Author Archives: Matt

Bitterness

This is what my Hallertau hop vine looked like on April 2nd of this year:

And this is what it looks like today (July 23rd):

hops big

hops big too

Indeed, it has grown. I've done a little better job this year of training it. Next year, I'm going to dig the rhizome up and split it into two plants. Then, I'm going to plant it along the back fence so I can train a vine on each one of the vertical pieces of fence. It'll provide us some more privacy and hopefully increase my yield.

I also harvested some cone flowers last night and started drying them:

Hop Coneflowers

I've already harvested more than I had all of last year. I'm hoping to have enough to brew a batch without supplementing the hop bill with anything bought.

I had enough time to transfer the hefeweizen to the secondary. It looks, smells, and tastes fantastic. I'm going to try to bottle the stout sometime this week.

Should they stay or should they go?

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The Wichita Wranglers have a snowball's chance in Wichita of existing next season. Springdale Arkansas has approved funding for a new stadium. The team owners (Mork and Mindy Rich) are "on vacation" at a posh resort with their craniums crammed in the beach.

The sports broadcasters and writers in Wichita have covered all the points:

Attendance is down
The Wranglers are a AA affiliate for a Major League team that wouldn't beat most AAA teams
WSU has a better stadium, team, program, bigger fan base, and a coach who can't find somewhere else to go
Wichita can't keep professional sports teams

Frankly, I don't care about the Wranglers. If they can find a better deal somewhere else, they should take it. And, as a tax paying resident of Wichita and Sedgwick County, I don't think the interested municipalities should extend considerations to keep the team here.

There will be a team playing in Lawrence Dumont when the Wranglers leave (independent leagues I'm looking at you). And the ticket-buying public won't care if the baseball on the field seems to be of "lesser" quality. An IL team will work harder to get people in the stands and have an entertaining product on the field.

I'm more concerned with National Baseball Congress Tournament. The NBC tourney is baseball in the purest form and needs to be kept in Wichita.

Wichita has a country club?

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Yes, yes it does. We were there for my wife's aunt's wedding reception.

The above is my wife (on the right) and her cousin from Iowa.

What kind of tractor is that?

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I've been waiting on pictures to post about my recent trip to Minnesota.

Dad and I drove straight through Friday night and made very good time. We were in Mt. Lake before 2am. After a few hours of sleep (and our initial trailer tire change), we got to the task of loading the tractor and engines.

Luckily, we had some help and the masterful tractor skills of Rodney Goertzen. We loaded the Rumely, six engines, and two old Maytag engines with relative ease.

After an interesting evening seeing people I haven't seen in 15 years and a nice quick trip to Minneapolis to see the Twins , we set off back home for Kansas. Our rough calculation for trailer weight was about 6900 lbs on a trailer rated for 7000. Plus about 600 lbs in the truck bed. Plus at least that much in the cab because I wouldn't ride in the bed.

Many thanks to Rodney and Mary Goertzen for the good conversation, kind hospitality, and hard work.

Our trip back to Kansas was a bit more eventful. Every time we fueled up or stopped for food, people would ask what the heck we were hauling. Most of the interest was in the tractor, but a couple of people knew enough to ask about the other engines.

We lost our first trailer tire just south of Norfolk, NE. The tread cap completely came off at about 60 mph but the tire stayed inflated. We were able to pull off the highway and get it changed without having to unload anything.

Almost immediately after we started back on the highway, we started losing pieces of the two trailer tires we hadn't replaced. We limped into Eisenmann Supplies in Madison, NE. The owner was working the counter and remarked that he had "cut a lot of engines like that up for junk back in the day."

In order to speed the process along, I helped put the tires back on. After settling up, we were on our way.

The rest of the trip was fairly smooth. The truck had some minor transmission issues that were solved by adding trans fluid. My wife and Abe met us in Hutchinson Kansas and dad drove the rest of the way to Pratt. His neighbor Bob helped him unload.