I’ve been working long hours lately.  It’s taken a toll on my health.  In case you weren’t sure what that term means every time I walk into my office I have to pay $0.75 at an actual toll booth and gain a half pound in weight.  It’s not pretty.  Toll booths should be prettier given the fact they’re going to take your money.

The good news is that the feature I’ve been pouring myself into is likely going to ship in the next 24-48 hours and we’ll be good to go. I might get some sleep again.  But my body will take a few weeks to move into “tired because it is night time” mode.  Which is a fun transition because it takes me a few weeks to get into “Spending Your Nights Awake and Daze Wishing You Were Asleep” mode.  Working long hours is sometimes part of my job, and that is not a complaint.  What my real complaint is is the fact the clock has hours between about 3:00 PM and 5:00 PM.  I would like to do away with those, or take a siesta, and then all would be right with the world.

Except for that ugly toolbooth.  That I could do without.  I’m still trying to figure out why it’s in my hallway.  Also: where does this fat come from?  I’m pretty sure that it’s not organic cow-beef fat.  I’m guessing it’s from pig, in which case, I want to get it with bacon. Lots & lots of bacon.

There’s a hymn with the name Jesus Paid It all. I enjoy the song a lot, it’s got great lyrics except for the first line of the chorus. It goes like this:

Jesus paid it all
all to Him I owe
Sin had left a crimson stain
He washed it white as snow

Except we don’t owe Jesus. He has redeemed us and made us adopted sons. This is the kind of position that negates any sense of owing.

So we changed it to this:

Jesus paid it all
His grace and love to show
Sin had left a crimson stain
He washed it white as snow

That’s a chorus I can sing with great gusto!

The girls went to school this last week for their first day of the sixth and second grades respectively. Abby is freshly 11 and Evie is going to be 8 in a few months.  It’s pretty amazing being their dad. I am already prepared to throat punch the boys. Stay away from my daughters.

A neighbor put this fine sign up near the entrance of our subdivision.

Only the arrow did not point to anything. In much smaller letters below that it said to go to the first cul de sac. Except there are two cul de sacs right across from one another.  It was the one on the right.

The free stuff reminded me of a saying my old boss at my old job used to say, “You can’t sell what you can’t give away. ” Free trash isn’t in high demand. The free stuff is still out on their driveway.

Part of me wants to move some of it into the other cul de sac just to mess with people. Part of me doesn’t want any such sign up in my neighborhood. Part of me wants to knock on their door and ask if they have any nicer free stuff I could have.

This blog has been more active lately.  It has been a surprise,  even.  But here’s the reason: I got a new smartphone.  I got a Galaxy S4.  It is the perfect laptop for me when I don’t want to carry a laptop.  WordPress has a native app for it so I can snap a picture,  tell a story, and move on.

I am, of course, writing this on my laptop while I wait on a phone call 😉

Not everyone should drink alcohol & I’m not advocating drunkenness, but this post is about brewing beer with my brother, which was fascinating.  Cooking often involves heat and chemical reactions, but rarely at such a scope as this process which takes weeks to months.

We brewed two small batches this day. 2 & 3 gallons each.  An amber and a wheat beer.

Grains are the backbone of the color & flavor. They need to be milled to extract the sugars (maltose).

The milled grains were placed in a sack to make their removal easier.  After you heat them you need to get them out.  Rather than straining the water this lets you just pull out the barley and other grains.

Hops carry the preservative quality of vitamin c and also counter the sweetness to bring balance to the beer’s flavor.

Yes, they are related to hemp. No, you don’t smoke them.

Once the wort (pronounced wurt) is boiled you need to cool it down. This can be done several ways including with this chiller.  The smaller pot was rested in some ice water in the sink.

The yeast & wort go into a carboy. This is a container that will keep the CO2 in, and the oxygen out to prevent funky flavors & spoiling from contamination.

After some time fermenting you can finally drink it.  This is not the beer we brewed, this is some other home brew my brother made.  It was delicious, just like it looks.

These were the tasty, tasty waffles that I had to “judge” last night. The 10yo decided that she was going to challenge her aunts. So they had a throw down. And the aunts made jessica compete.

So in clockwise form (stsrting top left) they were a delicious gluten free waffle, a delicious chocolate stout waffle with cream cheese sauce and salted caramel drizzled on it, a delicious raspberry-lemon waffle, and a delicious jalapeno cheddar bacon waffle with scrambled eggs and cheese sauce on top.

All were delicious and that pained the judges. Who won because they got to eat them 🙂

Because I’m a very blessed man I got to judge this family waffle throw down.

Coffee. But seriously? FRESNO? Can’t we all just get a hitch in our getalong and pretend that every city Starbucks has a shop in doesn’t need a cup?

I love you Fresno peeps, but this is some weird branding.

Chicks dig dirt.  Or I’m guessing so since these eggs are covered in it. That’s what happens when you get them direct from the farmer, I guess.