Sunday, July 23, 2006

Running & Brewing (Part II)

Woot! I've been running for a whole week.

No brewing in the house quite yet due to the heat. Its been so hot here that my basement is now in the high 70 degree F range, too hot to ferment any decent beers. Using a wet towel and a fan I was able to get a carboy of water to maintain a temperature in the high 60's, so I should be able to brew using that trick next weekend. The Bean Bex Birfday Brew will be a reality.

More details on the brewing as I get it under way next weekend...

Sunday, July 16, 2006

Running & Brewing

Since the hike, I've been a lazy bastard. In an effort to try and get my ass moving again I'm signing up for the Atlanta Half Marathon on Thanksgiving day. I bought some running shoes yesterday and did my first run today. It was slow and short, but not as bad as I thought it might be based on the fact that I only run when being chased.

Secondly, my birthday is coming up shortly, so my lovely wife was kind enough to buy me a full kit of goodies to start all grain brewing! I've got 95% of the stuff I need already, just need to make a quick run to Home Depot today to get the remainder of the plumbing parts that I need for my mash-tun and sparge water tank. I should be brewing my firt 5 gallon batch next weekend, an American Pale Ale. Once I have my methodology down and work out all the kinks I'm going to move to 10 gallon batches, enough for 4 cases of beer. Look for "Bean Bex Brews" soon... ;-)

P.S. I called for pizza the other night and they couldn't understand the spelling of my name. Once again a pizza name was called for.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Purchase of the Bellwood Quarry

The City of Atlanta completed the purchase of the Bellwood Quarry as part of the Beltline project. The quarry will be turned into the largest city park in Atlanta and a large drinking water resevoir for the west side. This is huge news! I just want to know when I'll be able to take the dogs down to the park, since its less than 3 miles from my house!

I haven't seen plans for this yet, but I can only assume the Path trail that runs near my house will connect to the new park eventually, meaning we can walk to the park. A new extension to the Westside trail was recently added along with a boardwalk across a local stream. I've yet to check out this new part of the Path... perhaps this week I'll be able to take the dogs for a walk...