Pipie Suits Up For Gardening

Brewed a Scottish Peated Wee Heavy Tonight

Visited Austin Homebrew Supply for two and a half cases worth of beer ingredients. Cost me $24 bucks. The six-pack of Sierra Nevada Torpedo I drank while brewing cost me about $10. You do the math.

Grain Bill:

.25 lb. peated

.5 lb. biscuit

1 lb. Special B crystal

1 lb. Cara-Munich
Malt extract:

6 Lbs. amber syrup
Sugars:
.5 lb. Turbinado sugar
.25 lb. Corn sugar

Hops:

.5 oz. Fuggle (bittering)

.25 oz. 10-yr. aged Czech Saaz (flavoring)

Yeast:

Safale S-04 dry English Scottish ale

Yum. Smells like BBQ. And, whene'er to drink you are inclin'd, Tam o' Shanters.

April Updates

Hey, Cupcake.

1) Jodie's back from Houston. I missed her, and so did the kids, but they did really well. Not a single mommy-related meltdown. Went to a birthday party at Goin' Bananas, and Caleb's house warming party (as usual, Scout didn't want to go, then didn't want to leave). Even got a bunch of work done on Saturday. And tonight, with Francesca, we're back to being all together.

2) Mike tried to do it again. Making me feel disoriented and defeated the last few days (he's in ICU, and stable now). Poor Betty. And Lis - like pregnancy isn't a bitch enough as it is.

3) Acquired another boss at work (now I have 4), who's in Raleigh, so I'll probably never meet him. Which is making the lead writer batshit crazy, mostly all over me. Please God -when the hell can I own my own business again?!

4) Got linked in one of Mandy's blog posts, that was nice. Random act of kindness to right the heel.

5) Can't tell you how desperately I'm looking forward to Shannon's graduation. Charles pointed out we'll be there for the North American Organic Brewer's Festival. Maybe drag James along.

7) Need to brew again. I'm thinking Scottish Wee Heavy. Feel like something heady, sweet, and smoked.

6) Thanks for all your support. I love you too. Cheers.

McKinney Falls, Part 3 - Lower Falls

Smith Rockshelter Trail winding up to the Visitor's Center has some steep stone stairs, and wooden walkways.

Toots tracing mile marker 3, in front of Old Baldy (to the left). She's a 500-yr-old bald cypress, over 60 feet tall.

Bathroom and water fountain break at the Visitor's Center. They also lent us some fishing poles. We bought night crawlers at the entrance.

You can tell we're in the middle of a drought - normally this entire rock ledge is spilling over. The girls bounced back and forth between those two rocks up front about 15 times.

Toots pointing to where we were fishing. Not a nibble. Worms were fun to play with, though.

Girls went bouldering instead.

Pipie took off like a little mountain goat.

She just grabbed holds and hauled herself up...

...straight up sheer walls.

Da-dah!

Heeeeee!

My natural-born rock climbers. We also saw frogs and a little shoestring water snake.

I love this place. Only 15 minutes from our house. Before Texas spring heat crashes down, Jodie and Francesca will be with us next time, when we head back for some primitive camping. And some real fishing. Meaning, catching.