Clouseau: Were you expecting one? A beaum?

Finished cleaning up around 11-ish last night and caught some shuteye. Woke up at 6 and had to check on things. Recipe said fermentation should start around 24hrs or so after pitching so I was completely unprepared for what awaited me in the brewery.

The fermenter was err..engorged and had become a beer bomb. It was foaming and making high pressure sounds as foam escaped around the rim of the lid and bucket. It looked a bit like an egg. Carefully removed the lid of the air lock which shot the airlock and a cup of foam several feet into a pile of junk that desperately needs to be cleaned. Vigorous fermentation achieved! I used a 3/8" drillbit and bored out the little pinholes in the airlock cap to let the pressure and foam come out while I was at work. It was a steady eruption. Any liquid I put in the airlock got blown right back out. Slightly worried about contamination, but at that steady pressure and foaming, little chance of something getting into the hole. I have succeeded in developing yet another hobby resulting in massive CO2 generation.

Went to Keystone as soon as they opened and got some advice and a length of hose to use as a blowoff and ran home at lunch to implement. Bubbles coming vigorously about every second through blowoff. Who needs solar? We should turn turbines with beer! Crisis averted. My house emits the glorious aroma of hops. I am digging this.

Thought for the day: What's the terrapass offset for explosive fermentation of an American Brown Ale? I wonder if they sell them for my 5 bean chili as well now that I think about it.

Smells like a brewery

October 28 2008 found the home brewery taken out of mothballs with a brown ale. This was the first in probably 15 years and the process wasn't bad at all. I had recently done 2 batches of wine with Bob and Kathy that need to be posted but not any beer in a while.

I got the recipe from Mother Earth News. Followed all directions and OG was 1.050, though temp was around 90 when I took it. Had an odd response from the digital thermometer after leaving the probe in the 1 step sanitizer solution for about a half hour. It was reading temps about 10 degrees off after being spot on all night. Pretty uneventful all in all. No boilovers, and I really liked the muslin boiling bags. Cooled the wort out on the front porch and just got too tired around 10:30 to wait any more so pitched the yeast and sealed it up. Temp read 101 degrees in the wort and 80 for an air temp which was really 70. Corrected OG should be 1.054 according to Brew Calcs. Recipe below, except I only used 1 packet of yeast per Keystone Homebrew Supply suggestion and the centennial hops were pellet form , not whole leaf.

3 ounces 60L (Lovibond) crystal malt
2 ounces chocolate malt
2 ounces biscuit malt
1 ounce 550L black malt
6 pounds Muntons plain light dry malt extract (DME)
1 ounce whole leaf ‘Cascade’ hops
1 ounce whole leaf ‘East Centennial’ hops
2 packets Windsor Ale yeast (or other dried ale yeast)

T minus a-lot

Got a camera, love it. Added some new roughage in the form of leaves to Pyle and turned it a bit. Do dry brown grass clippings count as greens or browns???

Strike!

My 5.5 yr old princess went bowling for the first time. Great family outing. She nearly beat me in the first game and rolled a strike. That chinese buffet did not see our family coming.

Day started with a trip to see the circus. It was pretty cool and princess E loved it. May I please interject that $10 cotton candy should come with jail time for the purveyor?

Pyle!

So, I decided to increase my Gomer score and start a compost pile. It has been brewing for a while now and it is lame to just not do it.

Dimensions are approx 5x5. Used a pile of grass clippings dumped from the summer that were very, very dry and the clipping from today that had a lot of leaves mixed in with them.

Went to take a picture of it for a day 1 shot and the camera won't turn on. Green light just blinks once and that's it. Looks like another unplanned expense in the immediate future. I love newegg..

Today is the Bottom

Today, both brother J and I have indepentantly declared a bottom in the stock market. Jumped into so several positions SPY, IJT and IJS. This slide has gone on quite long enough. I have decided to end it personally by providing support at 850 on theS&P with a massive cash infusion to the market of $500. Hey, it's not helicopter Ben and the T.A.R.P., but it worked.