Hows my little Chili Beer?

Holy Ghost Chili Batman!

Awhile back I got lucky and scored some cheap ghost chili peppers from the Galena Garlic Co. at the Illinois Product Expo on the premise of me sending the guy a few beers I promised I would brew with them.

Handling with caution.

Well the beer is finally brewed and I got the pleasure to see my friend Ryan's new (homemade) homebrew setup in action. The rig goes under the name of 5Thumbs if you're interested in one of your own, and you should be, it's a thing of homebrewed beauty.

I wanted the beer to taste like a nice smoky Chipotle Salsa, with just enough fire to be able to finish a bottle but too much heat to want a second one. I used a honey nut brown recipe, a bit of smoked malt, 5 ghost chilis, and honey added after the boil to get my flavor. I'm thus far very excited about where the brew is headed. This was planned to be a big slightly malty and boozy brew but due to some technical difficulties we ended up with a 6 gallon batch instead of a 5 gallon, which is not a problem, when I racked it the beer tasted perfect. I can only hope it stays that way in the secondary and the bottle!

The one gallon test boil to find out how much heat the pepper would impart.

The scariest sip of water I've ever tried.

5 Ghost Chili peppers going in at the beginning of the boil!

This I'm excited for the brew to be ready! I hope you are too! 

Right now the name for it is awful, 'The Hot 'n Spicy Honey Nut Brown' any better ideas out there?

Hows my little planter?

I swear people use our alley next to our house to avoid stopping at the stop sign 300 feet away. I got sick of people flying through it so I took matters into my own hands, who cares if it looks ridiculous.

So far I'm the only person who has run it over.

I do think it has had an impact and fewer people are driving down the alley since its now a hard right turn instead of using the 30 foot extension that is/was our yard.

A little Miracle Grow and some grass seeded next too it and it won't look quite as absurd in a few weeks!

Check out our drought stricken yard! We haven't mowed for 3 weeks!

Hows my little Shawnee visitor?

Pretty much since we moved down to Illinois we have always wanted to check out the Carbondale area, thanks to one of my old room mates in college. He told me of hills, trees, and places to climb and hike. Since we moved here we learned that both southern Illinois and Indiana are home to a host of different wineries. After plenty of our customers at work have told me about winery hopping on the Shawnee Hills wine trail we decided that it was high time we check out the camping and the wine.

Our first night there we stayed at the Von Jakob (pronounced yakob) Winery/Brewery/B&B it was a nice little spot and it was great to start the day at a winery that made some fantastic wine!

For the rest of the day we got our campsite setup at Giant City State park and hiked all of the short trials in the park. Laura and I were both pretty excited to be wandering along cliffs and hills amongst vast expanses of trees.

We both brought our swimsuits so that we could find a spot in the lake to swim in. We decided against swimming here though.

Illinois for whatever reason thinks prohibition is a good idea and has reinstated it at all of the state parks. Except at this one you can enjoy alcoholic beverages in the summer only...ridiculous? Yes.

Our campsite came with a small leash, using it and wine I was able to keep Laura from scampering off out of my sight.

The next day we decided we should hit as many wineries as possible. We found out from Von Jakob that Big Muddy Brewing was close by so we started off there with a very healthy tasting and tour with the owner. We stopped by a total of eight places, Big Muddy, Kite Hill, Pamona, Hickory Ridge, Owl Creek, Star View, Blue Sky, and Rustle Hill. I loved driving all around the area because we were zipping through, trees, over hills, around fun little cuves and bends. Our favorite stops were Pamona and Blue Sky Vineyards, they were both so relaxing locations which were unique in their own way, oh, and the wine was too. 

Pamona was built on a hill and the backside looked into the woods.

So peaceful!

Cheers!

Our last day we decided to take a hike into the little grand canyon of Illinois. It was a really nice little hike full of cliffs and waterfalls. We even managed to get lost for a little while due to a giant lack of signage.

I took this photo thinking it was a nice dried waterfall picture, not knowing this was also our trail back to the car.

We had a great time in southern Illinois! I would recommend a visit here to anyone who wants a nice weekend getaway, there are tons of B&B's, wineries, and nature to make anyone happy. We are planning on going back again someday to check out a different place to camp and some of the other wineries that we missed. Want to join us?

Hows my little Tough Mudder?

The Tough Mudder, where to begin? How to describe it? What were we thinking?

Team Jolly Roger: Eric, Diana, Me Jon, Brian, Chaz, Jason, Laura, Andrew, Dad, Aaron, Ryan, Missing Brian

The weekend started off great with a rental car and a road trip up to Minnesota with our new friends Eric and Diana. We kicked it off with a tour of Summit and a few cold ones afterwards. I'm still convinced that beer fresh from the brewery is its best. We bought some of the Dunkelweizen down here when we got back and it wasn't the same.

After some good homebrews at Brian's house we had a nearly sleepless night due to nerves.

After we got our big team of 13 Jolly Rogers together we headed to the starting line for one of my favorite parts of the race, we had to scale a 6 foot wall just to get to the starting gate. In the corral we got the most fantastic pump up/pep talk and were then released into the 11.5 mile challenging course.

When I was trying to recruit teammates for the race most people were terrified of the last obstacle "Electroshock Therapy", well that wasn't the worst one, the first was. The Arctic Enema was up there with the most unpleasant. It was a giant dumpster filled with ice and water, not just a little ice either, they used a huge box attached to a forklift full of ice to fill it up. But to make it memorable there was a wall in the middle with barbed wire on top that you had to swim under, and for whatever reason, people weren't in a hurry to get out on the other side. Standing up to my chest in frigid water was a pretty shocking way to get the morning started.

The Electric Eel, Sliding through the mud to avoid the shocking wires dangling.

The next worst part of the race was the hills. For some reason, I didn't really consider the running portion of the Tough Mudder, just the obstacles. So for the race to be on a ridiculously hilly course was extremely unexpected and we all ended up with some sore thighs as a result.

Speaking of challenges, I forgot to mention the weather. We kicked of the day with a nice misty 65 degree morning chill in the air. The wind bit through everyone's wet clothes and skin.

This is me using my body as a ladder for strangers...sure warmed me up!

Jon was the only one who made it up without climbing people.

So it sounds like a great time doesn't it? Absolutely! One of the big mantras of Tough Mudder is teamwork and camaraderie, I had a great time with a fun group of people running all over the hills and helping everyone up, over, and through all of the obstacles.

Strangers were very willing to help Laura down

Although we had a less than desirable finish due to a really long wait at Everest (a 20 foot slippery and muddy quarter pipe) and a frigid temp drop we all made it through. It sounds like most people on our team thought one Tough Mudder is enough, I on the other hand, with a few others will continue on with more. They are way more fun than a half marathon (and marathon obviously),  the length easily trumps the shortness of the warrior dash, and who doesn't like getting down and dirty with a few thousand other muddy and fit individuals.

See you at Tough Mudder Chicago 2013! (if the world doesn't end)

Hows my little bachelor in Chicago?

So far I've been to four-ish bachelor parties and they've all been very different, which is cool because they all have seemed to reflect everyone's personalities. Nathan's party was in Chicago, a fantastic city to over indulge in anything you can imagine.

We kicked off our day at Wrigley Field for an awful cubs game. The gameplay was no better than a couple of decent little league teams and I wasn't dressed for the weather in the least bit, 51 and misty. But the Wrigley experience was really cool. stepping out into the field is like a time machine, nothing lights up, everything is very classic, the old style was good and so were the ballpark dogs.

After that we watched the Kentucky Derby which was a really fun race, If I've watched it before  I don't remember. It may have been so fun because I ended up drinking most of the mint juleps I bought for the table, sometimes a taste for whiskey has it's advantages.

My favorite part of the evening was the Boat.

We (I) played this song obnoxiously loud and frequently. We got both approving and disapproving looks from the restaurants along the river. If anyone is looking for a way to kill a couple of hours I highly recommend looking this up, especially since you can BYOB. Shoot for your ride at sunset if you can.

The Hancock tower shrouded in a cloud.

We saw a 30 foot marilyn on one of our jaunts.

Altogether the weekend was a good one and I reaffirmed that I love visiting chicago.

She was wearing white panties.

Hows my little updater?

April was a busy month, I feel like just in time for me to feel all nice and rested I would do something to get my body all exhausted again. It all began with a big load of shit.
Literally.

About 10 miles from our house is a sheep farm and their big thing is called ewe poo compost. So while we were borrowing my Dad's truck for the roofing supplies I figured I would dump a load into the garden. You can't get a much more organic fertilizer than grass fed sheep poop, right?

Contrary to what you might guess, the poop doesn't actually smell, and it's all dried out and ground down, its more like dirt than poo. But yes, I am standing in a big pile of shit...The things people will do for their garden.

If you're wondering about the hay, we cover our garden with landscape fabric and hay during the winter and that combination kills weeds like it's nobody's business. Last fall we expanded our garden by quite a bit (the diagonal fencepost in front was the corner from last year). We didn't turn over any of the grass or weeds and had almost none survive the winter!

That strip of hay was where I already had ewe poo, and had planted onions, which are growing nicely now!

One of the most exciting things from this month was FINALLY!!!! receiving my Blichmann BoilerMaker brew kettle. I bought this beauty back in January and due to some ridiculous manufacturer supply issues I didn't get it for nearly three months! I have yet to brew a batch with this bugger but I can't wait! Check out this beauty:

The only hiccup is I didn't really understand how all grain brewing worked when I bought this and now I've got a new project to work on to utilize the false bottom. Oh well... 

We also got the opportunity to check out the fantastic and mostly abandoned Fischer Theatre in Danville through the YPN (Young Professionals Network) group we meet with. I've got a soft spot in my heart for abandoned places, I'm not sure why. Abandoned and grotesquely dirty bathrooms are also really cool to me.

  

Jazz Greats like Duke Ellington performed on this stage. Rumor has it Gene Hackman got his start here as well.

Why is that tube there? I'm not sure I care to find out why the water is so brown.

The Fischer is spending their money on useful things first like roofing and cosmetics last, but this ceiling in the main entry has been restored beautifully.

Last weekend was the Illinois Marathon and boy was it a good one! This year Laura and I both signed up for the I-Challenge, we ran the 5K together and then both ran the half marathon the next day. Laura and I tied at the finish of the 5K with a time of 31:05, except I got 1570 place and Laura got 1572 place, apparently someone finished between her and I. The next day we were both not so excited about running the half marathon since on the drive over it was down pouring, windy, and the temperature was hovering right around 50 degrees. Lucky for us the weather broke and the wind died down, the rain stopped, but it stayed cold. I was fortunate to have dressed properly and my plaid tights really pulled through on this one, I got lots of good comments and jokes about them, and laughed at quite a bit too. I was pretty jazzed about my time I was hoping for even one second less than two hours but bested that by several minutes. My chip time was 1:52:35. This was Laura's longest run she has ever done in her life and managed a great time of 2:45:32. My Dad also completed the Half marathon, I apparently passed him in the last mile and he didn't even say hi! I spent like 11+ miles looking for him before I gave up. 

I-Challenge Hardwear. 5K, Half, & I-Challenge Medals.

This is our I-Challenge crew post race. Three first timers and two veterans.

On Sunday, while feeling only a bit sore (thanks to some good training?) I decided while the dumpster was still in our driveway from the roofing project I should take an old plugged up chimney out of our attic. This would make way for our big upstairs project should we decide to ever get around to funding it. This was only fun for about 5 minutes. Playing Jenga with 8 pound bricks that can crash through your floor/ceiling if you fuck up is not fun. Also climbing a rickety ladder with heavy 5 pound buckets over and over and over is a giant pain in the ass.

Yes that chimney is crooked and leaning on the top right.

I either raised a lot of dust or awoke a lot of orb spirits. Believe what you will.

So Life has been pretty busy. I should have warned you this was going to be a long one.