Corporate Beer Still Sucks

Hello everyone

Fall is here.  It's not terribly cold, but the leaves are starting to fall off the trees.  And the shadows are getting longer, which means the sun is working its way south.  I'm not dreading winter as much as I used to back in the Oregon days, though.  Instead of eight months of overcast skies and constant drizzle, we tend to get a decent amount of sun in between the snowstorms.  Plus, snow is much more fun to go outside and play in than a rainstorm at 40 degrees.  Although, I've been hearing rumors we're supposed to get an extra-harsh winter, one for the record books, if the Farmer's Almanac is to be believed.  Also, the Idaho Transportation Department, in its "infinite wisdom," decided to suspend overnight plowing on all the major highways.  Gotta pay for those tax cuts for millionaires somehow, eh?

Good thing I work at home.

Beer (and a bit of Music) Talk  

I mentioned in my last post that I had recently tried a few new beers.  So I figured now is a perfect time to discuss one of those, "Loser" by Seattle's Elysian Brewing Company, which commemorated the 20th Anniversary of Seattle's Sub Pop record label (even though it's about 25 years old by now). 

The first thing I noticed was the generic-ish looking label, with the slogan, "Corporate Beer Still Sucks."  I can get behind a slogan like that as it is, but I was also immediately transported back 20 years to my senior year in high school, when the latest edition of Rolling Stone magazine had arrived at my house (yes, I had a subscription) and featured Nirvana on the cover, complete with Kurt Cobain wearing a t-shirt with "Corporate Magazines Still Suck" scrawled across the front.  The obvious irony was that one had to sift past page after page of corporate ads to get to the Nirvana article.

Anyway, this Saturday marks the 20th anniversary of the release of Nirvana's Nevermind, and Alternet has a story where the author claims it's the most important album of all time.  I'm not ready to go the full Monty and agree just yet, but the author makes a damn convincing argument, and the article is a great read.  Nevermind was Nirvana's first major-label album after releasing an earlier album and a few singles on the aforementioned Sub Pop, and Nirvana arguably single-handedly turned the record label from a little struggling business with some local buzz into a nationwide success, as they took a lot of credit (deservedly or not) for "discovering" Nirvana and the Seattle scene of the early 90s.

I should note that "Loser" was the name of a mid-90s hit by Beck, who, as far as I know, had no ties to Sub Pop.  But I guess the sentiment was the same.  In the wake of 80s bands who flaunted money and excess, the art nerds took over the music scene, at least for a few years.  It was a beautiful thing.

And the parallel to beer is striking.  On one hand, you have the big corporate brands whose focus is on marketing, with commercials featuring women in bikinis and other nonsense.  And on the other hand, you have the small brewers who care about quality and taste.  Guess who's winning?  Hint: it ain't the big guys.

Anyway, on to the beer itself.  After I finished amusing myself with the label, I cracked the bottle open.  The first I noticed was the smell, or should I say lack thereof.  It was the weirdest thing.  I always smell a new beer as soon as I open a bottle, and I always smell something.  But this time all I could detect was a faint odor of the bottle itself.  I poured it into a glass and nothing.  I stuck my nose right into the glass--to the point that I got beer on the tip of my nose--and inhaled deeply, but still, nothing.  Nada.  Zilch.  Zip.

I thought maybe my sniffer was broken, so I passed it on to Cathy, and she agreed.  Nothing.  Seriously, even swill has an aroma, though not a good one.  It was unreal.

With no odor, I wasn't sure what to expect in terms of taste.  It turned out to be malty, though not cloying.  There was somewhat of a hop bitterness, but not much, and no floral or citrusy flavor whatsoever.  The finish was a bit nutty, and it left a slightly lingering bitterness on my tongue, but nothing unpleasant.

In short: It was good.  Not groundbreaking, not knock-your-socks-off phenomenal, not even incredibly unique.  But something I could see myself enjoying over and over, perhaps for years to come.

Kinda like Nirvana.

In Closing

Not to assign homework, but I highly recommend checking out this article in The Atlantic about college sports.  It's very long, but thorough, and a fascinating read, even if you don't care about college sports.

Now here it is, your moment of Tucker Yak:

Rob

Beer Extravaganza (Part Two)

Hello everyone.

First, my apologies for the lack of blog posts lately. As mentioned, I spent the past week or so housesitting in the boonies, with dial-up and generator-powered electricity. I tried getting online, even just to check my email and Facebook messages, but the connection was so ridiculously slow (45k!) that I gave up. I did make a trek into town to get online at a restaurant that had wi-fi, but I couldn't connect for some technical reason.  And wouldn't you know it, by the time I realized I had already ordered food.

The good thing is I got lots of work done on my book.  I had come to the conclusion that I needed to start over, and so that's what I did.  I certainly wasn't an easy decision to make, as I had spent over a year on it and had written over 35,000 words, but it's the right thing to do.  I'm not really changing the story, but just changing how it's told.  I think my decision kinda freaked Cathy out, but then when I got back home and she read what I had so far, she said she thought it was much better and she agreed with my decision.  Now, I've basically said in 10,000 words what used to take 35,000 words to say, which means the story moves a lot faster, and I've ditched a lot of the pointless bullshit.  And more importantly, I feel better about the whole thing. 

But now I'm ready to do some blogging!

Rob (Beer) Happenings

As mentioned, Cathy and I made a trek up to Schweitzer mountain over Labor Day weekend for their Fall Fest celebration. It wasn't officially fall when we were there, and weather-wise it still felt like the middle of summer, despite the fact that the main village sits in the mountains at around 4,700 feet. It was nice, sunny, and surprisingly warm up there, and there was a pretty good turnout for the festivities. Initially, we brought Tucker with us, but when we walked past the stage, there was a band playing. The amplified freaked him out, and he managed to somehow squirm out of his collar and run away. Fortunately, he didn't go very far, and we got him and brought him back down to the car and let him chill out in the shade in the parking lot where things were relatively quiet.

Then we went back to the festival puppy-free and tried again. The first thing I did, naturally, was stand in line to get a glass and some beer sample tickets. Unlike the Brews Fest at Silver Mountain, where you had to pay for admission that included beer samples, admission at Schweitzer's Fall Fest was free, and if you wanted beer samples you had to buy them. I thought this was a better way to go. Also, Schweitzer had lots of different options for how many samples and even the type of drinking vessel. I chose the "pint," mainly because glass because you get to keep it and this would one more to add to my collection, but also because glass is always better than plastic, which is what the mug at Silver Mountain was made of. There was a plastic mug option, which I appreciate, because for those planning on drinking a lot of beer, it's good to have a non-breakable option.

Once I got my glass, I headed to the beer tent. One thing I liked better about Silver Mountain's Brew Fest was that you could get 1/4 mug tasters, whereas at Schweitzer, my glass came with three full-glass tokens. That was enough beer for me, but I would've preferred the ability to try more of a variety than just three beers.

Deschutes "Hop in the Dark"

In the tent, I found the Deschutes table right away, and they had Hop in the Dark on tap. That's all I needed to hear to know that's what I wanted to start with. Hop in the Dark is a Cascadian Dark Ale. There's a bit of a controversy over the name for this style of beer. Lots of people call it "Black IPA," because it's dark in color but has the hoppiness of an IPA. But here's the issue with that: IPA stands for India Pale Ale, and it's rather stupid to call something both "Black" and "Pale," no? I've also seen it referred to as "India Black Ale" or "India Dark Ale." Aside from the fact that "IBA" and "IDA" sound too much like "IPA," which would be confusing when people are trying to order a beer in a noisy pub, this style wasn't invented in India. In fact, India has nothing to with the beer, aside from a similarity in hoppiness to the IPAs that do trace their roots to British colonization (and exploitation) of India. This style was born and bred in the good old US of A.

That's why I am going with "Cascadian Dark Ale," and why I appreciate the fact that Deschutes does the same. The "Cascadian" part of the name comes from the notion of Cascadia being a name for the Northwest. And although this style was supposedly invented in Vermont, it's definitely been popularized and embraced by the Northwest, and it tends to be brewed with a generous helping of Northwest hops. I also am a fan of the Cascadia independence movement, so long as North Idaho is included if and when it happens. I don't want to move again.

Anyway, Hop in the Dark was predictably fantastic, and it's definitely one of the better examples of this style out there. It's got a nice, smooth, thick malty flavor that's balanced by a generous helping of floral, citrusy Northwest hops. Good stuff.

Rogue "Dead Guy Ale"

Speaking of the Northwest, the next beer I had was Rogue Dead Guy. It's hard to categorize Dead Guy. Rogue calls it a maibock, which is a strong German lager brewed with extra hops. But Dead Guy uses ale yeast, which is fermented at room temperature, instead of lager yeast, which is fermented at lower temperatures and is what maibocks use. To confuse things even more, Rogue calls it "Dead Guy Ale."

Whatever it is, it's good. The problem with Rogue is that it's way too expensive. Their beer is good, but I don't know why they insist on charging way more than everyone else. Even in Oregon, where Rogue is located, it still costs way more than Deschutes, Ninkasi, Bridgeport, Full Sail, and other similarly-sized Oregon breweries. I don't get it. It's probably one of those things where they figure if they charge more, people will assume it's because it's much better. But it's not. I mean, don't get me wrong--their beer is good to excellent. But so is the beer from those other breweries, which are 2/3 the price.

Anyway, since all the beer essentially cost the same here, I went with the Dead Guy. I'm still always surprised when I see it in a glass instead of a bottle of how light in color it is, because it tastes like a much darker beer. I don't expect it to be black or even brown, but maybe a dark amber in color.  Nope.  It's pretty light.  Fortunately, it doesn't taste that way.

Northern Lights "Chocolate Dunkel"

I was down to my last beer at this point, and Cathy had mentioned that she noticed Northern Lights had their Chocolate Dunkel on tap, which is something she'd enjoyed up at Silver Mountain.  Being the great husband I am, I spent my last beer token on this beer, just so I could share it with her.  Oh, who am I kidding?  I like the beer, too.

Normally, I don't go for sweet, dessert-ish beers like this one, but this one worked, particularly after the lingering hop bitterness in my mouth from the other two.  It also made a nice "dessert" to our food, which we'd just finished, but was nothing special, and so I won't be blogging about it.  To be honest, it's been over two weeks since the festival, and while I took notes about the beer, I didn't take any food notes, and I really don't remember what we ate.

Moving on.

Through all of this, there was a band playing Latin music.  They were pretty decent, though the music wasn't my style.  At one point in between songs, the singer said how glad they were to be "up here on Silver Mountain," which drew a few boos from the crowd until he realized what he'd said and apologized.  That was amusing to watch.  It was also amusing to watch the older yuppie couple make fools of themselves by salsa dancing in front of the stage while everyone was watching, though in truth I was probably a bit jealous that they were willing to make asses of themselves and not care what other people thought.  Either that, or they were just oblivious of how ridiculous they looked, but then how could you not know how ridiculous two people look when they're salsa dancing?

Overlooking Lake Pend Oreille

After the dunkel, it was time to go.  And we couldn't make the trip back down from the mountain without stopping and taking some photos of the unbeatable view.  The view is even better from the top of the mountain, and we almost took a chairlift to the top to take some more shots, but we had a Tucker puppy waiting for us.  Next time.

It's funny.  I've already gone to more beer festivals up here in the less than a year I've been here than the whole ten years I was in Oregon, the land of good beers galore.  And we're planning on going to another one: this time an Oktoberfest celebration in a couple of weeks.  I guess when you live in Oregon, every day is a beer festival.  Not so much up here.  Still, it's nice to make an event out of drinking good beer.  It makes it seem so much more special.

In Closing

I've got still more beer news to blog about, including tasting some new beers and trying a new brewery.  I also made my "world famous"* chili yesterday and plan on posting the recipe and some photos in the near future.  Plus, I feel it's time to talk politics again, since I haven't in a while, and since there's a lot to talk about.  And I might even have something to say about all the crazy college sports (football) conference realignments.  So stay tuned.

Now here it is, your moment of Tucker:

Rob

* Note: "world famous" only applies to Rob Dow's World, not the actual world itself

Beer Extravaganza (Part One)

Hello everyone.

Whoa!  How did I manage to go a week and a half without blogging?  I knew it had been a while, but I didn't realize it had been that long.  I guess I better get to it, then...

Rob (Beer) Happenings

Last week I brewed a batch of one of my most favoritest beer styles, the India Pale Ale (IPA).  It was surprisingly the first time in the seven or so years I've been brewing that I've tried to brew an IPA.  I don't know why that is.  I love IPAs. 

Fortunately, this attempt turned out better than some of my other attempts at brewing.

This particular batch is called "Ol' Deaths Whisper," and I picked up the ingredients in a conveniently pre-packaged bag from the Home Fermenter Center the last time I was in Eugene, OR.  Their website appears to be down right now (which is why I linked to the Beer Advocate site instead), and I hope that doesn't mean they went out of business, because they have great brewing supplies at really reasonable prices.

This was a "partial-mash" recipe, and for those who don't homebrew, I'll explain what that means in a moment.  But first, let me give you a quick rundown of the entire brewing process.  You start with some barley grains that are soaked in water until they start to sprout and release a lot of sugar.  The grain growth is then stopped by roasting, toasting, or some other method that usually involves a large oven of some sort, and this gives you malted barley. 

When it's time to brew, you soak the malted barley (and sometimes other types of grains, depending on the recipe) in hot water, and basically make a tea out of it.  Next, you get rid of the spent grains (you can feed it to livestock, or compost it, or even use it to make bread) and boil the tea down, adding hops to give it flavor as well as bitterness to balance the sweetness of the malt.  This gives you an "unfermented beer" called wort.  You let the wort cool to room temperature, and then add yeast to ferment the wort (lagers are fermented at lower temperatures). 

Over the next few weeks or so, the yeast turns the sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide.  Once this is done, you now have beer, and all that's left to do is to carbonate it, either by bottling it with a little sugar for the yeast to eat and convert to more CO2, or by kegging it and adding carbonation from a tank.  I used to be a bottling guy, but since we moved, we picked up a second fridge, and I'm now all about kegging.  Cleaning and sanitizing one keg is immensely easier than cleaning and sanitizing three dozen or so bottles.

But making a "tea" out of ten, fifteen, or even twenty pounds of malted barley and/or other grains is no easy task to do in an average kitchen.  There is all sorts of equipment out there to do this at home, but most of it is out of my budget at this point.  Someday...

Anyway, this particular recipe is a "partial-mash," which is a small amount of specialty grains tailored to the recipe plus a large amount of malt extract, which is essentially a condensed version of the malted barley "tea."  First, I extracted the "tea" from the specialty grains, in this case 3/4 lb. of amber crystal malt, and 1/4 lb. of Munich malt:

One thing brewing requires is a lot of water, and despite us having a well, our water quality isn't good.  It won't make you sick, but it tastes disgusting.  Maybe you like the taste of sulfur, but I don't.  So I used a filter.  The other problem is that we don't have great water pressure here, and when you combine that with a faucet-mount filter, the water comes out like a trickle.  Seriously, I often pee bigger streams than this:

Once the grains steeped for their allotted time, it was time to rinse as much of the sugars out as possible, in a process called "sparging."  I poured two quarts of 170 degree water over the grains:

I know the above photo doesn't show the hot water being poured over the grains, but I was brewing solo, and it's difficult enough to keep from spilling water and/or wort all over the kitchen, let alone trying to do so while also taking a photo.  Just use you imagination.

Next, it was time to add the extract.  This recipe was one of the few I've ever tried that called for both liquid and dry extracts.  I don't have a photo of the dry extract, but just imagine a tannish-brownish colored Kool-Aid mix.  Here's the liquid extract:

I don't like using the word, "liquid," to describe the extract, because it's not exactly liquid.  It's somewhere between the consistency of honey and molasses, and it takes several rinsings with hot water to get all the stuff out of its container and into the brewing kettle.  Meanwhile, you also have to keep stirring the kettle, because the extract you just added tends to immediately settle at the bottom of the pot instead of dissolving right away, and that inevitably leads to scorching.  I've had some delicious smoked porters before, but I can't imagine a scorched beer to be any good.

Once all the extract is in the kettle, it's time to bring the whole thing to a boil, stirring frequently until all the extract dissolves.  A nice foamy layer will form at the top:

Eventually, large bubbles will break through the foam, and that's when you know it's boiling.  That means it's time to begin adding hops, starting with the bittering hops, in this case, one ounce of Chinooks.  This recipe called for three different types of hops: Chinooks added at the beginning of the one hour boil, 1/2 ounce of Cascade hops (flavoring) added 40 minutes in, and 1/2 ounce of Columbus hops (aroma) added in the last five minutes. Each type of hops came in its own hop bag, which is basically a little pouch made of cheesecloth material to hold the hops in (and to easily remove them at the end of the boil):

After the boil, I ditched the hops and added some filtered cold water.  I then covered the pot, set it in an ice water bath in the sink, and let it sit there until the wort dropped down to about 75 degrees.  Then it was time to siphon it (some brew kettles have spigots, but mine does not, hence the siphoning) into the carboy, which is a glass container where the fermentation happens:

Once all the wort was siphoned into the carboy, I added more filtered water to make about five gallons total.  The temperature was still a little warm, so I held off on adding the yeast.  If the liquid is too hot (or too cold), the yeast will die on contact, and there won't be any fermentation, or at least not the good kind of fermentation.  So while I waited for the wort to cool a little more, it began to settle and form cool-looking bands in the carboy:

Finally it was cool enough to add the yeast.  I aerated (shook up) the carboy to get everything going.  By the next morning, there was a lot of activity already.  The bands were gone, and if you looked closely, you could see all sorts of movement inside the carboy as the yeast was gorging itself on the sugars.  There was also a layer of foam at the top from the CO2 bubbling up.  By about 24 hours in, the foam had built up pretty high and begun to work its way up the blow off tube, which is a tube attached to the carboy with the other end submerged in water, so the excess carbon dioxide can work its way out of the carboy, but fruit flies, bacteria, and other crap in the air can't find its way into the carboy and ruin the beer.

From then on, I just checked on it periodically, making sure the temperature stayed in the 65-75 degree range.

Here it is today, one week later:

It might be hard to tell from the photo, but there is still some fermentation going on.  But it has already peaked out.  The foam that went up the blow off tube has receded back into the carboy.  A bunch of sediment has built up on the bottom.  In a few days I'll check the levels, and if things look good, I'll probably siphon as much of the beer out as I can--leaving as much sediment behind as possible--into a secondary carboy, and then let it sit for another week or so.  Then it will be time to siphon it out of the secondary and keg it.  And in a week or so after that, if all has gone to plan, I'll have some delicious India Pale Ale on tap at home.  Yay!


In Closing

I've got lots more beer news, including a report (with photos) from the beer tent at the Fall Fest at Schweitzer Mountain last weekend, as well as three new (to me) beers I've tried at home during the past week.  But I've reached my blogging limit for the day, so you'll just have to stay tuned until next time. 

Now here it is, your moment of Tucker (or what happens when Tucker jumps off the dock right after you do, and you don't realize he's doggy-paddling away in the water above you as you're coming up to the surface):

I think it's time to trim his nails.

Rob

More Book Stuff, The Abyss

Hello everyone.

First things first: Here's an amazing book report of Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, written by a high school student a few days after 9/11. Click on the link and read it, now. Go ahead. I'll wait.

Now that you're back, let's get to it:

Rob Happenings

The past several days have been all about spending time with friends. We had a couple of friends from Oregon visit and stay the night with us a week ago. Then we reconnected with some old friends who live up here in Idaho last weekend. Then a couple of other Oregon friends stopped by last night. So the past week or so has been tons of fun and a great way to break up some of the monotonous solitude that's typical with rural living. Plus it was just great to see everyone.

The two friends who were here last night were among the ones I'd sent copies of the first 50 51 pages of my book to.  It turned out one friend only read the first few pages (which means she's either really busy or my book is really awful), but the other managed to make it through all 50 51 pages. After some beer, a little prodding on my part, and a lot of "please don't take this the wrong way" prefacing on his part, he gave me some solid criticism. Here's what I took from the conversation:

1. My writing often reads like college composition, not fiction. This is definitely true. After all, I was a college student for five years until quite recently, and that's where I honed my writing chops, so to speak. I also tutored students in college writing composition for three and a half years, so I'm finding it tough to break the habit. But that's stuff that can be fixed when I go back and edit. On the other hand:

2. My main character (a Christ-like character) is alternately brilliant and stupid, and I need to pick one. Either he knows everything or he doesn't. If he knows everything, he doesn't grow or change throughout the book, so what's the point?  If he's an idiot, he's just not believable.  I tried to get around this with a cheap plot device, but I just don't think it's working. Which means I'm going to have to reconsider my main character and his motivation. That's a much tougher one to get around.

3. There are a couple scenes and secondary characters that I might need to eliminate. I envisioned them coming back later near the end of the book to tie things together, but I'm not so sure now. I'll have to think about this one.

I don't enjoy criticism (not that I know anyone who does), so it stung at first, but I needed to hear it, and I'm glad I did. This particular friend is one of the most intelligent people I know, and he's not one to blow smoke, particularly about something like this.

All this is a reminder to me that writing is hard work, and I shouldn't expect to be a pro at it right from the get-go. For a brief moment earlier today, I considered scrapping the book and doing something else. But it's too late for that, so I'll just have to fix it. What would Kurt Vonnegut do?

Beer Happenings

As mentioned above, beer was consumed last night, including a special treat, a 2007 vintage The Abyss from Deschutes Brewery out of beautiful Bend, Oregon. Like a dumbass, I forgot to take photos of the beer as we sipped it, so here's a shot I took today of the empty bottle:

The Abyss is an imperial stout brewed with licorice and molasses, with 33% aged in oak and oak bourbon barrels.  I usually hate licorice, but I love beer, and this one has got to be near the top of my list of all-time favorites, if not right up there at the top.  My cousin bought me a case back when it first came out in early 2008.  When we were kids he must have done something horrible to me that I've since blocked from my memory, and now he's trying to atone.  No one could be that cool just because.  This bottle is number eleven out of the case of twelve, and if you're not a math pro, that means I'm down to one bottle of 2007 left.  I might not ever drink it.

I've been keeping my Abyss stash aging in dark, cool closets or basements of various placed we've lived over the last almost-four years, and like a fine wine (except better because it's beer) The Abyss only gets better with age.  Last night, I scraped away the wax coating Deschutes puts over the cap to ensure the seal and opened the bottle.  After it breathed for a minute or so, the initial alcohol burn (it's 11%!) evaporated away, and in its place was thick, chocolatey, coffee-ish, sweet-but-not-too-sweet goodness.  I couldn't really taste the oak or licorice flavors in this one as I had in some of the ones I'd tried that hadn't aged as long, but I didn't miss those flavors at all.  It was perfect.  It was like an orgasm in my mouth.  Except my own orgasm.  In someone else's mouth. 

Anyway, if you love beer, particularly big, dark beers, you owe it to yourself to try The Abyss if you can get your hands on it.

In Closing

Here it is, your moment of Tucker, taken last March at the Oregon Coast:

Rob

Beerfest and Tucker Swims

Hello everyone

I've got lots to talk about, including photos, so let's get right to it!

Rob Happenings

Last Friday Cathy surprised me with tickets to the Brews Fest at Silver Mountain Resort. For those of you unfamiliar with Silver Mountain, it's a ski resort in Kellogg, ID, a town east of Coeur d'Alene that sits in Silver Valley, which is carved out by the Coeur d'Alene river.  Kellogg was built on mining, including silver, hence the name of both the valley and the resort, and the ski resort sits on top of the mountains to the south above the town. One of the neat things about it is that the only way up is to ride in a gondola (or hike). To the best of my knowledge you can't drive up to the top, although there must be a service road for the employees to use because we could see rental trucks behind the stage. Anyway, I'd never been to Silver Mountain before, even during the eight years I lived in North Idaho during the 90s, mainly because I never had any reason to.  Whenever I went snowboarding, I always went to nearby Schweitzer, and I'd always heard Schweitzer was better, anyway. So I was kinda excited to see Silver Mountain and ride the "world's longest gondola" to the top. But let's be honest, I was really excited about the beer.

The ride to the top was what it was: a pretty uneventful 20 minute ride to the top. the views were great, but it's not like it was an amusement park ride or anything. We shared our car with another couple, and the lady seemed pretty afraid of the whole thing, especially at the section that crosses a valley pretty high in the air. I'm not a fan of heights, but it wasn't an issue for me, probably because there was glass (or plexiglass) between me and the ground below, aside from two small sliding windows on one side.

We got up to the top and stood in line to each get a mug and seven beer tickets, which were included in the price of admission to the event. Our mugs said "2005" on them, and the guy handing them out said they were "recycling."  I hope he meant "getting rid of leftover unused supplies," not "reusing the same plastic mugs for six years straight."  Anyway, a woman in another booth helpfully explained that one ticket was for a "taster" of beer, and that four tickets filled your mug. So naturally, using the skills I learned in college-level algebra, I assumed that one ticket meant 1/4 of a mug full. Some of the beer vendors apparently had other ideas.

I knew Ninkasi was going to be there, so I headed to their booth first. I was a little disappointed they only had Total Domination IPA and Believer Double Red on tap, two very good beers, but probably their two most common ones. But I decided to start someplace familiar before branching off into more exotic territory, and I chose a one ticket "taster" of Total Domination, while Cathy chose a "taster" of Believer. I was wearing a Ninkasi hat and a Stone brewing t-shirt for the event, and while the Ninkasi guy poured our beers, he commented on my clothes, and we chatted about good beer and Eugene, where Ninkasi is located and where until recently I was located for a decade or so. He handed us two mostly-full mugs of beer, not exactly 1/4 of a mug, not that I was complaining. I didn't try any of Cathy's Believer, but the Total Domination was predictably good, with a strong floral hop flavor and relatively clean finish, just like the other hundred or so times I've had it.

The extra-large "1/4-full" mugs seemed to be a (mostly) recurring theme. We headed over to the Deschutes tent and I sampled their Conflux No. 2, and IPA brewed with Belgian yeast. Blaugh. I realize Belgian beers and other styles brewed with Belgian yeast are all the rage these days, but I still can't get into it. The Belgian yeast flavor really turns me off, though I don't hate it as much as I used to, so maybe it's just an acquired taste thing. But the Belgian yeast and northwest hops together were just not a good combination, as they seemed to bring the worst in each other. The citrusy flavor of the northwest hops that I like so much was almost completely lost behind the pungent, sweatsock flavor of the Belgian yeast.  The yeast also seemed to amplify the hop bitterness, but not in a good way. Not a fan. Fortunately, this was the smallest (although still more than 1/4-full) taster I got, so I choked it down and moved on.

Cathy and I decided were were hungry, so she volunteered to stand in line at the sole food booth they had set up (Fail) while I got us some more beer. I ended up chatting with the guys at Odell, who had 90 Shilling Scottish Ale and Myrcenary Double IPA on tap. My shirt and hat proved to be yet another conversation piece, as I ended up chatting with the Odell guys about the wonders of craft beer before they offered me a (non-ticketed) taster of each. Both were excellent. The 90 Shilling was probably the smoothest Scottish ale I've ever had, and the double malt-level of the Myrcenary provided a nice balance to the double hop level, creating a big beer that didn't really taste like a big beer. I asked for a one-ticket taster of each, and the guy handed me two almost-full mugs. Yeah.

Cathy and I found a shady section of grass to eat our food pulled pork and pulled chicken sandwiches. Until last year, I had been a strict vegetarian (well, technically pescatarian) for thirteen years, and when I decided to start eating meat again, I vowed to only do so if it was sustainably and humanely-raised. Something tells me that wasn't the case here, but by the time I came back with the beer and we made it to the head of the line, we realized the only non-meat food they had available were tiny bags of potato chips.  This meant we'd either have to compromise our principles, starve, or take the gondola back down to the bottom. We opted for the former. So we choked down the crappy food (which actually didn't taste that bad), but at least we washed it down with good beer.

Next, we visited North Idaho Mountain's beer tent, and I sampled two tickets worth (which worked out to pretty much be a full mug) of their sunset red. This was a solid Irish red ale, a bit on the malty side with a slightly bitter finish, and it hit the spot. Then we headed over to Northern Lights' tent, and Cathy tried a free sample of their chocolate dunkel, which she liked so much she got three tickets-worth, even though she had planned on not drinking any more because she was going to drive us home. I ended up finishing that one for her later on.

North Idaho Mountain Sunset Red (left) and Northern Lights Chocolate Dunkel

We found another shady spot off to the side to enjoy our beers and listen to the music of the Kenny James Miller band. I'm not really into the blues, but the bass player was more than willing to funk things up on his 5-string, and after a rocky start due to technical issues, the band made up for it with long, extended jams that were more reminiscent of Widespread Panic than BB King, and so I ended up enjoying them. Also, I was on my fourth beer by this point, so I probably would've enjoyed the music regardless of the band.

Kenny James Miller Band

It was at this point that we began to worry about our dog Tucker, who was hanging out in the car at the bottom of the mountain. We had found a shady area to park, put a sun shade over the windshield, and left our tinted windows open enough so air could flow, but it was a sunny August day in the 80s, and we were beginning to feel like bad dog parents. So I polished off the red, and used the remaining four tickets at the Elysian tent to fill my mug with the exceptional Immortal IPA. Then we headed back to the gondola and down the hill.

Me with Elysian Immortal IPA and Cathy's Northern Light's Chocolate Dunkel

We didn't have to share the gondola with anyone else, which was fun, mainly because we could walk around the car and stick our heads out the window for better photos.

At the bottom, Tucker was chilling out just fine in the car. He didn't chew anything up like he's been known to do when left in the car for a while, so we rewarded him with some ball-playing time at a boat launch down the Couer d'Alene river.

"Throw the damn ball, already!"

"I can't believe you're making me beg!"

"That's what I'm talking about."

It's amazing how quickly he's gone from being scared of the water to just jumping right in. But since he's so obsessive about getting the ball, it shouldn't be a surprise.

In Closing

We have some friends from out of town coming in today, so I might not be doing much blogging for a few days while they're here. But I'll definitely be back soon.

Rob

Photo Happenings and the Five Worst Guitar Tones in History

Hello everyone.

In case you haven't noticed, I've been changing some things around here on my blog.  I feel like I'm still getting back into the swing of things, blogging-wise, and so I have to admit this blog is a mess in terms of consistency in subject right now.  That's one of the problems with having lots of interests, I guess.  So far splitting topics up into their own sections seems to be working okay, although sometimes it's difficult to narrow my thoughts down to one subject.  Such is life.  Anyway, I might play around with changing the formatting, colors, font, etc. until something "sticks."  I realize all both my readers are savvy enough to follow along without any trouble, so I ain't worried.

Also, Blogger changed their post editor while I was on hiatus from blogging, and while the new program seems to be intuitive and better than the old one, I'm still getting used to it, so I'll apologize in advance if the formatting looks shabby for a while.  I'll be a pro at this in no time.

I've added a banner ad to the top of the page and moved the rectangular one to the bottom of each post.  That way it's not annoyingly at the beginning of each post like before.  Also, there are now two opportunities for people to click on them, which I hope will happen a lot, though for the record I'm not encouraging anyone to do so.  As mentioned in a previous post, I'm prohibited from doing such a thing.  However, I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to mention that the ads are the only way I'm going to be able to make a living at writing until I finish my book and it (hopefully) gets published.  Anyway, if you don't see the ads, you're probably running something like Mozilla Firefox with AdBlockPlus, which is what I usually use to browse the internets, just like the good hypocrite I am.  You should use ad blocking software on other sites, just not this one.

Rob Happenings

I decided to change the heading for this section from "Personal" to "Rob Happenings."  I realize that people might not give a shit about what's going on in my life, and I respect that.  The point of having a heading was to break subjects up and make it easier for people to skip on past.  But calling it "Personal" wasn't very accurate because I was blogging about stuff going on in my life, but really not anything of a personal nature.  This is a public blog.  You'll have to do some serious digging if you want to find out about any of my skeletons. 

Anyway, I had a great time yesterday at our friend Michelle's family ranch.  She and her husband and kids were up visiting from Texas, and her family owns a gorgeous (and huge) ranch tucked away in a valley to the north.  We spent several hours taking photos of the property and Michelle and her family, and Cathy unsurprisingly got some great shots.  This was actually Cathy's third or fourth time taking photos up there over the past couple weeks.  Yesterday, I managed to get lucky and shoot a few keepers, but with a piece of property that beautiful, you can basically point the camera in any direction and wind up with a great shot.  Most of the time I just follow behind Cathy and do what she does.  Yesterday I didn't have to.

I have to say it felt great to take photos.  It's something I hadn't done in a few months, and I didn't realize how much I missed it.  Anyway, we'll have some up soon at Out There Photography's website which I'll plug right here: outtherephotography.com.  Do yourself a favor and check back there periodically to see the photos.

Music

The other day when I was working on my novel, I was writing a scene where I wanted to have music playing in the background.  But not just any music.  This music needed to have an annoyingly bad guitar tone.  I thought of several songs that would fit the bill, and ultimately the one I chose to go with had less to do with the annoyance level than with other story considerations.  But I thought the concept of bad guitar tones would make for a great thing to discuss here on this blog, so without further ado, here is my list of...  

The Five Worst Guitar Tones in History

To be clear: I'm not talking about the song writing or musicianship of the guitar players, which are both far superior to anything I could churn out.  Rather, I'm focusing on the guitar tone each used on the recording, which has nothing to do with skill or ability, but is all about taste, or lack thereof.  Each of the guitarists here made the conscious decision of making their guitar tones sound the way they did, and I can only assume it's the result of too much cocaine or the encouragement of some out of touch record company executive who might have been better suited to a job selling insurance.  Let's get to the list.

Dishonorable Mention: Peter Frampton, "Do You Feel Like We Do"



The guitar tone throughout the beginning and end of the song is actually kinda tasteful.  The problem is Frampton busts out the stupid talk box in the middle.  "Look, I can talk through my guitar!  It's the same uninspired lyrics I sing over and over again throughout the song, but now it sounds like a guitar!"  If I could sum up this idiotic vocal/guitar effect in just one word, it would be "gimmick."  Guitar-ish sounding vocals might be an easy way to earn some quick notoriety, but by about the 378th play on the classic rock radio station, it just sounds dumb.  There's a reason why no one else does it, and that's why Peter earns a dishonorable mention here.

5: Boston, "Don't Look Back"



I probably could have used any Boston song, since they all sound the same. But this is the only one I could think of by name. Guitarist Tom Scholz, who has a Master's in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, designed his own effects and amps to achieve the sound he wanted, proving taste is not something that can be taught by college professors.  After Boston became famous, Scholz started his own amp and effects company until it finally went out of business during the 90s.  Apparently, the elusive "let's piss off the roommate" demographic isn't big enough to sustain a company.  Listening to this song actually hurts my teeth.

4: Bon Jovi, "Livin' on a Prayer"



Woah-woah-woah
Woah-woah-woah
Woah-woah-woah
Woah-wah-woah

Every time I hear Richie Sambora's guitar intro in this song, I'm immediately transported back to seventh grade. And that's not necessarily a good thing. True, there were some great things about being twelve years old, but the music definitely wasn't one of them. I never liked Bon Jovi--I was probably the only one in my whole school who didn't--but I couldn't escape hearing this song and "You Give Love a Bad Name" on a seemingly hourly basis until Guns N' Roses came along two years later. It seemed everybody in my class not only had Slippery When Wet on cassette, but they carried it with them at all times. I think they must have handed out a copy to each kid at school one day. Fortunately, I was absent that day.

3: Yes, "Owner of a Lonely Heart"



Steve Howe earned a whole lot of accolades during the 1970s for his guitar work with the progressive rock band Yes. But by the 80s, Howe was gone and replaced by a guy named Trevor Rabin. I think the new guy realized he sucked compared to Howe, so he overcompensated with tons of effects.  The result is a guitar intro that sounds a lot like my neighbor's leaf blower. I'm aware that "Owner of a Lonely Heart" was a big hit during the 80s, but you have to remember this was the decade that also brought us minivans, parachute pants, and Kirk Cameron.

2: Survivor, "Eye of the Tiger"



I can't listen to this song without thinking of Rocky III. Actually, I can't listen to this song at all, at least not all the way through. It's terrible. The video is even worse, but if you mute the sound, it's kinda funny. Aside from that, everything about this song is awful, the least of which is the guitar tone. It sounds like an old lady with emphysema trying to clear her throat. And that's being generous.


1: Toto, "Hold the Line"



You know, I've always wondered what it would sound like if someone took a cheese grater to my ear, and I think I have a pretty good idea now.  What would prompt someone to make their guitar sound like a swarm of retarded bees?  Perhaps the guitarist was trying to be as annoying as possible in order to distract from the ridiculous warbling of the singer.  What a mess.  But I suppose that's to be expected from a band that took its name from the dog in The Wizard of Oz.  Fail.

In Closing

If you're thinking about getting me a present, here's a not-so-subtle hint:



Cheers.

Rob

Camping, Pavement, and Taxes, Oh My

Hello everyone.

I can't think of anything I'd rather be doing on a beautiful, sunny August morning than blogging. Actually, I can think of lots of things. But here we are, so let's get started.

Personal (with a little food and beer talk thrown in)

We had a fun time camping last night. A few months ago, we picked up a huge new tent to replace our old one, which had taken quite a bit of abuse when we went on our huge, five-week long mega trip. If you click on our photo website, OutTherePhotography.com, you can read all about the trip, and, of course, take a look at some of the many photos we took along the way. Anyway, we had been excited about trying out the new tent, but most of the summer so far has been spent traveling to writing conferences, art shows, friends' graduations, etc., that we just haven't had the chance (or haven't made time) to go camping. We finally made it happen last night.

The tent was awesome. It was a clear enough night to leave the rainfly off, and because the top is almost entirely netting, we were able to look up at the stars when we went to sleep. During our mega trip last year, we did lots of camping, and so we had set ourselves up for sleeping comfort by including a queen-sized air mattress and two extra-large rectangular sleeping bags that we zipped together to make one giant bag. We didn't exactly "rough it" on our trip. Last night we used the same set up, and naturally it worked great.

But it couldn't be a camping trip without food cooked outside, preferably over a fire. In this case we cooked cheese smokies over a campfire. Back in my vegetarian days, I would've gagged over the thought of a cheese smokie (before gagging down my Tofurkey kielbasa), but I've since been converted. This was no Oscar Mayer crap, either. The smokies were locally-made from locally, sustainably, and humanely raised meat, which is the only kind of meat I'll eat.

There was also adequate beer, in this case Session Lager from Full Sail. I've been into "smaller" beers lately, and a few ice-cold lagers around a campfire after a hot August day was perfect.

Did I mention that all this took place in our backyard? Normally, we would go somewhere else for camping, preferably some place with water. But this was Tucker's first camping trip, and in the unlikely event of him freaking out and barking or whining or who knows what, we didn't want it to happen in a campground where other people would get disturbed. Of course, he seemed to have no problem with the concept of sleeping in a tent for the night. He was curled up on the air mattress ready to go for bed before we were. I guess he's saving his freak out for when we actually do go to a campground where there's lots of sleeping people nearby.

And Now, a Musical Interlude

I had a dream last night that Pavement was playing in one on the local bars up here, and I've had this song stuck in my head all day. So without further ado...



Unfair (Music and Lyrics by Pavement)

Down to Santa Rosa and over the bay
Across the grapevine to LA
We got deserts we got trees
We got the hills of Beverly
Let's burn the hills of Beverly

Walk with your credit card in the air
Swing your nunchucks like you just don't care
This is a slow, sick suckin' part of me
This is a slow, sick suckin' part of me
And when I'm sucking kisses, sour

Up to the top of Shasta gulch
To the bottom of the Tahoe Lake
Man made deltas and concrete rivers
The south takes what the north delivers
You film hack, I don't use your pay

Lost in the foothills of Mount Pine
Drinking Euro, say goodnight
to the last psychedelic band
from Sac to Northern Cal
from Sac to Northern Cal

Taylor, neighbor
You're my neighbor
And I need favors
You're my neighbor
You don't need favors
'Cause I'm your neighbor
I'm not your neighbor
You crazy street trash

Politics

An IRS report showed that almost 1,500 millionaires and billionaires paid no income tax in 2009. Why? Because our tax system allows for all sorts of loopholes, and most of these loopholes aren't available to us non-millionaires (or at least not in a way that we can avoid paying income tax altogether), because we usually don't have the ability to donate heavily to charities and don't have sizable foreign investments. This is an example of how our tax system is skewed to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the rest of us.

Other examples? Long term capital gains are taxed at a lower rate than regular income, so if you make your living from buying and selling stocks or real estate (other than your home), you pay a lower tax rate than a school teacher or firefighter.

But it's not just income tax. The Social Security Wage Base (cap) is $106,800 for 2010. This means that someone making $106,800 in 2010 will pay the same amount of Social Security tax as someone who brings in $106 million in 2010. Not the same rate--the same dollar amount: $6,621.60.

Property and sales tax tend to also be regressive. Take two hypothetical people: one who made $50,000 last year (we'll call him Jack), and the other $5 million (we'll call her Jill). Property tax is based on property value, and while it's likely Jill's property is worth more than Jack's, it's extremely unlikely that hers is worth 100 times the amount. So a lower percentage of Jill's $5 million in income goes to property tax when compared to Jack. Same with sales tax. Jill is likely to spend more than Jack, but 100 times more? Not likely. It's possible Jill spends more on gas (and thus, gas tax) than Jack, but is she using 100 times as much gas? No way. And on and on.

As I discussed previously, Congress is eliminating programs designed to help Jack rather than have Jill pay one cent more, despite the fact that across the board, Jack pays a higher percentage of his paycheck on taxes than Jill does. Congress is doing this to help pay down a debt caused by tax cuts that mostly benefited Jill, wars that people in Jack's income bracket are much more likely to fight than Jill's, and rampant unemployment caused by a financial meltdown created by people in Jill's income bracket. I don't know how it could be clearer who Congress works for. Hint: it ain't you or me.

So the next time someone claims we shouldn't tax the wealthy to pay for programs to help poor people or to pay off the debt because "we shouldn't punish job creators," remind them the wealthy are already paying next to nothing, and then ask them just where in the hell are the jobs?

In Closing

On that note, enjoy this sunny August day (assuming it's sunny and/or still August when you read this), and I will see you next time.

Rob

Home Again

Hello everyone!

I'm back from the Willamette Writers Conference, and I'm glad I went. I learned lots of good stuff about the craft of writing fiction. I had been writing pretty much on instinct, and that was going fine, but there's nothing like being able to step back and look at writing from a pragmatic perspective in terms of writing strong sentences, keeping the story moving while creating a setting, focusing on consistency in point-of-view, and avoiding lazy writing. A classic example of lazy writing is, "He walked angrily across the room," as opposed to, "He stomped across the room." I have lots of "walked angrily" in my manuscript, so I'll definitely be going back and making my writing tighter and more descriptive (and better) when I'm revising. I also learned that exclamation points are lazy, and that I should show exclamation with my word choices, not punctuation. My story is loaded with exclamation points, so that's another thing I'll need to work on.

I'm tempted to pepper this blog with tons of exclamation points just to get it out of my system, because blogs aren't bound by the same rules as fiction. But I think it's good to get in the habit of avoiding them in all my writing, so if you love exclamation points, this may no longer be the blog for you. And, no, that doesn't give license for smartass readers to point out in the comments every time I forget and use one, okay?

Personal

Important stuff I very recently learned: Sometimes you have teeter right on the edge of losing something to realize how important it is to you.

The above statement is as cheesy as I ever hope to get here, so if you're into that kind of crap, enjoy it while you can.

Moving on.

Politics

I shut myself off from the political world during my stay in Portland, so I can't comment on anything specific. But it's safe to say violence is happening somewhere, people are dying for no good reason, politicians are making truly outrageous and/or stupid claims, and the ultrawealthy are getting ultrawealthier. And most people feel powerless to do anything about it. Am I right?

Food

If you ever find yourself in Portland, do yourself a favor and head on down to the D Street Noshery on Division and 32nd and pick up some Bulgogi Tacos from KOI Fusion's food RV. Then sit down under the tent and wash your food down with a pint or three from Captured by Porches Brewing Company's beer bus. You'll be glad you did. I was.

I also highly recommend stopping by Genies Cafe on Division and 11th for breakfast. The chorizo scramble is all kinds of amazing.

In Closing

I'm going to wrap things up somewhat early because I'm motivated to get back to writing my book. Until we meet again!

Rob

Brewing Pics, The Truffle Shuffle, and My 200th Post!

Hello everyone!

Welcome to my 200th blog posting (if you don't count my posts on other blogs, that is). Hooray! I have no big fanfare for this milestone, but that stuff is pretty overrated. Besides, I have other things to talk about!

First off, I promised photos of the beer adventure, so here goes:

Here is the wort happily boiling away on two burners on the stove. There's not a whole lot to do at this step except to just occasionally stir it and sit back and sip some beer. Hey, I can do that!

After boiling the wort for an hour, we needed to cool it off before trying to pour it into the carboy for fermentation, or else we'd have a repeat of the disaster from last week. The helpful guy at the Home Fermenter Center suggested placing the kettle into a sink full of cold water to cool it faster, and it worked quite well.

At one point, Matt took off his shoes, and I sent him to soak smelly feet in the tub because I was worried the wort might absorb some of his raunchy feet smell.

Actually, he's just washing and sanitizing the spanking new carboy. It's too tall to fit under the faucet at our kitchen sink, so we have to use the bathtub faucet. I don't know why Matt put his feet in the tub as well. Maybe he thought we were making wine.

There's the shiny new carboy. It looks just like the old one, except the bottom isn't blown out. Having a bottom that isn't blown out helps it hold liquid more easily.

Once the wort had cooled to the appropriate temperature, we transferred it to the carboy and added the yeast.

Here it is in its new home for one to three weeks. At the top is a rubber stopper with a hose that goes to a small bucket of water. The reason for this is that once the wort begins to ferment, it needs to ventilate. The yeast "eats" the sugars in the wort that was extracted from the barley and oats, and then it "pees" alcohol and "farts" carbon dioxide. I apologize for the scientific terminology in the last sentence. Anyway, the carbon dioxide is emitted as a gas, which takes up more volume than a liquid. So there has to be a way for it to escape, or else it will at least blow the lid off if not completely breaking the glass.

However, we can't just leave the wort exposed to the air since there are nasty things in the air that could ruin the beer, such as bacteria, dust, flies, etc. So with the bucket of water and the hose, the gas bubbles out through the water in the bucket, but the bad stuff can't go through the water and up the hose to get into the carboy! It's brilliant! Not that I invented the concept or anything...

Here's a shot from Saturday morning. I had decided to let the wort ferment in the spare bedroom because I could crank up the heat to 68 degrees and close the door. We might be freezing in the rest of the house, but at least the yeast is comfortable! It turned out to be a good idea because the yeast started going to work right away, as you can see from the foam in the photo. Since the photo was taken, the foam has expanded so much that it's traveled all the way up the hose to the bucket of water, and now the water is brown and smells like stale beer. But it's bubbling faster and more rapidly than any batch I've made yet, which means things are progressing nicely!

If it stops bubbling before this weekend, I might try bottling it then. If not, maybe I'll try in two weeks or so. We'll see.

* * *

Switching gears a bit, today Cathy and I ran walked the Truffle Shuffle. It's a two mile race to raise money for Committed Partners for Youth, which I don't know much about and quite honestly don't care much about. But at the end of the race you get a chocolate truffle, and this was an excuse to get out of the house and do something outside, so we decided to go ahead and give it a go. We had to register, and of course we were given our race numbers.

I like to post photos of myself like these in order to keep me humble. This one is exceptionally terrible. What's with the stupid head tilt? And look at how white and pasty my skin looks! I look as if I've just served 30 days in the hole!

Moving on, we walked the route, and we finished in about 42 minutes, although I think we would have finished sooner if the crowd hadn't been so huge. The first leg was exceptionally slow going because of all the people--the crowd was moving much slower than my usual walking pace--until things began to thin out. But that doesn't really matter all that much. What was important to me was that I finished, and that I didn't finish last. Fortunately there were really old people and a few people in wheelchairs, although even some of them beat me! Cathy would've definitely finished sooner as well if I hadn't been slowing her down with my craptastic knee. But she's a trooper, and so she was willing to slum it with me and the rest of the gimps bringing up the rear.

Had I been thinking, I would've taken a few shots of the race and the crowd. But sometimes I forget the obvious. Oops.

The crowd was an interesting mix, even though there were way too many kids for my taste. But a lot of people brought their dogs, so it all balanced out. There were a few people dressed like truffles, and there was one guy who ran the whole course while also, as far as I could tell, juggling those bowling pin shaped juggling things.

I also had a lot of fun hearing bits and pieces of other people's conversations as we passed each other. Here are my three favorites:

• "I mean, if you're peeing fire, you should just go see the doctor."

• "Just because she owns a book, that doesn't make her a witch."

• "You've doomed her to a lifetime of making fun of round-headed kids."

Eugene is such a great place to overhear strange snippets of conversation. I'm considering submitting these to Overheard Everywhere.

* * *

Anyway, I want to send a hearty thank you to the three or four of you who have kept up with my blog since the beginning and have put up with all 200 of my goofy, sometimes paranoid and/or idiotic rantings. I seriously think about each of you whenever I write, and I'm glad I can share a part of me with you, even if "I'm not getting paid for this."

Let's see if you can stomach another 200...

Rob