Broken Bottle Blog

Advantages of a laptop #53: You can blog while you brew. Man I love this laptop. It’s great, not only because I can entertain myself with the internet while I brew, but I can keep the recipe on screen. Also, I can keep my homebrew log on the laptop and update while I brew. Brewing an Oatmeal stout today, I try to brew this every year around the Holidays and my birthday, so I’ll be on par for that. I was planning on getting two batches ready for my B-day, but don’t have time today, maybe next week. Here’s the recipe:

11/16/02
Oatmeal Stout, Extract

Ingredients:

6 lbs. dark malt extract
1 lb. flaked oats (oatmeal)
1 lb. six row malt
1 lb. dark crystal malt 140L
1/2 lb. roasted barley
1/4 lb. black patent malt
1 oz. kent golding hop pellets 5.3% (bittering)
1/2 oz. willamettes hop pellets 5.1% (flavoring)
1/2 oz. willamettes hop pellets 5.1% (finishing)
wyeast #1084 irish ale 11/5/02
3/4 cup priming sugar
5 gallons water

Procedure:

1. Smack yeast pack
2. Steep grains in 4 gal. water until boil.
3. Add extract and bring to rolling boil.
4. Add bittering hops, boil 60 mins.
5. Add flavoring hops in last 10 mins. of boil, boil 5 mins.
6. Add finishing hops in last 5 mins of boil.
7. Steep finishing hops 5 mins.
8. Pour into first fermenter, check gravity reading and pitch yeast.
9. 4 days later, transfer to carboy.
10. At 2 weeks transfer to bottles. Add priming sugar, check final
gravity.
11. Leave in bottles 2 weeks.
12. Drink.

O.G.: 1.062
F.G.: 1.022
Alcohol%: 5.4%
Results:Fucking good, make more as soon as possible!!!

I think I’ll start a homebrew page too, and put all my recipes in there. Happy Brewing.

How hard could it be?

Kinky friedman is running for governor of Texas in 2006 as a third party candidate, he’s not an official candidate yet, he has to submit 45,405 signatures in March, but he has 30,000 people signed up now. In a recent Zolgby poll he got 21% of a poll of “likely voters”, that being voters that voted in the last election for our governor, more than any third party gubernatorial candidate has had a year before the election. I think he has some good ideas, better than the Republican Rick Perry we have now, I haven’t really checked into the leading Democratic candidate yet (who got about the same % of the poll that Kinky did), but probably won’t make a decision yet, at least until the hardcore campaigning starts. We’ll see what unfolds. Oh, did I mention he has his own line of salsa.

Well, I got my laptop, it was a trying experience but I got it. So, I’m writing this wirelessly from my living room, and it rocks! Microcenter opened at 6 am and I was there about 5:45 and the line was all the way around the building almost in to the Wal-Mart parking lot next door. Luckily they had plenty (170) of the one I wanted, and most people were going for another model. I didn’t get out of there until 8:30 am because part of the low price was a rebate for signing up for a Microcenter credit card, which took an hour to process, but I got approved for $6400. Of course EVERYONE was signing up for it, it was hectic. I got a Winbook A210, 40gb drive, 256 ram, dvd/cd-rw drive, only drawback is it doesn’t have integrated wireless connectivity, part of the reason everyone was going for a different model, but they also had a USB wireless adapter for free after rebate. So I got that to get me on the wireless network here. Roger and his mother also got one too. She left it with Roger to set-up, so we actually have five computers at our house right now. Roger is stoked about his, he’s actually at a bar right now sucking up some wi-fi and playing poker online. It’s crazy because I’m chatting with him over Instant messenger too, what is the world coming too.

It’s belated but Happy Thanksgiving everyone! What are you thankful for? Went over to the parents for the usual Thankgiving fare, turkey, dressing, the works! Tomorrow it’s shopping time, yes I’m gonna brave the early morning crowds to get the sweet deals. Hopefully getting a laptop for $299 from Microcenter. Roger is gonna try to get one from Circuit City for $199, his is a better deal obviously, but I think the crowds are gonna be a bitch. I think the crowds at a computer only store will be more forgiving then Circuit City, plus the Microcenter deal is until the fourth, so less I gotta have it now mentality. Wish me luck!

Went out last night with my bro to get his new XBOX 360, he had it reservered at Gamestop so he didn’t have to wait in line for hours like some. The line at the local Best Buy was 200 deep, and they’d been there since Sunday. Anyway, Gamestop had a nice scene going on, the Mad Croc girls were there dancing around to drum beats. Mad Croc is energy gum, and it is the worst tasting gum ever created, gum is not suppposed to taste bitter. There were fresh cookies, and prizes every 15 minutes. I actually won T-shirt! He got his XBOX no problem, and has it set up now, can’t wait to play it. Needless to say I’m tired tonight, so it’s off to bed early.

Went out with Nicole Friday night and decided to try a new place to eat, so we went to Pluckers on lower Greenville. Just your basic wing joint, but they had a few interesting things I wanted to try like fried Macoroni and cheese, and Dr. Pepper wing sauce. The Macoroni wasn’t great but wasn’t bad, basically just a small rectangular “cake” of macoroni with batter around it. We didn’t get the Dr. Pepper wing sauce on our wings, but the waitress was nice enough to bring us a couple wings with the sauce on it. I wasn’t bad actually, I thought it would taste like the Jack Daniels sauce they have at Fridays, and that’s kinda what it tasted like, except they added something to make it alittle spicy. Stayed there for a few beers, and Nicole presented me with a card, just a quick note, I won’t repeat what it said, but it was sweet.

After that we decided to head up the street to Ben’s Half Yard House for some more drinks. Nicole and I used to hang out at this place all the time, so it was like the good old days, we even sat at the same table! It was the usual fare, Jack and Cokes for Nic, Guinness pints for me, and good conversation. This was the first time in a while that I’ve got to hang out with her without any other friends around, so we got to have a really good talk. As I mentioned in a previous post, I didn’t know if I was still at best friend status, but I was reassured that I was very much so. Which made my day!

The night countinued back at my house, where there was wine and more good converation, until about four in the morning, wow! I don’t think Nicole gets the credit she deserves sometimes, she’s such a remarkable person, I can’t believe I know someone like her, it’s a blessing. Hopefully I’ll see her again soon.

Clark, Texas recently voted to change thier name to Dish, Texas, in exchange for ten years free Dish network service, for all 125 residents. I predict they become one of the fattest cities soon.

Got some pictures and videos up from Nascar. Pictures are in the Photo Gallery. Video is of the end of the race, didn’t have much disk space to record much video. Enjoy.

Happy Birthday, dude. I can’t remember if it was today or Yesterday. Hope you have a good one.

It’s suprising that there are no drivers, that I know of at least, sponsored by hearing aid companies. Nascar is LOUD, and not just the cars but the whole experience. First there are generators; about 90-95% of the campers have RV’s and there aren’t electric hookups, so everyone has a generator running. There was a 10pm ban on generator use but that didn’t stop some, many let them run 24/7. Which seemed like a waste of gas to keep your RV a/c on while at the 3 hour race, but then again if you have a hundred thousand dollar RV you can afford it. Second, the low flying helicopters and airplanes. The traffic, news, and tourist copters started flying about 10 am, circling and circling and circling the area. They were going pretty much all day. Also, airplanes towing banners were doing the same, even one advertising a motocross race the same time as the Nascar race, smart. Then the cars, which is the good kind of loud (insert Tim Allen grunt here), we were about 3/4 of a mile from the track and we could hear them during practice, over all the aforementioned noise. Once inside it was a different story, you literally had to shout to hear each other, it was awesome. Took a few videos, I’ll try to get them posted soon. But it doesn’t do the sound justice.

We got our tickets because the race was scheduled the same weekend as opening day of deer season, and many people thougth that was more important. Four tickets, Thursday thru Sunday for $175, face value was $238, for each person.

We get there Thursday morning and set up camp, we were hardcore and tent camped the whole time. Not much goes on on Thursday, went to the track and checked out some Nascar truck practice. came back and cooked food and drank some beer until we went to sleep.

Woke up to the helicopters Friday morning, fired up the grill for some bacon and eggs. The Fort Worth Star Telegram brought newspapers to every campsite each morning for free, sweet deal! Read the paper for awhile then headed to the track to catch the qualifying for Saturday and Sunday’s races, Ryan Newman got the pole, but screwed himself. Qualifying consists of two laps to get your best time, but if you get a fast time the first lap you have the option of waiving the second lap. Well, Newman set the pole his first lap, and got greedy and went for the second lap and blew a tire and hit the wall. You can keep your position as long as you don’t modify the car before the start of the race, well, if you wreck you have to modify it. So he went to the back of the field. Friday night was the truck race, the trucks are mostly up and comers trying to get to the Cup cars, so it was exciting. A little more paint swapping, crashes, rookie mistakes, things like that. Todd Bodine won. Got back to camp and some neighbors had pulled in a trailer next to ours, so we partied with them most of the night.

Saturday started the same, went to watch the Busch series race, fairly uneventful, Kevin Harvick won it. Saturday night is the big party night, and we got a little crazy. Some friends of ours came out to camp with us, and some girls camping close by brought thier beer bong over. Roger took two hits off it, and ended up puking right after. Ended the night by burning anything flammable in the BBQ grill, including full tiki torches. Also, had a few fireworks to throw in each others tents.

Sunday, big race day, the race started at three but there was lots going on before hand. Marching bands, concerts, and givaways, things of that nature. Our seats were great, second row from the top so we could see the whole track. Nascar is one of the few sports where the seats at the top are more expensive than the lower seats. I was listening to the race on the radio because you can’t hear the announcer at all, way to loud. Good race, maybe because I actually knew who the drivers were. Greg Biffle was who I was rooting for, but he didn’t do shit. Carl Edwards won it, and did his traditional backflip off the side of his car. After that we got back to camp and drove home, got home pretty quick, thanks to knowing where the backroads were.

All in all, a good time, I’ll get some pictures and videos in the gallery soon.

Going to camping at TMS tomorrow for Nascar weekend, should be a blast, never been there before. I’ll post the highlights when I get back.

Went to see a very good friend of mine last night at Two Rows restaurant and brewery. Great place to eat and drink, they have their own in-house brewery with six styles of beer on tap. Actually that’s the only beers they have on tap, which is very unusual for Texas. Plus on Mon., Tues., and Wed. pints are only a dollar. Try the Hefeweizen and the IPA, my favorites.

Nicole, she bartends there, she’s a long time friend from waaaaaay back. I think of her as my best friend, although I don’t know if I still rank that high with her. She looked great, seemed to be happy and beautiful as ever. Had a good time, wish I could see her more often, last time I saw her was this summer when the Vagabenders were in town. I could go on and on about her, we’ve had some great times together. Moral of the story: Nicole’s the shit, and we love her cause she is!

P.S. GWAR, Dec. 3, you in?