Memorial Day

Like last year and the year before that, we went up to Nickbot's for Memorial Day.  This time, there was uncooperative weather, Nick's shitty ankle, and unfortunately Brent couldn't make it up (huge bummer).  But nevertheless and needless to say, great times were still had.  While enjoying the natural beauty of Michigan, we drank copious amounts of homebrew, microbrew, and macrobrew, failed horribly in sneaking up on the wives via canoe, discovered the humor of worn out ankles, and I witnessed Cathy shoot a rifle and handgun for the first time in her life.  Great success.  For whatever reason, I didn't take many photos this year but I did memorialize this:

"It's not impossible. I used to bullseye womp rats in my T-16 back home, they're not much bigger than two meters."

Birds, Brews, and Shrooms

As always, visiting my parents was a good time. Notable events? I witnessed two juvenile Mourning Doves fledge. Split a six pack of homebrew with my dad. And was shown an interesting little thing in the yard:

Morel? Maybe, but I'm not touching it. I mean, I'm an adventurous and fungi, morel less, but the thought of just picking/eating this kinda scares the shiitake out of me. I just don't know how to accurately identify these things, and there's really not mushroom for error. Hey-oohhh.

Spent Grain Dog Treats

One more use for a brew's spent grain: dog treats.  The ones I make are actually fit for human consumption, but I wouldn't consider them much of a treat for humans.  An example of the difference between being edible and eatable, I suppose.  The dogs love them though.

Left a bunch with the parents when we dropped the dogs off this past weekend.

Cake Pops

Another one of Cathy's captivatingly cute confectionery creations:

Photographically featured fancy foodstuff feat.

ALLITERATION IS BOSS.

Overcast with a Chance of Morning Brewing

Had a chilly and misty weekend. Felt like the sky was oh-so-gently pissing on Chicago for the past 48 hours. So what did I do? Well, I woke up early on Saturday and brewed of course (I seem to be brewing a lot more than I was anticipating this spring).

Took another stab at an American pale ale, the style of the first batch I ever made. I imagine I'll be drinking it in warmer weather, so I went for the following characteristics: light malt profile, dry finish, low alcohol, low esters, moderately high hop presence. I'm thirsty already.

Hmmm...looks like a good day to brew.