Beer: The reason for the two-party system

My buddy Joe Balusik sends this along...

The History of Social Evolution

The division of the human family into its two distinct political branches occurred some 10,000 years ago, when humans coexisted as members of small bands of nomadic hunter/gatherers.

The pivotal event of societal evolution was the invention of beer.

This epochal event was both the foundation of modern civilization and the occasion of the bifurcation of humanity into its two distinct subgroups: Liberals and Conservatives.

Once beer was discovered, it required grain, and that was the beginning of agriculture. Neither the glass bottle nor aluminum can were invented yet, so it was necessary to stick close to the brewery. That's how villages were formed.

Some men spent their days killing animals to barbecue at night while they were drinking beer. This was the beginning of the conservative movement.

Other men who were weaker and less skilled at hunting, learned to live off the conservatives by showing up for the nightly barbecues and doing the sewing, fetching and hair dressing. This was the beginning of the liberal movement. An interesting evolutionary side note: some of these early Liberal men eventually evolved into women.

Liberal achievements include the domestication of cats, the trade union, the invention of group therapy and group hugs, and the concept of democratic voting to decide how to divide the meat and beer that the conservatives provided.

Over the years, conservatives became to be symbolized by the largest, most powerful land animal on earth.

Liberals are symbolized by the jackass.

Modern liberals like imported beer (with lime added), but most prefer white wine or imported bottled water. They eat raw fish but like their beef well done. Sushi, tofu, and French food are standard liberal fare. Another interesting evolutionary side note: most of their women have higher testosterone levels than their men.

Most social workers, personal injury attorneys, journalists, dreamers in Hollywood and group therapists are liberals. Liberals invented the designated hitter rule because it wasn't "fair" to make the pitcher
also bat.

Conservatives drink domestic beer; they eat red meat, and still provide for their women. Conservatives are big-game hunters, rodeo cowboys, lumber jacks, construction workers, medical doctors, police officers, most corporate executives, all soldiers, some athletes, and generally anyone who works productively outside government.

Conservatives who own companies hire other Conservatives who want to work for a living.

Liberals produce little or nothing. They like to "govern" the producers and decide what to do with the production. Liberals believe Europeans are more enlightened than Americans. That is why most of the liberals remained in Europe when conservatives were coming to America. They crept in only after the Wild West was tamed, and created a business of trying to get MORE for nothing.

Here ends the lesson in social history.

Bottled!

I bottled the latest batch last week Tuesday (10-AUG-2004), ending up with 39 bottles, mostly 16-ounce flip-top 'Grolsch' bottles. There were 8 12-oz 'stubbies' used -- I think they were Negra Modelo bottles. These didn't work out so well--the neck on these is very thick, and it made it difficult for me to get the bottle capper to crimp down on them. Hopefully they sealed alright, I had to "recrimp" them twice before the caps looked like they were secure. After they get emptied out, they're going to be recycled.

I really went overboard this time in sanitizing the bottles, filling each and every one with a strong solution of bleach and water, and then leaving them to sit overnight for two nights in a row. (This was after spending a few hours the preceeding Sunday with Savannah cleaning them out.) One nice result was crystal-clear glass, however. I don't believe these bottles were ever any more clean when they were in the original beer bottling factory. I'm reading where the cleaning solution I'm using (have to post the name another time, can't remember it right now) is an adequate sanitizer in and of itself, so really these bottles are double-sanitized. I know it's impossible to completely remove all the bacteria in a basement, rather than a clean-room environment, but I think I've gotten as close as possible with the bottles, anyway.

I picked up a nice trick while I was filling the bottles this time. Instead of setting them directly on the floor to be filled, I put them 8 or 9 at a time into the dishpan I use for sanitizing onto the floor. Now when I slightly misjudge how full a bottle is becoming, the resulting overflow goes into the dishpan instead of onto the floor where it has to be mopped up.

I've decided to rename the beer. Currently the name I'm pondering is 'Presidential Brand Pilsner' and I'm going with a simple design theme for the label. Basically it's an inverted triangle composed of vertical stripes of pale red, white and blue with the words 'Presidential Brand' superimposed horizontally across the top and middle, with the word 'Pilsner' superimposed vertically in the bottom 'tip' of the triangle. Below the triangle is a 'frosty mug' image on a pale blue background. The label also includes the words 'Gariepy's fire-brewed' and 'The Cavant Drive Brewery', along with the bottling date. Since I'm looking for something simple at clean-up time, this will be printed on standard inkjet plain paper, and affixed to the bottle with scotch tape. We'll see how well it works out.

In the meantime, Angela has given me a brand new stock pot for our anniversary! This is a 24-quart model, so I should theoretically be able to do 'full-wort' boils if I decide to go with all-grain brewing sometime in the future. (I also have an old cooler to use for a lauter tun. I found great instructions on how to design one this morning. It looks like an interesting project.) It's a nice, heavy-gauge stainless steel stock pot. The thing must weigh in at nearly double the weight of my old stock pot, which was a gift from my mother-in-law and arrived in the mail with a dent in the bottom. Will a thicker, heavier stock pot be more thermally stable for the 160F-degree 'rests'? We'll see the next time I brew!