Sorry for the downtime. Been experiencing hosting issues and have had to switch to GoDaddy hosting for the time being.
However, I lost most of the comments. Not much I can do about it.
Category: General Spew
Manny the Manatee
The news over the last week has been somewhat entertaining around downtown Memphis…
It started out with a couple of fishermen seeing something on Monday in the Wolf River Harbor (slackwater harbor that’s connected to the Mississippi river here downtown). Turned out that it was a manatee.
The TV stations even got it live on video.
So officals cut off boat access to the harbor and called people in Florida to try to figure out WTF to do about it.
On Tuesday, they became concerned about it being too cold for the manatee to survive. Activists got involved and got people from Sea World to come up and check it out.
They got here Wednesday, and became concerned as well. So they decided to attempt a rescue on Thursday morning.
Somewhere along the way, it picked up the rather lame name of “Manny”.
But on Wednesday, the manatee became trapped between a couple of barges, and there was naturally concern all around. They ended up deciding to wait until Thursday anyway.
Then Thursday rolls around, and they can’t find the damn thing.
They tried again this morning, with no luck. Now here it is this afternoon, and they are searching lakes and such nearby, with no success. For four days this giant sucker has been rolling around the harbor, then gives them the slip right when they actually want to find him.
Many of the above links have video links on the bottom left, if you want to watch the news reports.
Oh, the humanity!
Nooooooooooooooo!!!
Beer drinkers beware: 4 percent of U.S. hops crop burns
Seriously, I didn’t know that the US produced 24 percent of the world’s hops. It’s a damn shame. I hope it doesn’t hurt the brewers any. If it does, it’ll probably hit the microbrewers hardest, which would be the true tragedy.
Hefeweizen goodness
I finally chilled a few liters of the Hefeweizen I made a couple months ago. Had some last night. Even picked up some actual lemons at the supermarket in preparation.
The result: It’s good. Real, real good.
I may have to go buy the brew shop and pick up a bigger fermenter vessel and some actual bottles. It came out very tasty. Just the right amount of flavor and no nasty aftertaste like, say, Paulander Hefeweizen. The amount of hops was just right, the cloudiness was perfect as long as I didn’t pour off the yeast, and I’m sure using the correct type of liquid yeast made some kind of difference. All I know is that it was way, way better than my last attempt at a wheat beer.
In fact, the only Hefe I’ve ever had that beat this homebrew one was the Schalfly Hefeweizen at their brewhouse in St. Louis.
So anyway, I’m probably going to try to perfect this particular beer. If I can find the receipe I used, that is. I’ll probably try to get some base ingredients instead of some of the normal canned stuff like the malt extracts and such, and make it up from scratch. Help me learn the process a bit better.
Mr. Beer Mishap
So I pull out the keg the other day to bottle the Blackberry Brew that I’ve been fermenting for a couple of weeks, and what do I discover? The keg damn near exploded, that’s what.
Like I’ve said in earlier posts, the screw top system seems to have a few drawbacks. For one thing, the level of tightening that you need to use is questionable. I appearantly overtightened the lid, and the result was that the keg was overpressurized. Given that it is a fruit based beer, there’s a lot of fermentation going on, which means a lot of gas released. With it too tight, the gas couldn’t easily escape the keg and the keg was bulging and bent out of shape. Fortunately, it didn’t actually burst, but it was indeed pressurized, as I discovered when removing the lid and hearing the fizzzzzzz sound it made.
The beer was fine and I was able to bottle it easily enough, but the keg is damaged to the point where I really can’t use it any more. It also did some damage to the tap mechanism, which is not surprising considering the quality of the mechanism anyway.
I’ve changed my next club order to get a new keg, along with a 2 liter growler. The keg is only $10, so it’s not a big loss or anything, still, it is a bit annoying. I think I’ll keep using the Mr. Beer keg for smaller batches, but I’m definitely going to go buy a more sturdy fermenting vessel and make some larger batches as well. I’ll probably only continue to use the Mr. Beer for experimentation purposes, since I do find that an 8 liter batch is darn near perfect in terms of speed. You can have a decent beer made from start to finish in a month with that quantity, whereas the next bigger size (5 gallons) would take at least 3 months or so.
All in all, given the quality of the keg in such circumstances, and the non-dishwasher safeness of it, I can only recommend the Mr. Beer setup for a) people new to home-brewing and wanting to learn easily, and b) people wanting an easy way to quickly experiment with new brews and styles. The lack of a proper airlock with a ball valve (to prevent contamination) just makes the Mr. Beer keg suitable only for very short fermentation times. 2 weeks, maximum.
Just be sure not to overtighten the lid.
You’re On Notice
Word from the scene
Okay, so I go out tonight mainly to fuel my hunger and thirst. While I have plenty of stash packed away to fuel the thirst, I’m sadly low on foodstuffs. It’s been an interesting couple hours.
First, I head over to Wang’s. I’d just like to state, for the record, that this is the best named Chinese place, ever. Forget the play on word places, Wang’s doesn’t mess around when it comes to suggestive names. Wang’s.
Wang’s is right up the street, less than a block away. They used to be over at #1 Beale, but that old building got demolished (nobody seems to really know why), and now they’re over at the corner of Main and Gayoso. They’ve been there for a few months, I’ve just been too lazy to stop by. And I must say, their new digs? NICE. They have possibly the best stage I’ve ever seen in a restaurant. I may drop back over in an hour or so to hear whatever band is playing, because they did not skimp one bit on the sound system, or the stage. It’s huge, takes up like a quarter of the place, and looks like they could put on one hell of a show.
Anyway, I get some chinese food and a couple of chinese beers, and notice that the place is practically empty. This naturally concerns me, because I like the places around here to do well. Doing well means they stick around which means more fun for me, because I ain’t leaving anytime soon.
So I finish my meal, pay the extremely reasonable tab, and head over to Sleep Out Louie’s, or as Paul calls it, the Union Avenue Branch Office. They have a couple playing in there that I had not heard before. Pam and Terry or some such thing. I cannot recall. In any case, they’re pretty good. I listen to them a while, while playing some NTN Trivia and drinking mixed drinks, since I’m not quite trusting their beer dispenser system yet. Seriously, I love Louie’s, and I make it a point to go every Sunday morning if possible, but the beer taps need a major overhaul. First they had to clean the lines, then the fridges went out so it was warm. And IMO, it was never really cold to begin with. Still, they have very cheap liqour, so I tend to stick to the mixed drinks and we get along just fine.
In any case, Louie’s is dead too. There’s like three tables full, and nobody at the bar, and this is unusual for 7:30 on a Saturday. So I pay my cheap tab, and head to the Flying Saucer, (aka Paul’s Second Avenue Branch Office). And they’re practically empty too!
I have one beer, then ask around, and appearantly there’s not only a baseball game going on tonight, but some kind of concert. Looking around the intarweb, appearanly Widespread Panic played last night and is playing again tonight. I had no idea. That’s what I get for working hard all week and not paying attention. Not that I’d go and see them, but still, I like to be in the loop on this sort of thing.
So here I am at home, enjoying a Red Bull and Ketel, and typing this worthless drivel. Oh well. With any luck, Mandy will stop by later in the week on her way to NC, although I am doubtful at this stage. It’s kinda out of her way and all. Yes, this is a blatent attempt to guilt Mandy into showing up anyway. 
Enjoy the links.
Fireworks tip for the future
Little tip for those of you into the whole “explosives” thing…
When having a bottle rocket war, buy the cheap ones. Yes, the good ones have a more reliably burning fuse and thus are easier to aim and fire correctly, however they also have a much more powerful thrust to them, and thus the impact is more likely to leave serious wounds. I was pretty much pwned by my brother at our little rocket-fest last Tuesday, and the wound has turned into a fairly ugly scabbed over hole in my shoulder, along with some colorful bruising around it.
This is all from the impact of the rocket, mind you. The rocket itself rebounded off behind me and exploded a good distance away, as they always tend to do. Usually the cheap ones will have just enough thrust to tap you and possibly to burn your T-Shirt, however these packed a bit more of a wallop. They even bruised my leg through my blue jeans, although not nearly as badly and that wound has now healed entirely. The shoulder wound is recovering much more slowly and with a nice yellow jaundicey color patch for a bruise.
But despite my disfigurement, I had a good weekend. Got my drink on at Sleep Out Louie’s. Nice place on the weekends, especially with brunch until 2. I love those crab meat omelets. Also finally got some shopping done and all that jazz. Looking forward to September though. 
More about Amazon Grocery
Back when I wrote about Amazon Grocery the first time, I also placed a couple orders.
I’d been wanting a particular book, and my Amazon Prime trial membership had just expired (and I didn’t feel that “free” shipping was worth $70+ a year), so I started looking for stuff I needed which they had.
What I found I was running low on was toilet paper.
A bit of searching and I ran across some TP on Amazon. Plus the price was just right to make both my book and the TP get free shipping. Perfect.
So off my order went, for my book and for Scott Toilet Paper. Excellent.
It took it about 10 days to get here. Good thing I was only running low and not out of the stuff. But the book is good, and the TP.. Well… It’s paper. I don’t expect much out of my TP.
Nice handy dispenser box, I must say. Although I did get some odd looks from the apartment people when I picked up my shipment of what was clearly a bulk box of toilet paper. Hey, I looked right back at ‘em. A man’s gotta wipe.
Plus, this is rapid-dissolving, supposedly, so no more damn clogged up toilets. 
I still don’t see myself using this Amazon Grocery stuff for anything more than filler items for when I order books and such, to get up to the free shipping amount, but still, at least now those filler items will be useful stuff that I happen to need. Not sure where I’ll put these bulk items though.
Sweet Zombie Jesus!!
The impossible has occurred. The robot devil is skiing in hell right now.
Futurama has been picked up by Comedy Central! Whooo!
From Digg:
Comedy Central has ordered 13 new episodes of the animated series that Fox canceled two years ago. Billy West, Katey Segal and other stars signed deals this week to return the show to TV. In getting a second life, “Futurama” is following the path taken by “Family Guy,” which also found post-cancellation success on DVD and cable reruns.
Excellent. Love that show.
