Adventures in Wine-Making, Day Nine

Sorry for the delay. I got distracted. This week, on Dirty Jobs, my Dirty Boy was making all kinds of Dirty Jokes about his Dirty Tool. I had to go to bed for two days with the Dirty Vapors...

But I'm back now, and ready to tell you all about Day Nine!

Day Nine is when you put it -- the juice/wine/must stuff, whatever you call it at this stage -- into the secondary fermentor. Which is just a fancy way of saying "clean bucket." Or bottle, as the case may be.

As the case is here:

That's it when it was still up on the counter full of sterilizing fluid. A.K.A. bleach.

No! A.K.A. not bleach! I was only kidding about the bleach! A.K.A. Something Else! I don't know what it is because Johnny's in charge of Buying Stuff, but it comes in a package that says "sterilizing jazz" (or something along those lines) so that you know it's not really just bleach -- just like you know that what's in a package labeled "lips and assholes" is not really just hot dogs.

Now, what you have to do is, you have to siphon the wine-solution out of the primary fermentor (first bucket) into the secondary (jug). Johnny got this step set up and going too fast for me to take a picture, because he didn't want you-all to know that he was using his mouth to get the siphon going.

I said "So what? How else are you supposed to do it? And besides, I'm just going to tell them anyway."

And he said "Well, then make sure to tell them not to swallow what they suck up in there, or else they'll have the scutters for a week!"

Which sent me into a fit of such hysterics that it was half done siphoning before I managed to get this shot:

(Okay, maybe not quite half done, but still...)

Here is where gravity -- the real gravity, not the specific kind -- comes in handy: bucket on the counter, jug on the floor, both of them covered with white napkins so God can't see them eating baby birds.

Whoops.

Okay, now both of them covered with -- well, so, that's a wad of toilet paper, but it works. Really it's just to keep the fruit flies out until we put the lid on.

Which, ta da!

Now the wineless primary looks like this:

And if you thought the wine would give you scutters, boy howdy! You don't want to go anywhere near that scudge. The glass or two of plonk you might manage to salvage just ain't worth it. Trust me. Or trust Johnny, actually. I wouldn't know. Cuz I don't poop.

And that's it! Put the glass jug somewhere out of the way and try not to jostle it for the next couple of weeks. The airlock will bubble away and the cloudiness will settle out as the yeast eats up all the sugar it can find and farts and dies.

Which, oddly enough, is almost exactly what I do when I drink it!

Adventures in Wine-Making, Days Four Through Seven or So

Well, really that title should say "Days three through six or so," but since we forgot day three, we're starting on day four and tacking an extra day on to the end. We don't know if that's necessary or if it's just plain wrong, but it's what we did.

Really, you're supposed to measure the specific gravity of the wine to tell you when it's done, which has something to do with how much heavier or lighter than water your liquid is, which tells you (I think) something about the alcohol content. But you need a special tool to measure it and we say bollocks to that. Dionysus didn't have no specific gravity measuring machine, and he did pretty well for himself, as far as we can tell. Right?

So for days four through seven or so, here's what you do:

Step One: Open the bucket...

See that scudge floating on top? That's yeast poop. Or dead yeast. Or something. Actually, I've no idea what it really is, but it's supposed to be there, so don't worry.

Step Two: Stir it...

You can't see it in this picture, but there's a spoon in Johnny's hand and he is stirring it. Make sure you stir in all the scudge, and get down to the bottom where more yeast poop/dead yeast/whatever has come to rest. Johnny says it doesn't matter if you scrape every last bit off the side of the bucket, but when it was my turn to stir I did anyway. Because I'm good like that. And maybe just the slightest bit obsessive.

Step Three: Squeeze the bag. This is not a euphemism. Use the spoon.

The neat thing is that it will turn itself over for you. As you squeeze the gas out of one side, when you release it the gas that's still in the other side makes it bouyant enough that it flips gently over and presents itself to you for squeezing. Very helpful.

Oh, and that gas, by the way? Definitely yeast farts. Definitely.

It's not necessary for you to taste a little of it every day, and in fact Johnny refused because he's scared of live yeast, but I did. Just, when I was done, I let a drip from the spoon fall on my finger. The first day (which as we know was technically the fourth day) it still tasted like Welch's grape juice, but by the last day it was actually starting to taste like wine.

Not good wine. Not yet. But at least we know it's working.

Oh, Just Because It's Been a While...

It's not the best picture I ever took, but look what turned up on my bedroom skylight this morning:

Can't see it? Can't guess? Don't forget who you're dealing with here, after all...

Okay, here's help:

And it doesn't look like your standard bird poop, either. In fact, I'm starting to worry there might be cows lurking up in them there trees.

Shit*, I hope this doesn't happen:

*(no pun intended)**

**(okay, maybe little pun intended)

Hey, Housebloggers!

So it turns out that not everyone at Houseblogs.net wants to read about my poop and dental problems. I mean, my dental problems and my poop -- not my poop problems. Not my poop, either, actually, but all the kinds of poop I manage to find myself in the middle of before I know what hit me. Well, not in the middle of, exactly. Or hit me, either, for that matter.

Not everybody wants to read this garbage, if you can imagine.

So the good folks at Houseblogs.net have set up a program (not just for me; apparently there are other folks out there posting on poop and dental problems) whereby if I type the word "Houseblogs" waaaay down at the bottom of the post (you see it down there? it's green), then the post will show up on their website. If I don't, it won't.

And I'm only allowed to do that if the post is somehow marginally related to my actual, you know, house. Or, not necessarily my house, but houses or housing. Or anything related to it like heat or gas or oil. Contractors or insulation. Stripping paint off woodwork for two freaking years. Even the President of the United States of America if he happens to mention any of the above. But not if he mentions poop, or dental problems.

So.

For those of you who come here from Houseblogs.net and are relieved by this development, I deeply apologize and humbly bow from the waist.

For those who come from Houseblogs.net and actually, due to some old head injury or something, sincerely want to read about my poop and dental problems -- if you get a kick out of my silly poems, stupid pictures and etcetera -- may I suggest that you subscribe (using that big orange button over there --->) or else bookmark me for perusing at your own discretion?

And for those of you who come to me from elsewhere, carry on. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Or his poop.

Or dental problems.

Somewhere Over The AssVac...

I wanted to show you how my skylight has turned into a Pollocky study in bird poop, but my pictures just keep coming out like this:

Of course. Because it's, you know, a skylight.

So you're just going to have to take my word: it's gross.

I know, you're heartbroken that you don't get to see it, right?

I've really got to get over this fascination I seem to have lately with excrement...

Johnny Is Very Strange

Johnny was out in the garden for about an hour after work. He’s gone for a pint now. I wandered out to water the apple trees in the front yard and I found this:

Yeahsfaljkhdfa!

I could actually (block your ears if you’re squeamish) could actually hear them scrabbling around in there!

He doesn’t like to kill anything, but he knows the grubs aren’t good for the garden, so he pulls them out and sets them aside. I can’t bring myself to step on them cuz yeahsfaljkhdfa, so usually he throws them out into the street to get run over by a car.

This, though, this is new. Maybe he plans to make a little mud pie out of them? Maybe he just hopes they’ll bake to death in the sun? Maybe he plans to take them down to the river and set them free... Ooh, maybe he plans to take them down to the river and go fishing! Do any oceany-rivery-type fish eat grubs?

Yuck. I still don’t think that I could touch one even if it meant bluefish for dinner.

Oh, and when I shut off the water from the spigot I found this:

Yes, that’s right ladies and gentleman, I have now officially taken a picture of poop.

But seriously, although you can’t tell because the picture is crap (ba-dump bump), that pile of poo is perched nicely on the sill to our (albeit rotten) basement window. And, not to get too graphic about it or anything, it looks like whoever left it has been eating a lot of oats.

Skunks? Raccoons? Do they eat oats? If so, why would they be pooping on my windowsill? Don’t they have more private places to do that sort of business? Like under my front porch?

But if not them, then who?

Now, before you even think it -- and despite the title of this post -- I know for sure it wasn’t Johnny.

I don’t remember the last time I got him to eat an oat.

(ba-dump bump)