RIP Sue Gifford

On occasion you meet someone that truly touches your life, I have had a few but this last weekend I lost one of them. Sue Gifford was a dear friend that touched many peoples lives, especially a lot of young lost college kids attending OSU. I happened to be one of those young lost souls that hadn't a clue what they where doing academically or socially. While I was hesitant at first the Newman Center and Sue Gifford became a safe stable retreat in my life that conforted me and gave me the encouragement to hold on. Sue was one of those people you would have done anything for, because you knew she would have done anything for you and more. I loved talking things through with Sue, heck just a year ago I was talking to her about changing jobs, and she was saying how exciting it would be for me to be back in Corvallis again . I even give thanks to Sue for helping me through some of the bumpiness that existed early on when I was first dating my wife. Sue never judged and after I had decided that Catholisism was not for me Sue still welcomed me to the Newman Center and I still came because that didn't matter what mattered was that we where friends and always will be. Sue had a great laugh and a warm smile I will truely miss you Sue but I will never forget you.

Visiting my new home

Well what can I say really? Richland WA really isn't all that much, you really have to put all of the tri-cities area together to make it a town. I think for my wife and I it will work, I just think we both seriously have jitters about moving to the point that last night we were on a walk (back here at home) and we both started getting very edgy walking past the strawberry fields. Truth is we are really going to miss this place, Richland is dry, somewhat void of what we would consider young person community life, and it's not here. The funny thing is there is a lot of things for young kids to do in Richland, I think people our age get bored and have kids, and there are a ton of dentist, what's that all about? Visiting made us realize how good of an idea it was to rent rather than buy a place, I got to be honest at this point both of us are thinking we'll be there for a year or two and then come back.

I'm still really scared about what I will do up in Richland, Katy thinks I should just get a part time job at a hardware store or something. I think that may be a good idea but I also know from my experience with the brew store last summer that I don't really like retail. I'm thinking yard maintenance could be better, but I'm also worried about how I'll look not really doing something professional. At this point it's good that I don't have a job as there is a lot to do, but since we didn't buy a house I'm going to have to find something to do within a couple of months otherwise I'll probably go crazy. Luckly the house we are renting has a workshop so I should be able to take my woodworing tools with me. Ugh sometimes I like the uncertainty of the future othertimes I don't.

Moving

Well it's looks like we'll be moving to Richland, here's to new adventures!

Beer!!

Was a good night having fun with my camera and drinking a homebrew.

Rhubarb Pie

Rhubarb is a strange thing, for one, raw it's very sour and not all that tasty, for another it's leaves are poisonous, and lastly it really doesn't look like something you should eat. At what point did someone say "I think I'll eat that, it looks like something I should put in my mouth."? OK maybe there wasn't anything else to eat so it was survival of the fittest with only rhubarb and an everlasting supply of sugar to make it palatable. I guess it doesn't really matter how it was first discovered the point is that it was and it's tasty.

Rhubarb seems to be an important part of my family. Our favorite way to prepare it is in a pie, my wife would say it's sack religious to add strawberries to said pie, which is an American tradition, nope we like our pie straight up, rhubarb, sugar and nothing else. We had rhubarb pie at our wedding, we played "Rhubarb pie" by John Fogerty at the procession, and as we speak I'm watching my lovely wife make crust for a rhubarb pie made from rhubarb I just picked from my parents garden.

Your probably thinking I'm going to give you a recipe for rhubarb pie, truth is I don't have a recipe, I don't even help make it and I'm pretty sure my wife just has it in her head somewhere. Truth is thinking about rhubarb pie prompts me to reflect back on my life, I've been doing a lot of reflecting lately. Thursday I quit my job, or I should say I put my two weeks in, anyway I've given the city all I could muster and with a lot of planning and reflecting I determined that it was time. So I guess I now know what I don't want to do but the age old question still remains, what now? Most would say the future is so bright I gotta wear shades, I tend to agree, but the future is also uncertain which scares me a little. Some people have been very supportive of my decision, others have though I am crazy quiting a stable job in what can only be described as the worst economic crisis of our time. I say if not now when?

So I might be blogging again since I will have time, I think it would be cool to write about my experiences going through my quarter life crisis, I'll probably have recipes too, but we'll see. Life is going to be crazy for a while, I'm actually really excited, I think this could be a very positive experience.

Nothin like drinking trees

So yeah I like Gin and I like trees, as many of you know these go together since a key flavoring ingredient in Gin is Juniper.  I had the fortunate luck to pick juniper berries this fall on top of Paulina Peak in Central Oregon.  I have ever since geology field camp loved the taste of juniper berries and ever since have craved the flavor.  As my wife will tell you the first thing I do when I go on a hike in Eastern Oregon is find a juniper berry and then proceed to chew on it while I hike.  I drink less and less Gin these days so I really don't get my juniper fix these days but as you all know I drink beer and it got me thinking why not put juniper in a beer?  Well here is where the juniper berries that I picked on Paulina Peak come in.  As fate would have it I was loaned my moms food dehydrator and as fate would also have it I forgot to take my "Gin berries" out said dehydrator when I gave it back.  Tragically most of my berries where lost in the trash even though my mom heroically dug many out of the garbage for me.  Luck would have it that we just started shopping at a Co Op for our groceries and they have a large spice collection and incidentally juniper berries.  So tomorrow I will be making a juniper nut brown ale for the holiday season, kind of a Christmas tree beer if you will.  The recipe is as follows.

Juniper Nut Brown 5.5 gal batch

9.00 lb Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 76.6 % 
1.00 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 8.5 % 
1.00 lb Oats, Flaked (1.0 SRM) Grain 8.5 % 
0.50 lb Victory Malt (25.0 SRM) Grain 4.3 % 
0.25 lb Chocolate Malt (350.0 SRM) Grain 2.1 % 
1.00 oz Willamette [4.50%] (60 min) Hops 14.7 IBU 
1.00 oz Willamette [5.00%] (15 min) Hops 8.1 IBU 
1.00 oz Juniper berries (5 min)

1 Pkgs Nottingham (Danstar #-) Yeast-Ale 

possibly more Juniper to taste in the secondary fermenter

Tasty Bread

So recipes are what you want?  Well recipes you shall recieve.  I stubbled apon this recipe a couple of months back, it makes some damn tasty bread.  I have never been able to make what I would consider bakery quality bread but this one is a winner.  I'm also surprised at how well this bread holds up, I took a loaf camping and even after a couple of days it wasn't even slightly stale.  I'm thinking as the days get cooler this will be a good bread to hollow out and put some warm home made clam chowder in yummmyyy!