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February 2023
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Howdy, friends—it's been a while! As it turned out, 2023 started with a bang: a weeklong visit from Henry, then a trip with Allison to Oregon to visit my parents, then a business trip to SFO, then a two-week Board meeting sprint, then Lauren going out of town for a Big Talk, and then, and then, and then....
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And then I didn't feel so hot.
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I pulled out one of our remaining Binax tests and within minutes was confronted with that angry red line I had successfully avoided for just about three years. Fortunately for me (4x vaccinated) this has felt more like a bad cold than anything else. Lauren got it too and she's asymptomatic But it weirdly feels like a timewarp back to 2020: self-quaranting, grocery delivery, experimenting with new recipes just to stave off the boredom, binge-watching TV.
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And it's slowed me down just enough to have time to catch up on the website. Some relatively current musings to prove I'm still alive:
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- ChatGPT, and AI in general, is blowing up the world right now. While I very well may be forced to eat my words by our coming robot overlords, I'm choosing to remain skeptical for a bit longer. All these programs are doing is applying a very complicated algorithm to a broad corpus in order to figure out the next word to add to a string of text. Read Stephen Wolfram's exhausting post for an excellent discussion of what's happening. The capabilities they've shown are phenomenal; but this isn't a model of reality. The output of these chatbots goes off the rails pretty quickly because they're just adding statistically probable words to the pile. I predict that we'll find them to be useful tools, but I'm taking the under on it being a true revolution.
- I took advantage of my convalescence to watch Fleishman is in Trouble on Hulu. I took a weird journey with this one. The initial appeal was the show's literary-novel heritage—I missed the book but probably would have liked it. Over the first couple of episodes it pressed every single sensitive button I have regarding class and money and I quickly grew to hate the whole damn thing. As the series came to its close, one of its core themes—how we come to terms in middle age with who we've become and reconcile that with all the potential we had when we were young—resonated strongly and I was satisfied. There's a strong feminist critique of the Roths and the Updikes in there as well, but there's a lot to which I can relate.
- New music: the new Yo La Tengo album is just aces and Quasi's back after ten years with Breaking the Balls of History, which deserves a much better review than Pitchfork gave it. If the red line goes away I'll be seeing both bands over the course of the next week.
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This winter's frantic activity has left me little time for new projects so the backlog isn't high right now. Pacific Gravity is sponsoring the Los Angeles Belgian Brew Challenge next month so I did get a simple Trappist-style ale into the fermenter this weekend (as seen above, mid-bubble). After getting those last few high-ABV monsters out of my system, I want something light so there's an Intonarumori Italian Pils rebrew on deck. And then I'm thinking hard about whether I'm going to go down the Brettanomyces path with a Berliner Weisse—this feels like the next horizon.
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In the meantime I'll be trying to get rid of that damned red line and re-emerge into the world. Have a lovely rest-of-winter, y'all. Be good to each other. Read something enriching. Pre-order the upcoming New Pornographers album. Spring is coming.
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- Your friend in brewing, Eric.
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For those days when you really can't decide.
Ingredients
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- Grain bill: Eraclea Pilsner, Mecca Grade Shaniko, Rye, Honey Malt
- Hops: Cascade, Motueka, Nelson Sauvin
- Yeast: Omega Helio Gazer OYL-405, Red Star Premier Blank Yeast
- Secret Ingredients: Sauvignon Blanc grape concentrate, lightly toasted oak cubes
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Perfidy & Odium Barleywine
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More satisfying than a Dole Whip.
Ingredients
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- Grain bill: Maris Otter Pale Malt, Pale Ale Liquid Malt Extract, Belgian Biscuit, Carapils, Vienna, Special B
- Hops: Galena, Hallertau Tradition, East Kent Goldings, Tettnang
- Yeast: Wyeast London Ale 1028
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A dry saison perfumed with strawberries and brewed in honor of the Peanutgator
Ingredients
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- Grain bill: Belgian Pale Ale malt, White Wheat malt
- Hops: Magnum, Citra, Mosaic
- Yeast: Wyeast French Saison 3711
- Secret Ingredients: Sous vide strawberries, roasted hazelnuts, strawberry-hazelnut simple syrup
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