13 Simple Rules for Hockey Parents Everywhere

This is not mine. I got in an email today and am sharing it with you all

My 13 simple rules for hockey parents everywhere

By John Buccigross
ESPN.com

1. Under no circumstances will hockey practice ever be cancelled. Ever. Even on days when school is cancelled, practice is still on. A game may be cancelled due to inclement weather because of travel concerns for the visiting team, but it would have to rain razor blades and bocce balls to cancel hockey practice at your local rink. It's good karma to respect the game.

2. Hockey is an emotional game and your child has the attention span of a chipmunk on NyQuil. The hockey coach will yell a bit during practice; he might even yell at your precious little Sparky. As long as there is teaching involved and not humiliation, it will be good for your child to be taught the right way, with emphasis.

3. Hockey is a very, very, very, very difficult game to play. You are probably terrible at it. It takes high skill and lots of courage, so lay off your kid. Don't berate them. Be patient and encourage them to play. Some kids need more time to learn how to ride the bike, but, in the end, everyone rides a bike about the same way.

Your kids are probably anywhere from age 4-8 when they first take up hockey. They will not get a call from Boston University coach Jack Parker or receive Christmas cards from the Colorado Avalanche's director of scouting. Don't berate them. Demand punctuality and unselfishness for practice and games. That's it. Passion is in someone, or it isn't. One can't implant passion in their child. My primary motive in letting my kids play hockey is exercise, physical fitness and the development of lower-body and core strength that will one day land them on a VH1 reality show that will pay off their student loans or my second mortgage.

4. Actually, I do demand two things from my 10-year-old Squirt, Jackson. Prior to every practice or game, as he turns down AC/DC's "Big Jack," gets out of the car and makes his way to the trunk to haul his hockey bag inside a cold, Connecticut rink, I say, "Jack, be the hardest, most creative and grittiest worker ... and be the one having the most fun." That might be four things, but you know what I mean.

5. Your kids should be dressing themselves and tying their own skates by their second year of Squirt. Jack is 67 pounds with 0 percent body fat and arms of linguini, and he can put on, take off and tie his own skates. If he can, anyone can. I don't go in the locker room anymore. Thank goodness; it stinks in there.

6. Do not fret over penalties not called during games and don't waste long-term heart power screaming at the referees. My observational research reveals the power-play percentage for every Mite hockey game ever played is .0000089 percent; for Squirts, .071 percent. I prefer referees to call zero penalties.

7. Yell like crazy during the game. Say whatever you want. Scream every kind of inane instruction you want to your kids. They can't hear you. In the car ride home, ask them if they had fun and gently promote creativity and competiveness, but only after you take them to Denny's for a Junior Grand Slam breakfast or 7-Eleven for a Slurpee. Having a warm breakfast after an early morning weekend game will become one of your most syrupy sweet memories.

8. Whenever possible, trade in your kids' ice skates and buy used skates, especially during those growing years and even if you can afford to buy new skates every six months. Your kids don't need $180 skates and a $100 stick no matter what your tax bracket is. They will not make them better players.

9. Missing practice (like we stated above) or games is akin to an Irish Catholic missing Mass in 1942. We take attendance at hockey games very seriously. Last week, the Islanders' Brendan Witt was hit by an SUV in Philadelphia. Witt got up off the pavement and walked to Starbucks for a coffee, and then later played against the Flyers that night. Let me repeat that: BRENDAN WITT WAS HIT BY AN SUV ... AND PLAYED THAT NIGHT! Re-read that sentence 56 times a night to your child when they have a case of the sniffles and want to stay home to watch an "iCarly" marathon. By, the way Philadelphia police cited Witt for two minutes in jail for obstruction. Witt will appeal.

10. Teach your kids not to celebrate too much after a goal if your team is winning or losing by a lot. And by all means, tell them celebrate with the team. After they score, tell them not to skate away from their teammates like soccer players. Find the person who passed you the puck and tell him or her, "Great pass." We have immediate group hugs in hockey following a short, instinctive reaction from the goal scorer. I am proud of my boy for a lot of things, but I am most proud at how excited he gets when a teammate scores a goal. He is Alex Ovechkin in this regard.

11. There is no such thing as running up the score in hockey. This is understood at every level. It's very difficult to score goals and unexplainably exhilarating when one does. Now, if we get to 14-1, we may want to take our foot off the gas a tad.

12. Unless their femur is broken in 16 places, Mites or Squirts should not lie on the ice after a fall on the ice or against the boards. Attempt to get up as quickly as one can and slowly skate to the bench.

13. Do not offer cash for goals. This has no upside. Passion and love and drive cannot be taught or bought. I do believe a certain measure of toughness and grit can be slowly encouraged and eventually taught. Encourage your kid to block shots and to battle hard in the corners. It will serve them well in life.

Enjoy the rink. Keep it fun, keep it in perspective and enjoy the madness. In this digital world of electronics, you may find hockey to be the most human endeavor you partake in. Cell phones run on batteries. Hockey players run on blood. Blood is warmer. Welcome.

Happy Guy Fawkes Night

A rhyme in honor of the day:

Remember, remember the fifth of November

Gunpowder, treason and plot.

I see no reason, why the gunpowder treason

Should ever be forgot.

Remember, remember, the fifth of November,

Gunpowder, treason and plot!

A stick or a stake for King James' sake

Will you please to give us a fagot

If you can't give us one, we'll take two;

The better for us and the worse for you!

I will not be building any bonfires tonight however - Syd has hockey.

Fall Plans

So I am getting together my plans for this fall.

Let it be known that October shall be beer making month. I am planning on brewing a parti-gyle batch in the beginning of October. Parti-gyle just means that you make two beers with the same grains in the same mash: one a high gravity beer from the first runnings and the second runnings make a lower gravity beer. I will be making a spiced winter warmer as the high alcohol beer and an ordinary bitter as the session beer. Both are fairly English in character. So as soon as I can spare some funds to buy 22 pounds of Maris Otter, I will be a-brewin'. I also hope to get a porter or stout made later in the month, so maybe I should just get the 50 lb bag and be set for a while. I also want to make an ice beer at some point, but this can be an extract batch. You make a high alcohol beer like a barleywine and then quasi-distill it by freezing out some of the water content. This takes a 10ish percent beer and concentrates it to around 20ish percent. The result (due to the lack of carbonation and higher alcohol mainly) is supposed to be more like a spirit instead of a beer, but it is totally legal to make at home.

I want all this done by Halloween because I will need all of November if I hope to do NaNoWriMo again this year. NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month. Basically you begin writing November 1st with the goal of writing a 50,000 word novel (about 175 pages) by midnight, November 30. It is a very tough challenge. I didn't even attempt last year since we had just moved in and were still getting over the flood. The furthest I have gotten in the past was 18,000 words which got me to chapter 6. Last year 119,301 people made the attempt and 21,683 completed at least 50,000 words. My friend Ben completed it as well, so I know it can be done. From my past experiences I know that the toughest part for me is not proofing and editing as I write. I really need to just spit out everything I am thinking onto the page and leave the editor hat on it's peg until the month is over. At this point I have no idea what I will write about, but it will probably end up as contemporary fantasy.

So I now have goals for this fall. Hopefully I will get them done

V Speech

I just wanted to have this somewhere. One is a little big for a Quotable Rogue, but I make the rules here, so screw it:


"People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people."
-V

"Oh, heavens, no. Stealing implies ownership. You can't steal from the censor; I merely reclaimed them."
-V

"But on this most auspicious of nights, permit me then, in lieu of the more commonplace sobriquet, to suggest the character of this dramatis persona... Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition... The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous... Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V."
-V

Extended Weekend-ishness

Yeah, I made that word up. I have Thursdays and Fridays as my days off from work. Due to some schedule juggling, I ended up with 3 days off in a row and have been enjoying it very much.

Yesterday I spent a bunch of time catching up with some online friends I hadn't talked to in a few years and putzing around in game. It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed hearing how everyone was doing. It was a very nostalgic day in general. This worked out well since my back was acting up and a day of just relaxing online was just what the Doctor ordered as far as I am concerned.

Today was not as restful. Syd and I have a plan. She has done Girls on the Run (google them to see what they are about) for the last couple years. She really enjoys it. I have been on a diet for the last 4 weeks and have lost a total of 12 pounds so far. In keeping with my general goal of getting in better shape, Syd and I decided to start jogging in the morning with the goal of me being her running buddy in her next 5k. We are starting small, only 20 minutes, but we'll work on increasing it over time.

After I got out of the shower after our jog it was time to take Ian to get his braces off. Its been a 2 year journey with the hardware in his mouth and he was very happy about them coming off. There is not as much of the white marks that come come from not taking care of your teeth well as I had thought there might be, so that was good. He has very good teeth now, as he should for as much as it cost! In that regard I guess it is good in case he ever decides to go the TV meteorologist route.

I decided after lunch to take a ride on the bike because it was too damn nice not to. I got out on route 6 and ended up out in Amana. Since I was out there I decided to grab an oatmeal stout at Millstream Brewing. I really like that beer, their Schild Brau Amber lager (I generally tend to like ales, not lagers, so that should tell you how good that one is) and their Hefe-R-weissen. The brewer looked very busy so I didn't bother him. I just enjoyed my beer in their Hopfgarten. I was a little jealous though because they have some hops cones almost as big as my thumb! As I was walking back to my bike I saw a huge tote of spent grains on the back dock, so I figured out why he was in such a rush. I know mashing is the most stressful part of my brew days by far. I like Millstream, but they tend to be more German in influence and my tastes tend to run more English/Irish.

After I got home I had promised Sydney that she could try to teach me to ice skate. So we hopped on the bike and went over to the mall. I must say that I did pretty good for over 20 years since I was on the ice, and I couldn't skate for crap back then anyways. I managed to not fall on my head, though I never got more than 8 feet from the edge of the rink. After 5 laps my feet were hurting, so we called it quits and headed for the farmers market, then the library. Overall a very nice afternoon with my girl.

Well I am being called for supper for the third time, so I will put this post to bed now. Pics of growing hops cones and pumpkins to come soon.

Happy Anniversary

Heidi and I have been married 17 wonderful years today. In honor of this here are some facts about 17 (thanks to wikipedia)

In mathematics

Seventeen is the 7th prime number. The next prime is nineteen, with which it forms a twin prime. 17 is the sum of the first four primes. 17 is the sixth Mersenne prime exponent, yielding 131071. 17 is an Eisenstein prime with no imaginary part and real part of the form 3n − 1.

17 is the third Fermat prime, as it is of the form 2^{2^2} + 1, and it is also a Proth prime. Since 17 is a Fermat prime, heptadecagons can be drawn with compass and ruler. This was proven by Carl Friedrich Gauss.[1] Another consequence of 17 being a Fermat prime is that it is not a Higgs prime for squares or cubes.

17 is the only positive Genocchi number that is prime, the only negative one being -3. It is also the third Stern prime.

As 17 is the least prime factor of the first twelve terms of the Euclid-Mullin sequence, it is the thirteenth term.

Seventeen is the aliquot sum of two numbers, the odd discrete biprimes 39 and 55 is the base of the 17-aliquot tree.

There are exactly seventeen two-dimensional space (plane symmetry) groups. These are sometimes called wallpaper groups, as they represent the seventeen possible symmetry types that can be used for wallpaper.

Like 41, the number 17 is a prime that yields primes in the polynomial n2 + n + p, for all positive n < p - 1.

Consider a sequence of real numbers between 0 and 1 such that the first two lie in different halves of this interval, the first three in different thirds, and so forth. The maximum possible length of such a sequence is 17 (Berlekamp & Graham, 1970, example 63).

Either 16 or 18 unit squares can be formed into rectangles with perimeter equal to the area; and there are no other natural numbers with this property. The Platonists regarded this as a sign of their peculiar propriety; and Plutarch notes it when writing that the Pythagoreans "utterly abominate" 17, which "bars them off from each other and disjoins them".[2]

17 is the tenth Perrin number, preceded in the sequence by 7, 10, 12.

In base 9, the smallest prime with a composite sum of digits is 17.

17 is known as the Feller number, after the famous mathematician William Feller who taught at Princeton University for many years. Feller would say, when discussing an unsolved mathematical problem, that if it could be proved for the case n = 17 then it could be proved for all positive integers n. He would also say in lectures, "Let's try this for an arbitrary value of n, say n=17."

Similar to Feller, Prof. Vadim Khayms of Stanford University is also known to use 17 as an arbitrary value during lectures. His Computational Mathematics for Engineers course includes 17 lectures.

17 is the least random number[3], according to the Hackers' Jargon File. There is a proven theorem that 17 is the value most likely to be picked as a "random" number when such is needed in journalism which is derived from the Feller number.[4]

It is a repunit prime in hexadecimal (11).

It is believed that the minimum possible number of givens for a sudoku puzzle with a unique solution is 17, but this has yet to be proven.

There are 17 orthogonal curvilinear coordinate systems (to within a conformal symmetry) in which the 3-variable Laplace equation can be solved using the separation of variables technique.

17 is the first number that can be written as the sum of a positive cube and a positive square in two different ways; that is, the smallest n such that x3 + y2 = n has two different solutions for x and y positive integers. The next such number is 65.

In science

* The atomic number of chlorine.
* The Brodmann area defining the primary visual processing area of mammallian brains.
* Group 17 of the periodic table are the Halogens.

Age 17

* In the United States, the age at which one may purchase M-rated video games according to ESRB ratings.
* Also in some of the states in the United States, seventeen is the age of consent.
* In most states of the United States and the UK, the age at which you may donate blood.
* In many countries and regions, the age at which one may obtain a driver's license.
* In the United States, the age at which one may rent or purchase R Rated movies by himself/herself according to MPAA film rating system.

In culture

Music

* 17 is a number of obsession used by horrorcore rappers, Insane Clown Posse. The song "17 Dead" off their first EP "Belverly Kills 50187" uses the number frequently. Many of their songs reference the number 17 and most of their LP's contain 17 tracks.
* "(She's) Sexy + 17" was a 1983 Top 10 hit for Stray Cats from the album Rant N' Rave with the Stray Cats.
* "At Seventeen" was a 1975 hit by Janis Ian.
* "17", a song recorded by Rick James, in the album Reflections.
* The ratio 18/17 was a popular approximation for the equal tempered semitone during the Renaissance.
* "Seventeen" was the original name of The Beatles song "I Saw Her Standing There"..
* "17", a B-Side by Shiina Ringo on the "Tsumi to Batsu" single.
* The title of the song "17" by the Smashing Pumpkins. It is 17 seconds long, with no vocals, but comes with a poem which read at a standard speed will finish at the end of the song. This song is also a musical allusion to another Smashing Pumpkins work called "Blissed and Gone" which references 17 in the lines "Sweet 17, sour 29" and "I had no cause, just 17 days of rain".
* "17", a song recorded by Winger.
* "17", a song by yourcodenameis:milo.
* "Seventeen", a song by Ladytron.
* "Seventeen" by Jimmy Eat World
* "Seventeen Ain't So Sweet" a song by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.
* "17" a song by Kings of Leon.
* "Edge of Seventeen", a song from the 1981 album Bella Donna by Stevie Nicks.
* "17" by Milburn
* 17 Hippies, German band
* "Seventeen Forever" a song by Metro Station (band)
* Seventeen Days, 3rd studio album from American rock band 3 Doors Down.
* Dancing Queen by Abba features the line 'You are the Dancing Queen, young and sweet, only 17'.
* "All Summer Long" by Kid Rock features the line 'She was 17 but she was far from in between'.
* "Strawberry Wine" by Deana Carter features the line 'Strawberry Wine, 17, the hot July moon saw everything'.
* "God Love Her" by Toby Keith features the line 'The way a girl gets when she turns 17, kinda crazy'.
* "Sheer Heart Attack" by Queen features the line 'Well you're just 17 and all you want to do is disappear'.
* "Seventeen" is the sixth song on the album Give Me a Wall by ¡Forward, Russia!
* "Hello, Seventeen" by 12012
* "17 Again" is a song by Eurythmics as featured on their 1999 album Peace
* "Seventeen Seconds" is the second studio album by The Cure, released in April 1980 by Fiction Records.

Film

* Number Seventeen (1932), directed by Alfred Hitchcock
* Stalag 17 (1953), directed by Billy Wilder
* In 2004, Volatile Films released a feature length film titled The Significance of Seventeen starring Cindy Taylor; one theme addressed by the film is the high incidence of the number 17 and its function as 'the most random number' as described by MIT.
* In the film Three Days of the Condor, the title character played by Robert Redford works in section 17 of the CIA.
* In the Halloween film series the number 17 frequently reappears. Primarily with the age of people Michael Myers kills. Judith Myers is killed at 17 in the start of the first film, and Laurie Strode (the main character of the first films) is 17 when Michael Myers starts hunting her.
* 17 Again (2009), directed by Burr Steers

Print

* The title of Seventeen, a magazine.
* The number 17 is a recurring theme in the works of novelist Steven Brust. All of his chaptered novels have either 17 chapters or two books of 17 chapters each. Multiples of 17 frequently appear in his novels set in the fantasy world of Dragaera, where the number is considered holy.
* In The Illuminatus! Trilogy, the symbol for Discordianism includes a pyramid with 17 steps because 17 has "virtually no interesting geometric, arithmetic, or mystical qualities". However, for the Illuminati, 17 is tied with the "23/17 phenomenon".
* In the Harry Potter universe, 17 is the coming of age for wizards. It is equivalent to the usual coming of age at 18.

Religion

* According to Leon Kass, 17 has some significant meaning (as yet not known exactly) in the book of Genesis.[5]
* In the Yasna of Zoroastrianism seventeen chapters were written by Zoroaster himself, these are the Gathas.
* The number of the raka'ahs that Muslims perform during Salah on a daily basis.
* The number of surat al-Isra in the Qur'an.

In sports

* The most famous Ford number in the V8 Supercar championship, Driven by Dick Johnson to bring 5 Australian Touring Car Championships to his name. Now driven by son Steven Johnson.
* NASCAR driver Matt Kenseth's car number.
* The retired jersey number of former baseball pitcher Dizzy Dean.
* The number of former Chicago Cubs first baseman Mark Grace.
* The number of retired hockey player Wendel Clark
* The number of ice hockey player Chris Chaney
* The number of ice hockey player Rod Brind'Amour
* The number of ice hockey player Ilya Kovalchuk
* The number of ice hockey player Petr Sykora
* The number of ice hockey player Jeff Carter
* The number of ice hockey player Milan Lucic
* The former number of Right Winger Jean-Pierre Dumont when he played for the Buffalo Sabres
* The number of Hall of Fame basketball player John Havlicek
* The number of New York Giants' Wide Receiver Plaxico Burress
* The number of Cleveland Browns Wide Receiver Braylon Edwards
* The number of Toronto Blue Jays third baseman Kelly Gruber, and current first baseman Lyle Overbay
* The number that footballer Marc-Vivien Foé wore for the French clubs Lens and Lyon, retired by both clubs after his death from heart failure during a semifinal match in the 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup. Foé also wore the 17 shirt for the Cameroon national team at the time of his death.
* Real Madrid striker Ruud van Nistelrooy's shirt number
* The number that Cristiano Ronaldo wore on the Portuguese National Team, before switching to number 7 after the retirement of Luís Figo.
* The number of Carolina Panthers Quarterback Jake Delhomme.
* The number of Washington Redskins Quarterback Jason Campbell.
* The number of Colorado Rockies first baseman Todd Helton.
* The number of Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Brandon Webb.
* The number of NBA Championships won by the Boston Celtics.
* The number of Tuncay Şanlı in the Turkish national team while scoring against Greece in the 1-4 match in Athens.
* The number of Ken Griffey Jr. while playing for Chicago White Sox.
* The number of Ateneo Blue Eagles and GMA Network tv - host Chris Tiu
* The number of former Collingwood Football Club Captain Scott Burns when he played from 1995 until 2008.

Seventeen is:

* Described at MIT as 'the most random number', according to hackers' lore. This is supposedly because in a study where respondents were asked to choose a random number from 1 to 20, 17 was the most common choice.
* The number of laws of the game in Association Football
* The number of guns in a 17-gun salute to U.S. Army, Air Force and Marine Corps Generals, and Navy and Coast Guard Admirals.
* The number of flames emanating from the grenade cap-badge of the Grenadier Guards.
* During the Second World War, the four-engined heavy bomber as flown by the USAAF and other Allies and known as "The Flying Fortress", was also known as the B-17.
* A mild swear word in Swedish. The origin is debated, and is commonly used as "sjutton också!" ("seventeen, too!"). It can roughly be translated to "Darn!". It is of course also used for the number 17.
* The maximum number of strokes of a Chinese radical.
* The number of syllables in a haiku (5+7+5).
* In the Nordic countries the seventeenth day of the year is considered the heart and/or the back of winter.
* The designation of United States Interstate 17, a freeway in Arizona.
* The designation of U.S. Route 17, a highway that runs from Virginia to Florida.
* Seventeen, also known as Lock Seventeen, an unincorporated place in Clay Township, Tuscarawas County, Ohio.
* Seventeen was the former name of a yacht prior to being commissioned in the US Navy as the USS Carnelian (PY-19).
* The number of special significance to Yellow Pig's Day and Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics.
* In Italian culture, the number 17 is considered unlucky. When viewed as the Roman numeral, XVII, it is then changed anagramtically to VIXI, which in the Latin language it translates to "I have lived", the perfect tense implying "My life is over." (c.f. "Vixerunt", Cicero's famous announcement of an execution.) The Italian airline carrier, Alitalia, does not have a seat 17. Renault sold its "R17" model in Italy as "R177." See Cesana Pariol in the sport section about the name of curve 17.
* Android 17, a fictional character in the metaseries Dragon Ball.
* Some species of cicadas have a life cycle of 17 years (i.e. they are buried in the ground for 17 years between every mating season).
* The number to call Police in France.
* The number that symbolizes the soul.
* Force 17, a special operations unit of the Palestinian Fatah movement.
* The number of the French department Charente-Maritime

Green Thumb Revisited

I spent quite a while on my deck early this afternoon enjoying the mild, sunny day. As I was eating my sushi and drinking one of my last home brewed hefeweissens (see the pic below), I realized I hadn't posted any updates about the garden. I then grabbed my wife's camera and snapped a few pick of my limited successes.


My Cascade hops have done well. The partial crown that I was given is doing really good, growing about 30 feet so far with a lot of cones starting to form. In fact that bine is growing about 2 inches a day! The Cascade rhizome I bought and planted is about 20 feet with slightly less abundant cones forming. My other two varieties (Goldings and Willamette) did not take off very well, neither has gotten over 6 feet tall and I don't expect to get any yield from them.

The rest of my garden except for one pumpkin plant pretty much died off or was eaten by rabbits during our vacation out east. It looks like we will at least get 4 of 5 pumpkins off the lone survivor though.


Syd has been pretty enthusiastic about helping out. She is always wanting to water the plants and today she helped my prune the lower part of the two hops plants that are doing well. Hopefully she'll be there when I hit the garden with compost and potting soil this fall! (Not to mention when I harvest the hops)

Anyways, it's getting late

30 Things You Wouldn't Think To Ask.

1. Have you ever been searched by the cops?
Yes, both searched and searched for, but it's been quite a while.

2. Do you close your eyes on roller coaster?
nope

3. When's the last time you've been sledding?
last winter with Syd.

4. Would you rather sleep with someone else, or alone?
Someone else

5. Do you believe in ghosts?
Yes, but I believe it is a very very rare phenomenon. I think many people attribute
'ghost' sitings to explainably natural things or are psychosomatic projections. I guess I am more like an agnostic in regard to this.

6. Do you consider yourself creative?
Indubitably

7. Do you think O.J. killed his wife?
Seriously? duh

8. Jennifer Aniston or Angelina Jolie?
Jennifer Aniston

9. Can you honestly say you know ANYTHING about politics?
Quite a bit actually

10. Do you know how to play poker?
play, deal, etc.

11. Have you ever been awake for 48 hours straight?
Many many times

12. What's your favorite commercial?
I can't think of any to tell the truth.

13. Who was your first love?
Trina Austin

14. If you're driving in the middle of the night, and no one is around you, do you run a red light?
Very often. I used to be a duty driver in Boston after all!

15. Do you have a secret that no one knows but you?
a couple.

16. Boston Red Sox or New York Yankees?
Red Sox of course!

17. Have you ever been Ice Skating?
yes

18. How often do you remember your dreams.
Just my waking ones, and not always.

19. What's the one thing on your mind?
Why does every Thursday have to be XM country music day at Biolife dammit

20. Do you always wear your seat belt?
Usually

21. What talent do you wish you had?
It would be nice to be able to dance with some shred of talent

22. Do you like Sushi?
I love sushi. I think I will have a Boston roll for lunch now as a matter of fact!

23. What do you wear to bed?
Usually nothing

24. Do you truly hate anyone?
A couple people, but they deserve it.

25. If you could sleep with one famous person, who would it be?
Famous? hmmm, I used to have a really big thing for Janeane Garofalo

26. Do you know anyone in jail?
Not for a while now.

27. What food do you find disgusting?
green beans but even worse - wax beans - they smell like a paper mill!

28. Have you ever made fun of your friends behind their back?
Yes, but to their face usually too.

29. Have you ever been punched in the face?
Yes, it's not as bad as a 2 x 4 to the back of the head though

30. Do you believe in angels and demons?
See my answer to the ghost question

Green Thumb

We planted a little garden this spring and it is starting to take off. With our yard it is tough to find a sunny area, so we went with the easiest place to plant, which was under our deck. This has made the peas and broccoli a little hit or miss as to how well they are growing. The peas are kinda good while the broccoli is not doing as well.

The really good thing about being under the deck is that I can trellis my hops to the deck above. I have 2 cascade plants, a goldings and a willamette planted. The cascades are growing great and the goldings just started climbing the string 2 days ago. Both the english varients (goldings and willamette) have been slow going though so far.

Overall it is very rewarding to go outside each day and see the progress they have made each day. My son freaked me out by telling me that he saw some deer out sniffing at them last night though. They are not something that deer would want to eat, but then again deer aren't the smartest creatures either.

Here's some pics of my hops. I'll post some more from time to time.

2 months?

I didn't realize it had been almost 2 months since I posted anything over here until I was helping a friend set her blog up with Facebook. That is one of the effects of Facebook and twitter though. I post lots of short updates and it eliminates or makes redundant what i would normally blog about.

Lots of things have been going on in the last few months. The express tour is as follows:

• Heidi got a job. She works at Zio Johnnos here in Coralville. She doesn't seem to hate it, so that is a bonus.
  
  
• I got a motorcycle (and accompanying license). It's cheap, old, small, but also fun and easy to ride. Looking for a sissy bar so Heidi isn't afraid to get on. Syd LOVES to ride.
  
  
• Brewed my third batch of the year. It's a hefeweissen, a german wheat beer, that came out soooo good. Just waiting for it to carb.
  
  
• We are getting ready for our summer vacation out east. We had wanted to go to Washington on the way out, but it looks like time may be against us. We'll see. Should be a lot of fun anyways. My 20th class reunion is going on while we are out there.
  
  
• We(I) planted a small garden under our back deck. We have broccoli, peas, watermellons and pumpkins planted. The broccoli and peas are doing pretty good.
  
  
• I also planted hops rhizomes along the edge so I can trellis them up to the deck above. I have 2 cascade plants going along with a goldings and a willamette that finally came up. It will be fun to watch them grow up the trellises this summer. I don't care how much of a yield I get as long as I get enough for at least 2 (one cascade and one english) batches of beer.

Anyways, that's all for now. Hopefully I won't be another 2 months between posts.

Quote

Posting this so I don't lose it. Just quotable, not rogue:

"When we hold each other, in the darkness, it doesn't make the darkness go away. The bad things are still out there. The nightmares still walking. When we hold each other we feel not safe, but better. "It's all right" we whisper, "I'm here, I love you." and we lie: "I'll never leave you." For just a moment or two the darkness doesn't seem so bad." - Neil Gaiman from Hellraiser #27, "Hold Me"

Second All-grain Batch

I will get to blogging about things other than brewing soon. However, one of the things that I use this blog for is as sort of an electronic, wherever-I-may-be, brewing log. That means that today I will be writing all about my latest batch.

After a very late start, I got to brewing again today. I had an Irish Red recipe kit that I had ordered at the same time as the first batch's kit. Irish Red is typically red, malty, lightly hopped with caramel notes. After tasting the wort that I took out for testing, I have to say that it should be just that!

I started off the day grabbing some water over at the HyVee in Iowa City. Coralville's water has a history of being pretty funky and I like how the water I used last time worked, so I got some more today. I also had to get a digital thermometer because of the fun I had with temps last time. So off to the Coraville HyVee liquors this time since they have about the only brewing supplies around here. I still used the big graduated thermometers so I could see when I was getting in the ball park and while I was cooling the wort, so they still came in handy. I also picked up some amber dry malt extract in case I did not hit my expected gravity out of the mash.

Everything went fairly well mashing. I used a little too much water I think. The mash tun is still too big too, so my temp didn't hold as well as I'd like. I only hit about (1.035ish) 60% out of the mash, so I had to use a pound of dry malt extract to get back to my target (1.043) gravity.

I also had to play with the hop bill some as well. Once again this kit had my hops too high for the style, so I held out the Willamette (4.4% AA) bittering hops until 55 minutes and held back the flavoring/aroma E.K. Goldings (5.4% AA) until 15 minutes left.

Also at 15 minutes left I put my new wort chiller in with the boil to sanitize it. It was a bit of a fiasco getting the hose up to my deck, but eventually everything was hooked up and right after flame out I started the hose. I cooled that down to 82 degrees in about 25 minutes. I will be adjusting my immersion chiller so it sits higher in the kettle. I will get much better cooling that way. Overall I was very pleased with my chiller's operation. I just need to watch where I have the outflow pointing next time so I don't soak my pants.

My biggest mistake this time was leaving the wort to cool those last 5-10 degrees without shielding it from the fluorescent light. It sat in the carboy, with the top stoppered, but I forgot to cover it with the dark Tshirt I use to keep light off it and forgot to shut out the fluorescent light before we left for the hockey game. It sat in the light for about 4 hours of so. I hope it will not have any ill effect. After we got home the temp was down to 76, so in went the yeast. The first bubbling has just started, so all looks good so far.

Brewing Video

Here's some video of the krausen running out the tube and the airlock once the krausen started to fall :) I wish the churning would show up when I was focused on the carboy. It's kinda cool to watch.



It's still bubbling away.

First All Grain Batch

So tonight I got a wild hair up my ass and decided enough procrastinating, I am just going to go ahead and brew this cream ale recipe. I fired up the propane burners, rinsed out the mash tun and got to it.

My recipe called for a 20 minute rest at 133, so I added my grains to roughly 3 gallons of water at 140 in a kettle. I couldn't keep temps very well all day. After 20 minutes I turned up the burner and got the mash up to about 160 and then transferred the whole thing to the mash/lauter tun. about half way through I checked temps and it was down to 145ish, so I threw in half a gallon of nearly boiling water. That brought things back up to about 155. After I drained that into the boil kettle, I sparged with 4.5 gallons at 170ish for 10 minutes. I was about 1.040 out of the mash, so I hit target! I will figure my effeciency later, but rough guess is 75%. Not too shabby for my first time out.

I noticed the hops were kinda high alpha for a low gravity cream ale, so I boosted the OG about 8-10 points with a pound of DME so my starting gravity is 1.052. Looks like it will be around 5% ABV. Strictly speaking, this and the high hops bumps it from a cream ale up to a blonde ale, but no biggy. We'll see how it turns out after fermentation :)

Notes for the future: 5 gallon (instead of 10) mash/lauter tun for normal gravity beers, better thermometers - 2 of them, a cooling system, and more planning/less spontaneity.

Overall a fun time, but makes for a late night. I am still waiting for it to cool enough to pitch my yeast. Thankfully it's cold enough outside to help me out with the cooling.

Recipe:

7# 2 row
.75# honey malt
.25# Biscuit malt

1 oz cluster hops 60 min (7.7 AA)

Wyeast 1056

25 things

The 25 things application seems FUBAR, so I am posting mine here:

1. I've been shot twice, not bad, just stupid. First time (.22) grazed me between the legs (just missing the boys, thus my children) second time a farmer shot me in the ass with rock salt, very painful.

b. I was arrested for the first time at 15. Once again not bad, just stupid. I was released with no charges.

iii. I hate fads, that's why I resisted this list thing until it had died down somewhat. In keeping with this, I will tag no one in this if the application will allow it. Since it will not, I will tag only my wife. Okay, they are totalitarian in their tagging requirements, so prepare to be tagged dammit!

17. I like to make beer. I am just starting into all-grain brewing.

xiv. I was second in my state and went to nationals for the Citizen's Bee. It's like a spelling bee only with American studies/history questions

d. All the competitions, special tests, contests, etc. that I entered in High School were primarily excuses to get out of class. I just get really competitive once I am actually in one. In the abstract I could usually care less.

8. In spite of being an avid punk/heavy metal/alternative music lover, I like James Taylor's music. I blame my parents

XX. My children are my single proudest achievement in my life

25. I am a liberal democrat but find myself drifting towards libertarianism at times

f. I think every person in America should be required to go to Boot Camp, not necessarily be in the military, God no. The lessons from Boot Camp are life altering (in a good way) however.

1a. I abhor mistreatment of the flag through negligence or apathy, but defend the right to burn the flag as a form of protest. Yes it seems a juxtaposition but really it is about respect. Don't make me knock your hat off when the flag goes by during a parade.

E(b16). I am a member of the American Legion, the American Homebrewers Association, the Democratic party, the RPGA and AMVETS

Twelve. I originally decided to become a dealer (part-time, lol) just to help my poker game. I rarely play anymore.

__. I used to have my own freelance web design business. I find that I tend to dislike clients, so no more of them, thank you.

VII. I was a paid writer for the MMO game Shadowbane as part of the Herald program.

j. I worked for the IGN network for a short time as a paid writer

9. I once did a consultant job in LA for a firm looking to bring Asian MMORPGs to the American market

1101(b2). I love the new Dr. Who (and some of the other BBC scifi series) and am working hard at fostering this in my children. I am only batting .500 so far.

cc. I met my wife on a blind date. I think I used a normal man's lifetime quota of good luck in one day that day.

23 I believe in pretty much everything; ghosts, UFOs, etc. I think people are too easily influenced to believe that they have experienced these things however. I think they are far more rare and have much different explanations than we are coming up with right now. If that doesn't make sense, I don't care because it's my believe not yours.

eighteen. I like odd sounding words and word combinations: Fuck-knuckle, Koumpounophobia, Tristadecaphobia, Irish Wristwatch, etc.

21 I am over half Irish. My mother is 3rd generation full-blooded Irish in America and my father, from what he's said, a very small part Irish. I love the Irish language: Póg ma thoin

xxii. My favorite number is 52. It has been that since I was 6, even before I knew how many cards were in a deck or could play cards.

h. I still carry my lifetime crew member card for USS Constitution and a copy of my DD214 in my wallet to this day.

25 I miss having art in my life. I used to paint and draw a lot and was even thinking about pursuing design/fine arts in college. Life just gets so full sometimes. My one surviving painting hangs above my fireplace now.