Hi kidlets. I know it has only been about 4 days since my last post but here we are.

On February 1st, I brewed a porter. Now it is in the fermenter with the yeast doing their thing. What is a porter, you might ask? Well, that may or may not be easy to answer. Porters were the first “industrial” beer, originating in the 17th century and becoming a staple in Great Britain. The actual origin of porter is lost in myth and anecdote, but it has its roots in brown ales. It was the drink of the laborers and was aged in huge vats. On 17 October 1814, Meux & Co’s Horse Shoe Brewery in London had a 22 foot high vat burst open, knock out the back wall of the brewery and flood the surrounding neighborhood. There were injuries and a few deaths as a result. After this they started using smaller vats to age beer. Stout beer is a direct offshoot of porter. Back in 1986 when my brother got me into brewing my first batch was a porter. I remember fondly using a 2.5 Kg can of malt extract and a 5lb bag of corn sugar. It came out good and started my interest in brewing.

So this batch is fermenting. Fermentation of beer goes through some stages. First the yeast prepares itself by absorbing nutrients and minerals that it needs to work. The second stage is when yeast is metabolizing the sugars in the wort (raw beer) and producing carbon dioxide, alcohol and flavor compounds which complement the flavor of the beer. The final stage is when the yeast re-absorbs some of the byproducts of the process and starts to go dormant. Below I have provided some videos I have uploaded to show these stages.

Today, I had some time, so I went back to Little Buffalo State Park US-1376 and activated. It is close to here and a nice park. It was a beautiful day, nice and sunny but the temperature was around -2C so SWMBO stayed home. I started out on 40M and soon had 10 contacts: enough to be a legitimate activation. I worked 3 more on 40M and then changed band to 17M which seemed to be open. I worked 12 more stations including some dx (Venezuela, Puerto Rico and Finland) along with Washington State, Oregon and other US states. Overall, I logged 25 contacts.

I think I have satisfied my need to blog for today so I will bid you all adieu and namaste.