got a pork loin and sauerkraut that I will start in the crock pot soon, and will of course be watching the Buckeyes play in the Rose Bowl. As of right now we are four point underdogs against Oregon.

I'm not sure what else I have planned for today. I still have the other half of my French press of coffee to drink, and I haven't brought the newspaper in yet. I may or may not do some laundry. It is very very cold here today. Two degrees right now. I might swing by a Redbox again and get another movie.

Happy New Year!

I let my on-line subscription to www.consumerreports.org lapse for a couple years, but I just renewed it last week. This post is more of a note to myself on what laundry detergent, dishwasher detergent, and dish soap (for washing by hand) I am going to buy next based on their latest reviews.

Laundry detergent
Tide 2X Ultra for Cold Water
Simplicity Hypoallergenic Non-Toxic 2X

Dishwashing detergent
Cascade Complete with Bleach Hydroclean Action Powder

Dish Soap (washing by hand)
Dawn Direct Foam

Liquid Fabric Softener
Ultra Gain Joyful Expressions

I went duck hunting for the first time last week and have been meaning to make a post about it. Until I get to a full-blown post describing the day's adventures here are a few pictures to tide you over.

Tom setting out the decoy spread before sunrise.


Armed and dangerous.


Our only duck of the day. Unfortunately I didn't shoot it.


Tom let me take the duck home though.


It dressed down to 1.3 pounds and turned out very nice.


Amy came over to help roast it that night, and we also made Alton Brown's French onion soup. It turned out good too.

I get to buy one of these tomorrow!

I took today off from work to make it a four day weekend and to paint my garage door. I started the day by leaving the house at 8:30 AM to have breakfast and read the paper at McDonalds. After that I stopped at the library and picked up the movies Crossing Over and In Bruges.

The main reason for going out was to swing by Home Depot. I had exterior primer and paint left over from painting the trim a couple years ago, so I took it back and had them put it on their paint shaker for me. I also picked up some sand paper.

I got home and set up camp in the driveway. I tied Mitch up in the shade, plugged the radio in, poured a big glass of Diet Pepsi, and set out all of the gear I needed.

I first ran my palm sander over the entire door and then washed it down with a towel and water. After it was dry I cut in the edges with a brush. When that was done I washed my brush and then poured primer into my roller pan and finished up applying the primer.

The primer needs at least 16 hours to cure before applying the top coat, but that's OK because now I am tired.

It is 4:30 PM, I just got out of the shower and I'm trying to decide what to do next. The first Ohio State game of the season is on ESPN tomorrow at 11 AM CDT. I was going to make a pot of chili and corn bread for the game, but now I don't feel like cooking. I think instead I will get a frozen Home Run Inn pizza (my favorite!) and maybe a few other nibbles to have on hand.

I don't know whether to get up and get the top coat on the garage door right away tomorrow before the game, wait until after the game, or just do it on Sunday or Monday. I guess I'm leaning towards doing it first thing in the morning. Maybe I will just cut in with the brush and then wash up. That is the hard part. Using the roller is easy and only takes 20 minutes.

I picked up dog poop and got the grass cut Thursday night when I got home from work, so I don't have to worry about fitting that in this weekend.

After 24 hours of drying on top of the fan my hops went from 5.5 ounces to 1.9 ounces.

I harvested my first season of hops tonight and I got way more than I expected. I was thinking an ounce, maybe two if I was lucky. I got 5.5 ounces!



I expect the weight to go down after they are dried, but I have no idea by how much.

I have a box fan on a stand. I pointed the fan straight up, and then took a window screen, spread the hops out on the screen, and put the screen on top of the fan. They should be dry by tomorrow morning.



After I was done picking the hops my fingers were coated with a wonderfully aromatic yellow sticky film from the fresh resin in all the cones.

Tonight I finally got around to watching The Wrestler. It is the best movie I have seen in a long time. Mickey Rourke was amazing. He deserved all of the best actor nods and wins he got for the role. I can't wait to see his next movies.

I just racked the beer I brewed last week and I think it is going to be very good. My basic recipe now is 6 pounds of dry malt extract, 1 pound of specialty grains steeped for an hour, usually crystal malt, and Safale US-5 yeast. Then I adjust the hops to what I want. This batch I wanted to be on the lower end of the hop spectrum and keep it on hand for people new to craft beers so they won't be turned off by a really hopped up beer. I designed the recipe to come in at 31 IBU's (International Bittering Units). The Safale US-05 is supposed to have been cultured from the Sierra Nevada brewery. It is very crisp and clean and just gets out of the way.

After I tasted a sample this morning I wanted to dry hop it in the worst way, but like I said I want this to be an approachable beer for people just starting out. I think I might brew this same recipe next weekend and just nudge the hops up a smidge, and dry hop it.

This is also the first batch I brewed where I put all of my hops in a mesh paint strainer. This resulted in a very clear beer and I think might help reduce the chances for off tastes.

Also because there were no solids in the beer I could finally see how much yeast was generated. I scooped out 4 cups of yeast hulls from the bottom of the fermentor!! All of that from an 11 gram yeast packet.

Brad's Summer APA
Brewed 7/3/09
IBU's: 31

1 lb crystal malt steeped 30 minutes
6 lbs Light Dry Extract
0.60 oz Cascade [5.40 %] (60 min) Hops
0.70 oz Columbus [12.20 %] (60 min) Hops
1.00 oz Amarillo [8.20 %] (5 min)
Safale US-05

This is what my four hop plants look like so far. I need to figure out a better support system for next season.



This is a little frame I made out of PVC pipe, four elbows and two T's. The T's are what the elastic of the paint straining bag are looped around. I put all of my hop additions into the strainer bag, and then when I am done with the boil I just pull the bag out and I am left with very very clear wort.



I got a package of two bags for $4 at Home Depot. They are made for professional painters to pour their five gallon buckets of paint through before they use it in a spray gun or if the paint gets bits and pieces in it.

For my purposes the bags will be reusable for a good number of times. I just turn it inside out, rinse it really well, wring it out and hang it to dry.

I love this picture of Mitch coveting Bella's Nylabone.

Mitch is 6 years old today!

I didn't tell him, though, so he won't be upset that I didn't get him anything.

I picked up a bottle of Don Miguel Gascón Malbec 2008 yesterday but have not tried it yet. It has a number of pretty good reviews on-line. If I had to assign a letter grade to what most reviewers said about the wine I would say it is averaging around a B+, maybe an A-, and especially for the price.

I was too full from a chicken dinner yesterday and I don't want to open it until I am ready to enjoy it without distraction, so I will wait to uncork it until then.

Went out for some beers last night with some work friends to Two Brothers Brewery. Our waitress was very chatty and it came up that she used to work at a winery. We started talking wine, and one thing she said was that Argentinean malbec's are an excellent bargain right now and very delicious. They have almost become the national varietal of Argentine. I plan on picking up a bottle this weekend when I do my grocery shopping and will let you know what I think. If you try a bottle let me know what you think.

For what it's worth, if I had to replace my GPS today I would get the Garmin Nuvi 755T. It is on Amazon.com for about $320.

A few months ago I watched the Good Eats episode where Alton Brown makes sauerkraut. There is almost nothing too it and I decided I wanted to give it a try. Since then I have been looking for the perfect glass crock to make it in. Last night I think I found it at Wal-Mart, so I picked that up and a couple heads of cabbage and attempted my first batch of sauerkraut today.

This is what it looked like after being in the crock for about 30 minutes.



My finger is pointing to the level of liquid so far. The glass of water sitting in the crock is to provide pressure to help squeeze out the liquid from the cabbage and to keep the cabbage submerged to avoid contact with the air.

This is what it looked like after four hours.



All of the cabbage is now covered by liquid. In order to fit the lid on I put a smaller glass of water on top. The glass is sitting on top of a little glass saucer. I tried it with just the saucer but the cabbage was buoyant enough to lift it up to surface level.

I am supposed to keep it cool (65 – 70 degrees) and skim off the blooms that will form every couple days for two weeks. It sounds like after the first couple weeks no more blooms will form and I let it sit for another two weeks for a total of four weeks.

I used to be able to get real sauerkraut at Bobak's when they had a local store. It is so much better than the sauerkraut that is just cured with vinegar. I can't wait to see how it turns out. Very excited. If it works and I like it I don't think I will buy sauerkraut anymore. It will keep for six months in the fridge, and it would be no big deal to whip up a batch every few months.

I love this ad. Makes me laugh every time.

I love my Toyota Matrix! I was able load up my lawnmower with lots of room to spare. It's surprising that a little car has so much functional room



The transmission/gearbox that drives the front wheels of the mower locked up. This morning I spent some time seeing if I could take it out myself and replace it, but I got to a point where the next step could have left me with a bunch of parts laying on the garage floor and not knowing how to put them back together. So I took a couple of eight foot 2x4's, laid them on my bumper as a ramp and rolled the lawnmower right into the car with no problems.

I took it to Sears and it turns out the truck only picks up lawn mowers to take to the shop on Thursdays, and the kid said it usually takes two weeks after that. Looks like I am going to have to borrow a neighbor's mower a couple times.

The gearbox froze up early last year or late the year before that, and I just took the drive belt off and used it as a manual mower. It is a little heavier than a non-self-propelled mower, but it wasn't too bad pushing it. But the last week or two my knee has been a little tender and pushing the mower up the few steep inclines I have was not comfortable, so I figured I better get the mower fixed. It's also nice having the self propelled working when it is 95 degrees and humid in the middle of summer.

Here are the latest pictures of my hop plants.

Willamette


Cascade


Chinook


Centennial

I don't print very much on my home ink jet printer, and as a result I think I end up wasting more ink it gums up in the cartridge than I actually use for printing.

I have always used the printer manufacturer's ink cartridges, but when I went to the get new ink a month or so ago I thought I would try refilled cartridges. The lesser quality was immediately noticeable. The edges of each letter was blurry and I could see the ink bleeding along the little paper fibers. Not recommended.

Because of all this I have decided I am going to buy a low end laser printer. As far as I know the dry toner powder will not dry up and clog like ink jet ink, or at least I think it would last much much longer than the ink does. My requirements:

1. It must have built-in networking so I can plug it directly into my router and send print jobs to it from any of my computers around the house.

2. I would very much like it to have automatic duplexing so I can print on both sides and save paper, but I am not 100% committed to this.

3. I am going back and forth on whether to just get a black and white printer or a color laser printer. I don't know if the quality of the color output of a low end color laser printer will be as good as the color laser I am used to at work or an ink jet. For what I mostly print I don't know if the extra money for color is worth it either. I'm probably leaning towards just black and white, but I'm still open to color. I will have a better idea once I see some sample prints at the store and price out the cost of the color toner.

A toner cartridge costs more than a set of ink cartridge, but on a per sheet cost it is much cheaper. It's something like $0.08 per page for an ink jet and $0.02 per page for a laser. The printers I am looking at are in the $200 range. The brands I am interested in are Brother, Samsung and, of course, HP.

My first hop plant poked out of the ground today! It is the Centennial variety. The warm weather being forecast the next couple of days should help coax the other three plants to show themselves if they are still viable. It looks like a mini hop cone at the top, and all of the leaves have that distinctive hop look. How fun!

I've been aware of neti pots for a while but never gave them much thought. About a month ago I was sitting in my doctor's waiting room and I noticed there were a few neti pots in boxes on the counter for sale. I have the highest respect for my doctor, so the fact that he had them for sale made an impression on me, but not enough to do any more looking into it. This morning I read a story that a scientific study was released that said using a neti pot has health benefits, and especially for people with allergies. That did it. I went to my local Walgreens, plunked down $11 and left the store with my very own neti pot. I tried it as soon as I got home and I think I really like it. I've had minor sniffles from seasonal allergies for the last couple of months. Immediately after trying it I felt like my sinuses were wide open and I could breathe very easily. Also I haven't had to blow my nose today after I used it.

It looks like a small tea pot. You mix up some salt with warm water, lean over a sink, put the tip of the pot in one nostril and then tilt your head so the water streams into your nose and exits the other nostril. One weird thing is that it takes a couple seconds after you start pouring for the water to come out the other side because the sinuses have to fill up first. I didn't realize they were that big. After you stop pouring it also take a couple seconds for all of the water to empty out of your sinuses. Also kind of a weird feeling. Then you do the same thing in the other nostril.

After leaving the drugstore I stopped and got a car wash at one of those do it yourself places, got some gas for the lawnmower, cut the grass, filled up the bird bath, hung my bird house, brushed Mitch, and applied Rain-X to my car's windows. When I came in from working outside the electricity was out. I took about two hours for it to come back.

I think I am going to watch Goya's Ghosts on on-demand tonight.

I got my four hop rhizomes planted today. The spray paint markings on the grass are leftover from the underground utility location service. You can see the popsicle sticks in the picture I used to mark which rhizomes I planted where. From west to east I planted, in alphabetical order, Cascade, Centennial, Chinook, and Willamette (rhymes with damn it).

This is mostly a note to myself:

The area I want to plant my hops is 7' wide, almost 3' deep, and the soffit is 9' above the ground.

This is what it looked like out of the front of the house Sunday night, April 5, and the backyard the next morning, April 6. April!!!

I think this is going on the Zune tonight.

I actually blew a piece of the apple I was eating out of my mouth when I saw this on TV tonight. It's funny because it's true.

After about a year of critically tasting beers I've definitely decided that my absolute favorite beer is an American IPA called Furious from the Surly Brewing Company in Minnesota.

I have only had it on tap in bars, but it also comes in 14 ounce cans. If you should happen to see this can at your favorite carry-out do yourself a favor and buy as many of them as you can afford. (I think their cans are very ugly, and if I didn't know what was inside would not bother picking up the can for further inspection.)

The Greyhound Brewery has selected the following hop varieties to plant on its estate hop field:

Cascade
Centennial
Chinook
Willamette

I added this song to my Zune a couple weeks ago and I am embarrassed to admit how many times per day I listen to it while bouncing in my chair at work.

Mitch runs in his sleep all the time but nothing like this.

Grammar Nazis

This made me laugh. Totally my kind of humor.

The guy at work that is an all-grain brewer invited me and a couple other brewing friends to his place Saturday morning to hang out while he brewed a batch. I stayed just up until the start of the boil because after that point all-grain and extract brewing are the same. The all-grain process is easier than I thought it would be, but for now I think I am more than happy with the results of my extract beers. It was neat to see though, and at some point I will probably step up to all-grain. He was an extract brewer for 10 years before going to all-grain.

He lives in Evanston which is close to a barbeque place I have been wanting to try called Smoque. I haven't tried it up until now because it is about an hour drive one way. This place is all about the meat, and is probably some of the best I have ever had. If your idea of barbeque has lots of sauce on top then this is not your place. Their pork and brisket are dry rubbed and then smoked for 12 and 15 hours respectively. It is an almost perfect balance of the meat flavor, smoke, salt, and seasoning. They only have one sauce and it is served on the side. It is a fairly thin vinegar-based sauce with a nice sweet twang. The first few times I dunked the whole piece of meat on my fork into the sauce before realizing that was not the right balance. It turned out dipping just the bottom fifth of the piece of meat provided the right amount of balance, and I didn't dip every bite. I dipped maybe every third bite. To summarize the meat, it was smoked so perfectly you really do not want to cover it up with sauce. I liked just a little bit of the vinegar sauce to cleanse my palate so the next two bites of plain smoked meat seemed like the first bite all over again.

The platter I got came with coleslaw and two sides. The slaw needed a little more dressing, but was still a nice fresh counterpart to the meat. The barbequed baked beans were on the sweet side, but not objectionably sweet side, and they had a lot of flavor and nice big chunks of perfectly cooked down onions. The mac and cheese was very good but the serving size was a little on the small side. It was baked in its own little tin foil cup.

Overall I will go back and give it a solid B+, and it would not be much of stretch to give it an A-. The place is very small and when I walked in the line was huge. If I lived a lot closer I probably would have said to heck with it and left, but since I was in the area I stuck it out. The line actually moves very fast and I was there about 15 to 20 minutes. Not too bad.

I had my cable service upgraded to digital and switched from traditional POTS service to getting my phone service from the cable company on Thursday, and I am loving it more than I thought I would!

I have already watched three movies using the free on-demand service. Unless there is a really big movie that I want to see as soon as possible on DVD I think the on-demand service will take care of most of my movie needs. So far I have watched 21, Walk Hard, and Grind House.

When the phone rings the caller ID info pops up on the TV screen. That is pretty cool.

I can look at future shows on the program grid, and if I want to make sure I tune to it when it comes on, I just click a button and a little reminder pops up on the TV telling me it is time to turn to that channel! I even went out to Friday night's schedule a week away and set a reminder.

I also LOVE being able to look at the program guide and still be able to see and hear the program I am watching in the upper right corner. With my previous service when I opened the guide the sound and picture disappeared.

One of the older fence posts in the back yard snapped from the high winds we had a couple nights ago. I need to call the fence guy and have him come out to dig out the old "stump" and set a new one. For now I braced it up by nailing a 2x4 at the top of the post and secured it at the ground by pounding a stake in front of it. It's not going anywhere now so I have time to get the guy out here. I will try and wait until it warms up a bit. Hopefully in the next week or two.

I have been thinking about replacing my furnace and air conditioner for the last couple years. I'm glad I waited because I saw in the news today that I will be able to get a $1,500 tax credit under the stimulus package to do that. There will also be money available for renewable energy upgrades. Once I get a new roof installed in the spring I would be interested in looking at adding a little bit of solar capacity to the house. I have thought about installing just a few panels on the roof and the switches and wiring to get it patched into the house, and then down the road add additional panels as prices drop and efficiency increases.

The siding on the house looks dingy and needs to have something done to it. I am going to look into having it painted rather than residing the house.

Everything is still in place to refinance my mortgage. My banker said things are taking longer than normal because of the huge increase of everyone refinancing at the same time because of the low rates.

I have Monday off for President's Day. I just have a few easy chores on the list for today; pick up dog poop in the back yard, this week's laundry, a trip to the grocery store, empty the dishwasher and clean up the kitchen. I also bought wind deflectors for the rear windows on my car a few weeks ago, but have been waiting until the weather warms up to install them.

I got to the DMV before it opened this morning and was home with my new license by 8 AM.

I rented Saw V to watch tonight.

I haven't had White Castle in forever and I have been craving them so I swung by there for lunch.

Went to Meijer to get some fun Super Bowl food. I ended up with a 10 inch frozen Home Run Inn pizza, fixings for chili, and a two pound hunk of Jennie O turkey ham that was on sale for $2 per pound.

On the way home from Meijer I was going to stop by the carwash to get the thick layer of salt from the car, but there were at least 10 cars in line so I will try some other time. Maybe I will see if it is open 24 hours and go back late tonight.

When I got home I threw together the chili and put it in a crock pot on low.

I drove 24 city miles today and averaged 31 MPG.

I'm going to take some laundry from the dryer and move another load from the washer and then settle in with the movie and hope I don't get too freaked out.

This is great.

This is where I think I will leave my ScanGauge II for now.



It is sitting inside a little compartment with a fold-down door. I have most of the cable tucked in behind the ScanGauge, and you can see the cable that leads to the OBDII connector coming out of the left side. It is snaked up over the steering wheel column and then down to the connector.

There is a little punch-out in the back of the compartment. Once it warms up I am going to take remove the punch-out and run the cable through the back of the compartment and to the connector so you won't be able to see the cable at all.

I have improved my gas mileage by almost 25% since I've started using the ScanGauge.



Tomorrow morning (Saturday) I plan on leaving the house at 7 AM to get my drivers license renewed. I hope getting there first thing in the morning will let me miss standing in a long line.

I have started my federal tax return and have only entered my W2, my mortgage interest and property tax and I owe/am owed right around zero, which is fine by me. I don't think the rest of what I still have to enter will make much of a material difference.

Mitch doing what Mitch does best.

Just a quick update post.

This morning, Saturday, an appraiser came out to do an appraisal on the house because I am refinancing. It will drop my rate by 1.125%.

Before the appraiser showed up Mitch threw up. A chunk of Nylabone with sharp edges came out, so I think that is what was irritating his stomach. It brought back memories of Goliath who seemed to throw up about every month or two and always first thing in the morning, and usually when I was still more asleep than awake. A nice way to start the day.

Today I also FINALLY got around to cancelling my traditional land line phone and ordering VoIP from my cable company. That will also save me a bunch of money. I am also upgrading from traditional analog cable to digital cable and got a bunch of extra channels that I have been wanting, and I will still be paying less per month than I was paying with cable and a land line separately. Some of the channels I am looking forward to are:

Biography Channel
Science Channel
National Geographic Channel
Two Sundance film channels
Seven Starz movie channels
Seven Encore movie channels
BBC America
49 music channels

There are also a bunch of supposedly free on-demand channels, but I don't know too much about those yet. They say there is a library of thousands of movies and most of them are free, but they don't say what kind of movies or how old. I'll let you know.

My ScanGauge and tire pressure gauge arrived today. I used it a little bit when I ran some errands tonight. It updates much more quickly than the fuel mileage display in my van did. The van's display refreshed maybe every 1 to 1.5 seconds. The ScanGauge seems to update almost continually. As a result you get much more feedback on how your throttle control affects fuel mileage. The air pressure gauge is the best I have used. It makes a very good leak-free seal and beeps when it has a reading. It has a built-in flashlight right under where the valve stem goes in. That will be very handy when I am checking the pressure in the garage at night.

Amy stopped over this afternoon after visiting a patient and we watched Astronaut Farmer. The movie was just OK. Entertaining but not great.

I went to the library tonight to return a couple DVDs, Meijer to get a few groceries, and Office Max to get a copy of TurboTax. It is $15 cheaper at Amazon (not counting shipping) so I guess I will order it from them.

I checked out the audiobook version of Thunderstruck by Erik Larson from the library and ripped it to my Zune. Now I have to figure out when and where to listen to it all. It is 10 CD's worth.

This might be the Macintosh that brings me back to Apple!


Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

Fun stuff. Anyone that knows me (I measure Mitch's daily dog food ration to the gram) won't be surprised to hear that when I found a digital tire pressure gauge with resolution to the tenth of a pound rather than the standard half a pound I ordered it. Other places have it for over $30, but amazon.com has it for $16.


I also ordered the ScanGauge II. It plugs into the OBDII port on your car and gives you real-time readings of dozens of values from your car's onboard computer. It can also read error codes and reset the dreaded "Check Engine Soon" light.

I think I will mount it like this.

These are the values it can display:

Maximum Speed
Average Speed
Maximum Coolant Temperature
Maximum RPM
Driving Time
Driving Distance
Fuel Used
Trip Fuel Economy
Distance to Empty
Time to Empty
Fuel to Empty
Fuel Economy
Fuel Rate
Battery Voltage
Coolant Temperature
Intake Air Temperature
Engine Speed (RPM)
Vehicle speed (MPH)
Manifold Pressure (not available on some vehicles)
Engine Load
Throttle Position
Ignition Timing
Open/Closed Loop

A friend at work got a coffee roaster for his birthday. I have not tried any coffee he has roasted yet, but if I like what I taste when he brings me some I think I am going to buy a roaster and start roasting my own. Green coffee beans cost a little less than half of quality roasted coffee, and green coffee will keep for two years. I think I could cover the price of the roaster after about 15 pounds of coffee. This is the roaster my friend has. This website also has a really nice selection of beans.

The batch of beer I bottled on the first of the year turned out really good. It is an APA with all Northern Brewer hops. I think this will be the last of the single-hopped batches I make. Now that I have a feel for what different types of hops contribute and what I like, I will start customizing recipes to suit my own tastes. I also think the APA style, hopped to the higher end of the scale, is going to be my signature beer and what I brew most. When I am in the mood for an IPA I will pick up some at the store or visit Tim-In-Law and drink his homebrew. To get the bitterness (IBU's) just right you have to add the right amount of hops at the right time in the boil. An amazing tool for that is BeerSmith. I used it on this last batch of beer and worked out perfectly.

My standard recipe going forward will be six pounds of light dry malt extract, a pound of crushed crystal malt, and a blend of American hops (Cascade, Simcoe, Columbus, Centennial, etc.) that bring the IBU's to between 40 and 50.

I got back this afternoon (Sunday) from a really nice Thanksgiving holiday with my family. It started Tuesday after getting home from work. I packed up the car and got to bed somewhat early. I wanted to get to sleep earlier but I ended up turning off the lights between 10:00 and 10:30.

I set my alarm for 1:40 AM, showered, made coffee, let the dog out, and started driving around 3:00 AM. This lets me miss all of the holiday drivers and worked out pretty well. I got to Toledo around 9:00 AM.

The new car was great on the highway and I was really able to load it up with stuff. One large greyhound and the requisite lounge area and space for him to standup, his kennel, two suitcases, laptop bag, wort chiller, stainless steel brew kettle, 15 gallon garbage can, 3' long plastic instrument sanitizing trough, and 14 bottles of homebrew.

Took a little power nap once I got to Mom and Dad's and hung out with Dad and my nephew and just relaxed. Mom got home in the late afternoon if I recall and then I followed them to the daycare to pick up my niece and then on to my sister and brother-in-law's place.

We drank homebrew, had snacks and then Tony Packo's (rhymes with smack oh, not taco) hot dogs for dinner. Tim and I made a beer run anticipating the good beer stores would be closed on Thanksgiving Day.

The weekend before Thanksgiving I made a batch of dough, punched it down a few times and then froze it. Thanksgiving Day morning I used it to make hard rolls for dinner. Tim's deep fried turkey was probably the best he's done yet. Every thing else also turned out perfect and was delicious as usual. I know I am biased but I think my family has the best Thanksgiving food!

Tim and Lisa had to work Friday morning and while they were gone the rest of us decorated the house, picked up a cake, and set out presents for Tim's month-early surprise birthday party. We got him everything he needed to start homebrewing!

That night some of their friends came over to give him a birthday present and then we proceeded to eat pizza and drink a lot of good beer and had a great time.

Saturday morning I guided Tim in brewing his first batch of homebrew. It was a Brewer's Best IPA kit and everything went smoothly. It should be ready to drink for Christmas. Afterwards he picked up an extra ounce of hops to dry hop next week when he racks it to the secondary fermenter.

After that we went out to lunch at a neat place in downtown Toledo. Then we went to the homebrew shop to get a few things Tim needs to connect the new Corny keg he got to dispense his homebrew and I got a few hundred bottle caps. After that we went to an army navy surplus store to see if I could find a new parka (I didn't) and then to Anderson's for a wreath for Lisa.

Saturday night we just chilled out and had a blast playing with the kids. Katelyn is at an especially fun age to play with. I also loaded into my car over 150 beer bottles that Tim has been saving for me! He didn't think we would be able to get them all in my car but we did. And they traveled very well. None of them shifted and there was no rattling which I expected a lot of. Now I have to scrub the labels off from over 150 beer bottles. I will be able start to brew more regularly with the extra bottle capacity so I will always have fresh beer waiting in my basement.

I got up early this morning so I could start driving back and try to miss the winter weather that was promised later in the day, and to try and beat everyone else coming back home from the holiday. It worked and I didn't encounter any traffic jams at all.

I unloaded the car as soon as I got home, but didn't do any unpacking, or decide where I am going to store my bottles while they wait to be cleaned and filled. I took a little nap and then showered, set up Mitch's cage and did some general neatening up downstairs. I am going to brush my teeth soon and try to get to bed early in case I need to get up early and shovel snow.

I finally got around to snapping a few pictures of my new car today while I was out doing errands.

It was the first time I put gas into it and I was so thrilled that it only took 8.5 gallons to top it off.






Lots of extra room in the garage now.


Here you can see the window wind deflectors I installed in action. I can be cruising down the road with my window open like that and no rain comes inside.

I got a coupon in the mail today to get a six pack of Pilsner Urquell for $2! My kind of coupon.

Lots of updates to write about over the last few weeks.

Probably the biggest is I had to buy a new (to me) car. The van was pretty sound overall, but I took it in to have a few things fixed and it turned out the repairs were going to be a couple thousands dollars. I have had it for almost nine years and it had 140,000 miles on it so I didn't feel bad about getting rid of it. I definitely got my money's worth out of it. In city diving I was getting around 20 MPG, sometimes less, so I was also very excited to have the excuse to bump up my fuel economy too.

My list of required must-haves was pretty short. I don't think I've seen a car that doesn't have air conditioning in the last decade so that was kind of an assumed requirement. Automatic transmission. It had to have cruise control and it had to be able to haul Mitch, his collapsed cage, a couple big suitcases and a few extra boxes, bags, etc. More than 99% of the time it will just be hauling me around and commuting to work so nothing flashy, reliability was important, and looking to minimize purchase price.

I didn't have a specific fuel economy rating in mind but I was expecting something at least in the high 20's. Obviously low miles and late model is good but also didn't have an exact cutoff in mind. Wanted a stereo system with an audio input jack on the front to plug in my MP3 player but that is something you can always add yourself for not too much time or money.

I loved the Scion xB. It is HUGE inside. However the xB's prior to 2006 or 2007 didn't have cruise control as an option, and the later model xB's had cruise control but they also put bigger engines in them which really dropped the fuel economy; almost to the mileage of the old van! So unfortunately the xB was out.

I test drove a Honda Fit and I was comfortable behind the wheel, but at the same time I felt like I was ducking my head and was being forced to lean to the right away from the side of the car even though I did have enough room. Just something subconsciously didn't work for me. With the back seats folded down it did have a good amount of cargo space, but I could do better.

Long story short I ended up going with a 2007 Toyota Matrix with only 3,400 miles. It is basically a new car. I love it! Very fun to drive especially compared to driving a van for almost the last decade. It feels very big inside for a small car. Tons of room for cargo when the seats are folded down, and the front passenger seat also folds flat so you can get some really long things in the car and still close the hatchback. It is rated at 29/34 MPG but I have not calculated how I am doing so far.

I already bought some wind deflectors for the windows from the WeatherTech factory showroom (no shipping costs!) and love those. I went with this brand because everyone on the internets had good things to say about them AND more importantly they installed without using adhesive tape like a lot of the other brands. I also bought their all weather floor mats for the front. They fit perfectly. I highly recommend their products.

The stock Toyota radio that came with it does not have a front input jack so I have been looking at my options for that but that is not urgent for me. I have also been looking at, and hearing really good things about, the ScanGauge. It plugs into the OBDII computer port of your car and lets you monitor pretty much everything the computer monitors in real time as well report error codes that make the dreaded "Check Engine Soon" idiot light come on. The primary feature I want it for is for keeping an eye on real time and average mileage since my car doesn't display that, but all the other stuff would be really fascinating too.

Enough car stuff. The other big change is my hair style. I have started shaving my head. My forehead has been slowly creeping back to meet my bald spot and I wanted to beat it to the punch. I have gotten mostly positive feedback and I feel pretty comfortable with it.

My Norelco electric razor I've had for probably six or seven years finally died and I replaced it with another Norelco. It performs even better than my first one! This one is designed to be rinsed out under hot water every day so you are always using fresh clean blades. I would buy it again in a second.

I have a three pound pot roast in the slow cooker with potatoes, onions and carrots for dinner tonight.

I have a batch of beer that I need to bottle today. That will bring me up to three batches (15 gallons) that is conditioning in my basement. I've met another homebrewer at work that kegs his beer and doesn't need bottles so he is saving his empties for me so I can get my bottle collection up to four batches worth. Tim-In-Law has also been working on increasing my bottle count. Four batches of bottles is about 200 bottles or eight cases!

I have almost a pound of Centennial, Cascade and Northern Brewer hops in the freezer for upcoming batches. My last two batches have been single hop batches so I can get a feel for what each type of hop contributes. My next batches will probably be an all Cascade an all Northern Brewer batch.

I'm in the process of getting quotes for a new roof on the house. I'm not looking forward to that expense.

I'm going to have to check this place out seeing as how it is just like a mini mall.

I have today off for the Columbus Day holiday which gave me the opportunity to take Mitch to the vet this morning for his annual check-up and shots. I scheduled to take him in Thursday morning to have his teeth cleaned because he is starting to get some gum irritation.

Last night a friend from work invited me over to eat a bunch of game birds he shot. There were just four of us, but he cooked about 15 quail, 15 pheasant, and a couple chuckers.

We started out with about a dozen skewers of pheasant breast on the grill with an Asian soy/sesame marinade and some pheasant legs with barbeque sauce as an appetizer.

Then he brought out the tray of roasted quail. Quail was a tie for my favorite this evening. After a bit he brought a tray with the roasted pheasant and chuckers. These had been dry rubbed with a spicy Cajun spice blend.

While I was still working on my chucker he brought out a large pheasant pot pie. This was the other favorite of the night. He made it in a regular 9" pie pan. Huge.

For dessert they baked a cherry pie. All of it was delicious.

They made three of the huge pot pies and sent one home with me along with a few quail.

I took Mitch along and he seemed to enjoy himself too. They were worried that their young and extremely energetic and non-stop motion German shorthaired pointer hunting dog would be too much for the calm laid back Mitch. They were just fine together.

Everything is in place. Kettle is on the fire coming up to temperature. Steeping grains are in the mesh bag. Yeast pack has been smacked. Liquid malt extract is in a hot water bath. I think I am going to open up another homebrew that I put in the fridge last night and sip that while I am waiting for my water to heat up.

Friday evening and three beers under my belt. Drawing the water I will brew with tomorrow so it can sit overnight and dechlorinate. Will get everything set out that I will need tomorrow so I can get brewing as soon as I have had my coffee and breakfast.

Tried one of my homebrews that I bottled last weekend. It is maltier than I expected but still good. Drinkable. I think another week of conditioning will carbonate it a bit more and bring out some more of the hop bitterness. I used two cans of amber malt extract. Tomorrow I have a can of amber and a can of light. I like the trial and error aspect of this hobby.

I am going to a friend's house Sunday to eat some pheasant he shot. He likes really weak beer, but I will still take a couple homebrews with me even though I don't think he will like them.

Talked to Tim-In-Law for a bit and am jealous of the load of great beer they they have for tonight. I am really interested in trying the Racer 5 IPA they tried and said is awesome.

OK, I have the stereo tuned to 104.3 FM and it is time to go get everything ready for tomorrow morning.

I wasn't quite sure how to keep track of which bottle of homebrew is which, and then I had a good idea: I will write the date I bottled each bottle on the bottle cap with a Sharpie. It is so simple I don't know why I didn't think of it before.

But that didn't take care of the problem of remembering the specifics of each batch (i.e. ingredients, unusual or different techniques that may have changed the outcome, etc.) We bought a little notepad for this, but you can run of space on a page, it can get dropped in a pale of ale, etc. So I had a second follow-up idea to the first idea above: I am going to use this entry to keep track of each batch of beer by bottle date.

I will just keep adding information to this entry rather than adding a new entry with every batch.

---

Brew Log

Brad's Summer APA
Brewed 7/3/09
IBU's: 31

1 lb crystal malt steeped 30 minutes
6 lbs Light Dry Extract
0.60 oz Cascade [5.40 %] (60 min) Hops
0.70 oz Columbus [12.20 %] (60 min) Hops
1.00 oz Amarillo [8.20 %] (5 min)
Safale US-05


Hop Scare IPA (kit from Midwest Homebrewing Supply)
brewed 4/26/2009
1 lb caravienne malt, steeped 30 minutes at 155 degrees
6 lbs liquid gold malt
2 lbs dry light extract
1 oz Warrier hops, 15.4% alpha, 60 min
0.5 oz Amarillo hops, 8.2% alpha, 30 min
0.5 oz Amarillo hops, 8.2% alpha, 15 min
1 tsp Irish moss 15 minutes
2 oz Cascade hops, 5.4% alpha, 4 min
Wyeast American Ale II Activator pack


Bottled 1/2/2009
6 pounds light DME
1 pound crystal malt 60L
norther brewer hops
1 ounce 60 min
1 ounce 40 min
1 ounce 10 min?
1 ounce dry hopped
Safale US-05

Bottled 11/15/08
Brewed on 10/25/2008
1 pound US crystal malt 30 Lovibond steeped 20 minutes at 165 degrees
5.3 pounds DME
1 ounce centennial - 60 minutes
.5 ounce centennial - 40 minutes
.5 ounce centennial - 30 minutes
1 ounce centennial - 15 minutes
1 teaspoon Irish moss - 15 minutes
1 ounce centennial dry hopped into secondary fermentor when racking after first week
2 7 gram packets of Cooper's Ale Yeast pitched dry directly into wort without proofing
Used wort chiller for first time. Cooled down to 70 degrees in about 20 minutes

11/1/2008 – Estimated bottling date of batch brewed on 8/11/2008.
OG 1.050
2.5 ounces Simcoe hops, continuous addition. 0.5 ounces dry hopped in secondary fermenter.
3.3 pounds Briess CBW non-diastatic unhopped golden light LME
3.3 pounds Briess CBW non-diastatic unhopped sparkling amber LME
Steeping grains: 1 pound Briess 60L crystal malt 6 row
1 teaspoon Irish moss - 15 minutes
1 pound Briess victory malt
Wyeast Northwest Ale yeast.
Primed with cane sugar.

Bottled 10/4/2008 – Ad hoc recipe. ~5.5% ABV
6.6 pounds amber LME
0.5 pounds light DME
1 ounce Cascade bittering
0.5 ounce Kent Golding bittering
1.5 ounce Kent Golding flavor
1 pack Munton's dry yeast to the primary, and another pack to the secondary when fermentation stopped.

Aerated the wort this time. Poured hot wort into primary fermenter with a bag of commercial ice.

After one week of bottle conditioning my first impression is that this turned out almost like a hopped up stout. Using all amber extract is too much for my tastes. It is still good though.

Bottled 8/22/2008 – Mead, basic dry. 10.4% ABV 12 pounds mesquite honey, Pasteur Champagne Red Star yeast, acid blend (citric/tartaric/malic)

Bottled 8/10/2008 – First solo batch. Used a Brewer's Best American Micro Style Pale Ale. 1.5 ounces Cascade hops, bittering 1.5 ounces Willamete hops, flavor. Added the yeast before the wort was properly cooled. I think it was about 130 degrees. Added a second packet of yeast to the secondary fermenter when fermentation stopped a few days after racking.

Bottled 6/7/2008 – Batch brewed at Bev-Art

I am officially sick of McCain saying "my friends" in every other sentence.

On the positive side though it makes for a good drinking game.

I have been really interested in trying Anheuser-Bush's first ale (as far as I'm aware) called Budweiser American Ale. I finally saw it in the store yesterday and picked up a six pack right away.

It is easily the best beer AB has ever produced, but it is just an OK beer compared to all of the other great beer out there. The carton says it is dry hopped with Cascade hops but I can just barely detect their aroma, and I detect no hop flavor. The hop bitterness is nice without being too overwhelming for people used to insipid macro lagers.

It wasn't dry, but it also wasn't overly malty or heavy. It had a nice body and mouth feel.

Another nice touch is the bottles have pry off caps rather than twist offs which means I can reuse the bottles for my homebrew. I expected to have to throw them away. A nice surprise.

Finally, a six pack was $7.50. For just $0.50 to a $1.00 more you can buy a really outstanding beer. If it was priced more like their other beers in the $6 range I might be more tempted to pick some up every now and then when feeling the pains of a bad economy, but at that price I don't think it's a beer I will be seeking out.

So overall it is a decent and approachable beer, but nothing too interesting. My hope is it will give people that normally just drink Budweiser-type lagers their first experience of a nice hoppy ale and be a "gateway drug" to the better beers that are out there. I am also hoping it will be showing up on tap in bars and restaurants that normally just have Bud on tap. If that was the best choice and I was feeling like a beer I would order one. If they just had Bud, Miller, etc. I would probably just pass.

I went to the homebrew shop on Sunday to get ingredients to brew an IPA next weekend and I am pretty excited about what I got.

The centerpiece of the batch is three ounces of Simcoe hops plugs! Their alpha acid content is 13.2%.

I also stepped up from dry yeast and got a Smack-pack of Wyeast Laboratories Northwest Ale strain. This is a link to the details of the yeast strain.

For steeping grains I got a pound of 60 Lovibond crystal malt and a pound of victory malt. I tasted a few grains of the victory malt before he crushed it and it has a very pronounced toasty bread taste. Lovibond is a measure of grain's darkness. The higher it is the darker it will make the beer. Crystal malt has a nice sweetness to help offset my Simcoe hops.

Finally I got a 3.3 pound can of amber liquid malt extract (LME) and one can of light LME.

On Saturday I finally bottled the batch of beer that my family drove 4 hours to help me brew 6 weeks ago on August 23, 2008. It is tasting really good and it is going to be really difficult for me to wait until this weekend to try a bottle. Friday after work I will bring a bottle up from my beer cellar and put it in the fridge so it will be ready to inspire me while I am brewing Saturday morning.

As a treat to myself for a productive weekend of yard work and chores I went to Whole Foods Sunday evening to try a new beer.

I picked up a 22 ounce bottle of Dreadnaught Imperial IPA from Three Floyds Brewing Company for $12. It turns out my instincts were good because it is the 17th highest rated beer on Beer Advocate! I didn't end up drinking it because I wasn't 100% in a beer mood and didn't want to waste it. Maybe I will save it for Friday night to enjoy while watching the presidential debates.

I also picked up a six pack of Mad Hatter IPA from New Holland Brewing Company. This is what I ended up having Sunday evening and I loved it! Might be my new favorite. At $8.50 I consider it to be a bargain. I almost walked out with a different six pack but I noticed that they had twist offs and I can't use those to bottle my homebrew, so I picked up my second choice and really lucked out. I can't wait for Tim-In-Law to try it and see what he thinks. I think it will compare well with his favorite Arrogant Bastard.

I've decided it would be better to make one post here rather than countless tearful phone calls to friends and family.

I have been diagnosed with bruxism.

I have been in regular contact with health care professionals and they are doing their best to help me. It is not contagious.

My head is still swimming with what this means, how my life will change, and if people are going to think of me differently.

It would mean the world to me if you see me in the store, at work, etc. to just treat me normally. Tell me about what is going on in your life, how your job is going, what you did over the weekend.. Don't cross the street and pretend you didn't see me. I am still the same person I was yesterday, just with a new cross to bear.

Thank you in advance for your support.

When I first started my journey into homebrewing I thought the goal was to try and make something that tastes close to what your favorite craft brewery makes.

Now I realize your favorite craft brewery's goal is to try and make something that tastes close to what homebrew tastes like.

Quick update: had a follow-up dentist appointment tonight to have a preemptive filling in some deep places that could collect debris. Very minor. She didn't even give me a shot, just a topical anesthetic. She also ground down a couple of points on a couple teeth so my bite meshes better. I could feel the improvement right away. Finally I was also fitted for a Nightguard because she said it looks like a might be grinding my teeth from side to side when I sleep. She said they will call me in a couple of weeks when it is ready to come in for a final fitting.

On the way home I stopped at Office Depot just to see if there is anything I couldn't live without. I couldn't find anything, but on the way out I stopped at the clearance table and found hand held staplers for $2 each, so I bought two.


Then I stopped at the library and got two beer history books and the movie 300.

I sat on the patio and read some of one of the beer books and had a delicious homebrew.

My favorite beer was Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, very respectable beer with an "A-" rating on beeradvocate.com. I think my first solo batch of homebrew I made on the patio is noticeably better than that, even though I made the two yeast mistakes and had to pitch additional yeast halfway through the fermentation. I am very encouraged. I can't wait to taste a sample of my latest batch when I rack this weekend.

Even though I have an awesome dentist and totally trust her I still get nervous and worked up before going in. When it's over I feel exhausted from stressing all day prior to the appointment. Therefore I am already brushed, PJ'd and in bed and it is not even 9:30 PM

Friday afternoon around my lunch break I jokingly sent my brother-in-law (who lives over four hours away) a text message telling him I would be brewing beer Sunday morning and he should come and help me.

To make a long story short about eight hours later mom, dad, sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew rolled into my driveway!

We all went to Portillo's to get some dinner and then went back home. Everyone else went to bed but Tim and I stayed up until a little after 1 AM talking about beer and we sampled 16 of them between the two of us. We have a lot of fun buying a big variety of individual beers and then splitting each one and see what we like and don't like.

Even though I then took a shower and didn't get to bed until 2 AM we were awake and brewing on the patio at 8 AM. I had a good time because that's what I was looking forward to doing all week anyway, and Tim seemed to enjoy it, but I think everyone else just indulged our beer enthusiasm. Thanks guys!

It was humid and getting warmer by the hour so by the time the beer was in the basement starting its fermentation and we got things a little cleaned up I was all hot and sweaty. I took a shower and then we went to Two Brothers Brewing Company for lunch, a few celebratory beers and a brewery tour.

After that we stopped at Binny's and picked up a large bottle of Chimay Blue and an out of this world outstanding large bottle of Avery Maharaja.

By the time we got home the lack of sleep, early start, heat and beer got to us and the guys stayed home and took a little cat nap and the girls drove to our downtown and walked around a bit.

For dinner we got some nice Chinese takeout which hit the spot and then we drank the two bottles of beer from Binny's.

This morning, Sunday, we got up and went to breakfast and then stopped at a local international grocery store and picked up a few fun things. Then we went back home, they had to pack up and they hit the road around 12:30 PM.

Since then I have just been doing little chores: laundry, straightening up, putting away brewing gear, etc. It was a really fun weekend that seemed to go too fast. I think part of the fun was that it was so last minute and spontaneous.

Somewhat related: last week I chilled one of the beers from my first solo batch and it seemed very light in body. Almost no mouth feel, but the flavor was good. I didn't care because it was my first batch and didn't expect it to be perfect. Thursday I brought another beer upstairs and put it in the fridge. While waiting for the family to show up I thought I would drink the now two-week-conditioned beer so the family wouldn't have to make polite comments about it. To my surprise the extra week of conditioning turned it into a super star! It was so good I immediately put eight of them on ice so they would be ready when they showed up after their drive, and I brought 6 more up and put them in the fridge before going to bed. Yeah beer!

The batch Tim and I brewed Saturday morning seems to be doing fantastic. The wort tasted good, and the piney hops smell that is coming out of the bubbling air lock now is just amazing. My original gravity was 1.060.

After the boil was done I added 10 pounds of store-bought ice per Alton Brown and it brought the temperature of the wort down to 70 degrees almost instantly. Great tip.

For aeration I used a half gallon plastic pitcher and scooped up water from my dechlorination bucket and then dumped it back in from about 6 feet up and did that for a few minutes and then added that water to the wort to bring it up to 5 gallons. I did not actually aerate the wort for fear of it oxidizing. So far the yeast seem to be digging it.

My plan is to brew my next batch of beer this Sunday morning. I wanted to do it Saturday but it is going to be hot, humid, and probably rainy. I have all of the ingredients I will need. Here is the list:

1 pound Gambrinus honey malt – crushed

3.3 pounds Northwestern Amber Liquid Malt Extract (LME)
3.3 pounds Briess Sparkling Amber LME

1 ounce Centennial hops (9.6% alpha acid)
2 ounce Kent Goldings hops (5.0% alpha acid)

Muntons' yeast

I also have a few pounds of Briess Pilsen light dried malt extract (DME). I am going to add some to the batch to see if it will give me extra body, but I am not sure how much I will add yet. Probably between 8 and 16 ounces, but I have to do some research. I will also use DME rather than priming sugar when it is time to bottle.

I will use all of the Centennial hops and half an ounce of the Kent Goldings hops for 60 minutes of bittering, and the remaining 1.5 ounce of Kent Goldings hops during the last 5 minutes of the boil for flavor and aroma.

For those keeping track I got the Briess Sparkling Amber LME and Briess Pilsen light DME in Toledo. The rest I got at Two Brothers Brewing Company.

I am kind of following the proportions that my first kit had, but not necessarily the ingredients. The kit had two cans of light LME, whereas this batch is amber, so it will be a darker beer and possibly sweeter. I think I will have an extra half ounce of hops more than the kit, but that should be OK because of the extra sweetness, plus I like hops.

I am just using dried yeast ($1 or $2) and not liquid yeast ($8) because I am still not confident yet, and if I screw up I don't want to waste money on premium yeast. If this one turns out good the following batch will have liquid yeast.

I'm looking forward to it! I will try to get all of my chores out of the way on Saturday so I can dedicate Sunday to beer and brewing.

I think I am going to buy this phone just because opening the box is so cool!

We bottled our first solo batch of beer 6 days ago and I couldn't wait a full week before trying a bottle. It turned out really good! I think it is on par with the batch we did with supervision at the beer class. It has less carbonation than the supervised batch because of pitching the yeast improperly, but it still gave me a little beer burp. I can't wait to see how it tastes after another week or two. Here is the obligatory video I took of the first pour.

Needle Nose thought my tool box was as good a place as any to rest his amazingly heavy head.

This is how I start sanitizing my beer equipment on brewing, racking or bottling days. This was taken on a racking day.

I have already added an ounce of iodophor to the carboy and am now adding 5 gallons of water. This will sanitize (not sterilize) the inside of the carboy which is what the beer will be racked into from the primary fermenter.



After the carboy is filled up I siphon it into a plastic container we got just for sanitizing. Doing this will sanitize the inside of the hose, and then I drop the whole hose into the container to sanitize the outside of it. We also put all of the equipment that will come into contact with the beer into the container.

I checked the specific gravity of the mead and beer tonight and the alcohol content of the mead is about 9.9% and the beer only changed a little bit since the last time I checked and it is between 4.2% and 4.4%.

The beer hasn't changed much because the fermentation really slowed down after I checked it last and I didn't add more yeast until just a few days ago on Friday. It took a couple days for the yeast to really get going again. Because of the way the beer is bubbling now I think it should be ready for bottling by this weekend.

You have to sanitize everything that comes into contact with your beer. The easiest way is to mix up five gallons of iodine solution in the fermenter and throw all of your equipment in there. That works great for most of my stuff but there are a few things that stick up well above the top of the bucket. Also on nights like tonight when I just need my thief and hydrometer it is wasteful to mix up a full five gallons of solution, but the thief is one of the long things that stick out over the top of the bucket.

Well I had a brainstorm and came up with the perfect solution. I went to the hardware store and bought one of those plastic troughs you use to wet wallpaper rolls. It cost $3 and one gallon of iodophor solution is the perfect amount to adequately cover everything. Here is a picture of it in action.



The thief is in the trough being sanitized and it is what I use to pull a sample out of the carboys for testing.

On the counter next to the trough is a racking cane. I don't use it because I bought an autosiphon, but the cane came with the bottle filler so I keep it just in case.

The next thing on the counter is the autosiphon. This is a racking cane inside of a tube with an airtight seal between the two. You pull the racking cane out and then push it back in and it automatically starts your siphon going. You don't have to suck on the end of the tube to get it going and contaminate things. HIGHLY recommended.

The last item is a food grade high temperature plastic stirring paddles for stirring the wort in the brew kettle.

I took this picture a couple weeks ago after I racked the beer from the primary fermenter to the carboy. The stuff in the bottom are the dissolved hop pellets and yeast hulls. The tube is the autosiphon with the flexible tubing attached to it and is of course what I used for the transfer.

Here is a picture of our mead and ale fermenting. The mead is in the carboy on the left and ale is on the right.



Notice the clarity of the mead. Last Wednesday I went downstairs to check on it and it still looked like lemonade. Completely opaque. I went downstairs on Friday and it was totally clarified! What a surprise. They have both been fermenting for three weeks. The beer is probably a little over 4% alcohol and when we checked the mead a week ago it was 8%, but the as vigorously as it has been fermenting I'll bet it could be over 10% now. I plan to check both within the next few days.

I didn't think a movie from my digital camera would have enough light or resolution to show the massive amounts of tiny bubbles that continuously rise to the surface day and night, but you can actually see it pretty well. The sound in the background is the air conditioner running. The mead is actually pretty quiet. At the end you can see a bubble of gas escaping in the air lock at the top.

I racked my beer again yesterday and checked the specific gravity. It went down only another point in the last week, but it tastes really good. It will still be very drinkable, just not as high of an alcohol content as it is supposed too. Actually that might make it a good summer beer! It is still around 4% ABV. I plan on bottling it next weekend. I think I am going to put a little yeast nutrient and yeast energizer in the fermenter today to see if that might help things along a bit.

We also racked our mead and checked its SG. It is at about 8% alcohol now! We drank the 6 ounce sample we needed to check the SG and it was so good we pulled another glass to drink. If it tastes that good now I think it will be amazing in a few months. It has a beautiful light straw color. We used Champaign yeast because we wanted a dry wine rather than a sweet one, and the Champaign taste is coming through nicely. We were going to make half of this batch still and half sparkling, but we think we might make it all sparkling now. Still not 100% sure yet, but that's what makes it fun.

After we took care of our 10 gallons of deliciousness we took the Two Brother's Brewery tour. I've done it once before with my parents but Amy had not taken it. Afterwards we were sitting in the tap house and I was trying a Cane & Ebel and think I have fallen in love with Simcoe hops. They are a fairly new variety introduced in 2000. I haven't seen them at my local homebrew shop and I think right now they are available mostly to commercial brewers. If I can't find them for my next batch I think I will try Cascade hops because I have read people describe Simcoe hops as Cascade on steroids.

The brewery also has a homebrew shop and I picked up 3.3 pounds of amber liquid malt extract for my next batch of beer and Amy got a large can of sterilized peach puree for an upcoming batch of mead. I think for the other half of the malt in my next beer I will use a powdered malt extract, but I don't know if I want that to be an amber or a light. I still have to do some more research. I am thinking about buying a little bit more than I need for the batch and use the extra as priming sugar rather than corn sugar.

If you describe the homebrew process to somebody it sounds like a lot of work and complexity, and it is if you had to do it all at one time. But because brewing and racking and bottling all happen on different days separated each by several weeks it is really not that bad. I actually look forward to each process. Each process takes about two hours from start to finish. Brew day probably takes a little longer because you have to boil your wort for one hour, but that is more just relaxing than actually working.

I had to go into work today for a little bit to check on a database that had been updated yesterday, and Amy is in Kansas to see a patient for the day. I am going to start some laundry, put away some brewing gear from yesterday, and do some puttering yard work. Don't know if I will cut the grass, but I plan on at least spraying and/or digging some weeds, pick up dog poop, light pruning, and maybe organize the garage a little bit. My aquarium has not had a partial water change in WAY too long. I should do that today too. Oh yeah, a bike ride would also be a good idea. The weather here is perfect today.

Just got back from a 9.8 mile bike ride. Had a Smithwick's and a Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA (I'm feeling good!) I'm going to take a shower and then check the specific gravity of the beer we brewed last week. I did two things wrong with it. 1) I did not aerate the wort and 2) pitched the yeast while the wort was too warm. The first day the airlock was bubbling almost continuously. After that it was bubbling about every 3 minutes or 3.5 minutes which I think seems on the slow side. I think it stopped bubbling today. Checking the specific gravity will tell me how far along it is to being beer. I might be surprised and it is already beer. It could go either way. We'll see.

I got this clipping in the mail today from my Dad. I HAVE to try this place. Any restaurant that boasts multiple menu items with "1 pound of bacon" in the same ad has to be good, right?


click on image to enlarge

Last week I went for a 9.7 mile bike ride and tonight I rode for 11.7 miles. My legs could have gone more, but my butt was getting saddle-sore.

Today Mitch is a big boy and is 5 years old! In honor of his birthday I thought I would post a video of him I took a few weeks ago but never got around to posting.

I was trying to get him riled up to play by making growling sounds and thumping the bed. It works sometimes, but this time all he did was stick his tongue out of the side of his mouth. I was laughing so hard I couldn't keep the camera steady.



My beer was going gangbusters the first day, but today it slowed to a bubble every 30 to 40 seconds. I did some looking on some homebrew forums and it might be because I did not aerate the wort enough before I pitched the yeast. I also added the yeast when the wort was possible too warm. You are supposed to get the temperature down close to 70 degrees, but I added it when it was 105 degrees. I hope to rack it to a carboy Friday are Saturday. I think I read somewhere that doing that can sometimes give the yeast a little nudge to start working again. I will also measure the specific gravity again to see how far along it is. (i.e. how much of the sugars have been converted to alcohol)