homebrew!

i'm fretting quite extensively about the IPA that S and i homebrewed on Friday (he took the day off of work to brew: there's a man who has his priorities straight!)

it was the first batch i've brewed in a long time, and the first time he's ever brewed. more worrisome to me, i've always brewed with other, more experienced brewers, who were in charge of when the inevitable existential and logistical crises developed. being the lead brewer was pretty nerveracking.

good things:

• we got it all brewed, without totally destroying the kitchen in the rented home he just moved in to about two weeks ago.
  
• it's the correct general color
  
• it started with a VERY vigorous fermenting action
  
• i have yet to be made sick by it

bad things:

• i dropped the carboy (thankfully, we spent the extra $20 for a high tech, plastic carboy!) while aerating it, spilling probably a half gallon.
  
• the disinterested guy that sold us the homebrew equipment didn't bother to point out that the high tech plastic carboy needed a smaller rubber cork for the airlock, so the homebrew spent its first 24 hours of existence with ziploc bag taped over it for an airlock.
  
• we only had a 15.1 liter pot to brew in, so we were volume limited, and i didn't add enough plain water to the fermenter, so we only have about 3.5 gallons fermenting in the 5 gallon carboy.
  
• the fermenting action has dropped dramatically, leading me to worry incessantly.
  
• S's house is FUCKING COLD, so we've had to turn on the heat to keep the fermenting temperature warm enough, which makes the front living room area of his house unbearably hot. so i closed all the vents in the house outside of the room where it's fermenting.

i'm toying with re-pitching yeast tomorrow if we don't get some fermentation action.

in other notes, The Good Senator is in town, and we spent most of yesterday brewpub touring. links to reviews to be posted soon.

back to worrying about the homebrew, and reading Papazian's The Complete Joy of Homebrewing.