NBS BIF #12 Sign Up Thread

Blah blah blah, yadda yadda yadda ..... is Kimmich gonna brew a milkshake IPA or not???

ISO

 

Left out the part where the dining room of the hotel was gutted by a fire that started by people playing catch with the table candles........

 

After some thought, I think I’d like to join in this round if you’ll have me. I’d need a volunteer to ship north though. With the border closed indefinitely, my Buffalo helper isn’t really much help of late.

I can send along some pointers on shipping to Canada that will help keep the cost down and the likelihood of a smooth trip through customs high. I’m also happy to assume all the customs risks; if the box gets seized, I’ll take the loss.

The good news is, due to the near total lack of American beer available here, I’m a pretty easy target when it comes to finding new beers. If there aren’t any volunteers to send cross-border, no offence will be taken.

 

I'm sure someone will volunteer. But it wouldn't hurt to post those pointers for whomever gets yinz now and for future reference. There are some damn good beers brewed in Canadia, most of which never cross the southern border.

 

I once took a creeper picture of Jeremy Kozmicki from behind while he ate lunch at Founders with his wife and kids. I'll try to find the picture and post it after the statute of limitations for stalking runs out.

 

Found it

 

Hey-oh! Sorry, meant to respond the other day.

I'm taking a step back from beer. I've spent a lot over the last few years and have some new kittens and obligations I need to take care of now. I'm sure I'll be in and out of NBS and I'll see you all around

Also looking forward to seeing what beers you all sling around this year. Some amazingly kind and generous members of BA right here!

 

Hope a long story is okay, I apparently can't summarize well-

Back in the middle ages of the SCA, a group I used to belong to that studies the middle ages by recreating (not reenacting) the various areas of interest. It was a glorious time, I made many friends and learned countless skills and saw things no other living mortal has ever seen. I tell you now the story of the Pensic Loogie.

Pensic War happens every year in western PA, near Butler. Back when it was still growing, the camp grounds were expanded over and over, sometimes in haste. People camping in groups were assigned sections of the grounds and they were allowed to tap into the campgrounds water supply for showers and cooking. With our allotted land that year, we had a problem – the water tap was not threaded like all the others, so hooking up our water system wouldn’t be possible. Well, Culyn and I, being guys, figured we would just replace it with a hose bib like every other tap out there. How hard could it be?

We went to the Everything store and bought the hose bib, the hose clamps and a vacuum breaker for the task and headed back to camp. We asked some of the other members of the group to run around and open any reasonably close taps to lessen the pressure. We had our tools ready, the parts ready, we were ready. Once the other taps had been opened (I think there were 2 within 100 meters) we opened up the old tap to relieve and pressure, and gasped as a slimy green something stretched out of the tap about 4 inches and then slowly retreated. This was such a complete surprise to both of us that we stared at it for a minute, looked at each other, and back at the tap.

“What the hell was that?” he asked .

I responded “How the hell should I know?”

“Is it alive?”

“I don’t know, sure looked like it”

This went on for a minute until we became aware of people yelling at us about running the other taps, so we shook our heads and got back to work. We carefully opened the tap again to release the pressure and it came back – slowly, like it was being cautious. So we turned off the tap and it pulled back very quickly. We didn’t know whether to be scared or grossed out or what. Neither of us had any experience with what looked to be living snot. But we were guys and the women needed water for their showers and we would not let them down. So we started again, this time with resolution and opened that tap up wide and that slimy entity came back and shook what we could only guess was its tongue at us before slipping back into the tap. We were astounded, it had to be alive! But what was it?

Culyn had the idea of grabbing it the next time it came out. I told him to go for it – but I wasn’t going to touch it. So he prepared himself and I put my hand on the handle and turned on the water. Slowly at first, no sign of the snot creature. So I cranked it open to almost full and the creature came back out and Culyn grabbed for it and water was going everywhere and people were yelling at us and I was yelling at Culyn to grab the thing and Culyn screamed like a little girl and threw his hands away from the tap. So I slammed off the water again.

He looked at me with a wild look in his eyes, I looked at him and we both burst out laughing as we had no other response appropriate. We may be dealing with prehistoric or alien life and it was slimy! What do we do? We thought we should drink on it and think it through, but time was of the essence – those other open taps were making small rivers of mud and more campers were complaining about lack of water access. So no time for beer, we had to act.

Right. No snot creature was going to get the better of us. We devised another plan. Cut the plastic pipe just below the old tap and throw the removed tap (and hopefully the creature) into a bucket. Then quickly affix the new hose bib. Utility knives are sharp, but don’t cut through plastic pipe in one go, I was getting soaked, but finally made the cut. Culyn bravely grabbed the closed tap and threw it in a bucket and turned to help me get the new spigot on. Got it on once, had to take it off to put on the hose clamp. We are both soaked and tools are slipping and people are laughing at us but we prevailed. Our camp could have showers now! Capital improvements to the campsite.

But what was in the bucket? We had put a little water in it as it seemed to live in it, but it was not to be seen. Culyn wouldn’t touch it, so I mustered up my courage and carefully lifted the old tap from the bucket. No sign of the creature. I twisted the handle while holding it at arm’s length. No sign of it. I looked in the opening, nothing. I looked in the end that we cut off – nothing. OMG, was the thing still in the water supply? Is there a colony of them?

Our fellow campers had shut off their open taps and come back to admire the new threaded spigot. Culyn and I didn’t know if we should tell them about the slime creature, our filters should keep it out of the water. But curiosity won out and I started taking apart the old tap from the pipe. The parts would be used for something. As I was pulling off brass tap off the plastic pipe finally, the slime creature reappeared! Now I was screaming like a little girl and had *everybody’s* attention.

I had dropped it in my shock but looked closer; it wasn’t moving. Did we kill it? Culyn came over and looked at it. 5 other people came over and looked at it – there it was, on the grass, stretched between the tap and the plastic pipe. Someone prodded it. Nothing. So I bent down and carefully took hold of the pipe and pulled. It hung on. Then it did something completely unexpected – it unraveled out of the pipe! The new part was less slimy – dry even. What was this thing? I pulled a bit more and then touched the dry part very carefully. Then I swore every word I knew and made some up. It was silicone plumbers tape that part of it had gotten algae on.

 

The Amazing Koz!

 

Great story! Nothing like life's "I'm a moron" moments....we all have them.

The dreaded tape monster.....

 

Oh, a fully matured version! The color is even pretty close!

 

October through Feb are always really busy times for me with kids sports schedules and work so it’s tough to keep up. I know I did a lot of talk to text posts from the road (don’t Ba and drive!) in the past to stay engaged. Still considering it though.