“Let’s go get some Tombstone pizza instead,” Eric said to his girlfriend, as he imagined the success of this compromise.  He’d get back at P.F. Chang by trading their delicious Asian cuisine for the worst frozen pizza in existence. That would show them.

The grocery store was visited, the Tombstone was bought and taken back to Eric’s place.  He removed the plastic exterior, discarded the cardboard stability disc and put the firm pizza into the oven to do its magic.  Not twelve short minutes later, the two happy little love larks sat on the couch enjoying their warm circle of garbage, watching television, peaceful as peas, having a swell time at home instead of out in the hustle and bustle of the world on a Saturday night.  Dexter, Eric’s girlfriend’s beagle spaniel, was also there for the evening to enjoy the fine aromas of melted cheese and mixed-meat sausage and the joy of cozying up under warm blankets.  It was a lovely scene.  A modern-day Norman Rockwell painting worthy of its own winter popcorn tin.

Every so often, they would pull a sausage from the pizza and toss it to the pooch, like any loving pet parent with bad feeding habits would do.  Dexter would squee with thrills, jump with delight and devour the bits without chewing, like any pooch with bad eating habits would do.

Until the moment when he decided one sausage bite wasn’t enough.  He wanted more pizza.  He wanted much more pizza.  So he RANDOMLY JUMPED UP TO BITE ERIC ON THE FACE AND REMOVE A HUNK OF HIS NOSE.  Bit it right off. For apparently no reason.  At least that’s how Eric tells it.  If he was teasing the dog or blowing on the dog’s face or twirling his wiener around like a high school color guard flag, he left that part out.

Eric came to work Monday morning with a really cool bandage all over his face.  I want you to picture John Hurt in Elephant Man-style bandaging.  You will not be picturing it accurately, but you will be picturing it awesomely.

I made this button for him to wear.

He showed us a picture of the wound that was taken after his evening in the hospital.  It basically looked like a clown nose; a giant super red blotch taking up most of the tip of his breathing triangle.  Like a kid who dunked his face in a cherry pie and pulled back.  The end was definitely not visible.

“That’s not blood you see.  That’s just the inside of my nose.”

Maximum sexy. I’m glad I wasn’t chewing any Big Red at that moment.

The emergency room visit obviously took many hours, and his apartment bathroom looked like an episode of CSI was shot there.  Apparently that’s what you get when you name your dog after a television serial killer.  Good thing I also intend for that to be my son’s name, if I manage to make one one of these days.

They looked for the nose hunk when they got back to the apartment late that night.  It was nowhere to be found.  (I bet I know where it is.)

Dexter didn’t touch the rest of the pizza while they were at the hospital.  It remained perfectly in tact on the coffee table upon their return.  But, you know, saucier.  From the blood.  From his face.  Added iron.

Right now, Eric is at the plastic surgeon discussing which piece of his ass he’d like to have ripped off and taped to his face to cover the hole.  I honestly do feel very bad for him, as having any type of damage happen to your face is absolutely the worst.  It’s the most definitive and obvious part of your body, plus you’re forced to tell the story over and over to everyone because they all see it. I am however looking forward to calling him butthead.  And have it be literal.

I think he should just have the rest of it ripped off and go Voldemort with the whole thing.  

See? It really doesn’t look so bad like that.  And yeah, that’s the bloodlusty beast that did it. 

All in all, he blames P.F. Chang and their too-small restaurant for all this.  If they let him in, he wouldn’t have bought Tombstones, wouldn’t have gone home, and wouldn’t have had this happen.  Nevermind it was Saturday night in one of the busiest places around Pittsburgh and he didn’t make a reservation.

I hope everything goes well for him and the process to fix his pretty face isn’t terribly cumbersome. Good luck, my friend.

(Oh, and Eric doesn’t read my site because it isn’t about baseball.  Please leave some comments I can show him so he is forced to see this!)

“It’s Lincredible”
“Lin It to Win It”
“Linconceivable Play”

I have no idea who Jeremy Lin is and would like to keep it that way.  Because I have more important things to do.  Like sit here and work, drink Wolfgang Puck coffee, and listen to Tone Loc’s “Funky Cold Medina,” which is 1989′s absolute best song about drinking, date rape, canine masturbation and the accidental seduction of a transexual performed by a cast member of Ace Ventura and Disney’s Blank Check.

Fun factoid: The kid from Blank Check grew up to be Worf’s son, then went on to get a large tattoo of a butterfly on the center of his neck, become a substance abuser and get arrested several times for assault and drug possession.  Hooray!

His eyebrows and mustache halves are exactly the same shape.

There are a few other important things you should know, which will be dumped on you in the style of The Bloggess’ “Shit I did when I wasn’t here” lists, but with less quality:

• I made this today, which Walking Dead fans may enjoy.
• I made this today, which people who hate douchey drivers may enjoy and desire to purchase and deface the back of their automobile.
• You should purchase at least seven of each of the above items.  Presidents Day is just around the corner.  And Presidents is just a few letters away from presents.  While you’re seeing what I did there, get out your credit card.
• Also related, people need not drive 92 mph on a 55 mph highway at 5:34am when I am on my way to work.  (You can’t possibly be late at that time, highway people.  Quit being dicks.)
• I hate the fact Earth’s moon is named “The Moon.”  Get a real name, you loser.
• I went to a gastropub on Sunday night.  I have no idea what a gastropub is.  It seemed like a regular restaurant to me.  Apparently it was a gastropub.  The best types of experiences are the ones you don’t even know you’re having.  The restaurant (Meat and Potatoes) says this on their website:
  What is a Gastropub? Our definition is the following: A public house (a.k.a. Pub) that serves high end or craft food and libations that also focuses on the fundamentals of food and education. We also believe that you know a gastropub when you are in it.
  Incorrect.
• Billy Elliot is one of the best musicals I’ve ever seen.  Ty Forhan, the boy who played Billy in the show we saw, is absolutely ridiculous and will make you feel like the most unaccomplished assbag on the planet, no matter who you are.  Seriously.  Like puke all over yourself amazing.  He’s insanely talented and I want to see everything he does for the rest of his life assuming he doesn’t get a butterfly tattoo on his neck and assault people.
• Billy Elliot may have you walking around your house singing “Merry Christmas Maggie Thatcher” for at least 3-5 days following.

The most important news to report is that despite my ongoing fear that any time I enter the city I will be stabbed, shot, mugged, raped, poked, prodded, chastised, lost, and forced to touch filthy public objects, only the last of that list happened.  That’s a pretty good result.

Now that I’ve done whatever the hell that was, I’d like to tell you things.  First:

Skyrim is social and productive suicide.

I was hesitant to start the game until I was ready to make the commitment.  It had been sitting on my shelf since Christmas, beckoning me, waving its flashy jewels my way and whistling as I walked by in my best jeans.  I put it off, first playing Saints Row: The Third and Arkham City, thinking they wouldn’t be as consuming.  I was right.  But then they were over.  Then it was just me and Skyrim, having a staring contest in the living room.  And eventually I gave in to its flattery.  Now I’m 21 hours in and have completed what I believe is very little.

As we’ve been discussing on Twitter, Skyrim is like an infection that plagues the body.  As @HishamElfar so accurately said, “Symptoms may include: Vampirism, becoming a Were-Wolf, habitual addiction to potions and the odd arrow to the knee!”  Also, ignoring your urine for hours on end because you don’t want to get up and walk away for even two minutes, and a failure to keep up with your social networking and blogging duties.  But hey… these dragons aren’t going to slay themselves.

In related-in-no-way-whatsoever news, it’s been two weeks since I bottled my first homebrew.  People keep asking how that’s  been going.  The answer is I don’t expect it’s ready to drink yet.  Nonetheless I’m going to give one a taste, because I have a high number of ants in my pants that only beer can satisfy.

Named after one of Bioshock's leading plasmids.

The verdict?  I was wrong.  This shit is bubblier than Renee Zellweger.*  It will probably be even better if I give it another week, but the cap popped off with a pfffft and the burps were churning through my chest after just a few sips.  It tastes great – well balanced, not too hoppy that the wife doesn’t like it (she says it’s good), but with more character and boldness than your typical grocery beer.

I’m impressed with myself.  The product may get even better if given a little bit more time.  Full thoughts on the product will come in another week or so when I chill a half dozen of them and consume.  You know, for consistency.  And science.  Yay!

*Note: If the beer were completely flat, I would have also used the Renee Zellweger reference.

Last month, Alyssa Vaughan was pretty cool.  She sent me and my wife Christmas presents.  She started a blog that I recommended you read.  We met over Twitter when she wanted to have long chats with me about transmission fluid exchanges, the way any good friendship starts.  Our mutual enjoyment of many similar subjects and individuals made us fast pals.  She said my writing inspired her, which was a compliment I was super honored to receive, and would lump me in with the likes of Wheaton and The Bloggess when suggesting good reads on #FollowFriday, which I thought was nuts.  When Anne Wheaton started talking to me on Twitter with some regularity, Alyssa jumped on the bandwagon and got herself noticed too.  The three of us had a great time cajoling and carrying on about scabs and creepy dolls and other nonsense, 140 characters at a time.  It was bliss.  Cheery, sporadic, low-bandwidth bliss.

Then this happened.

Last night was w00tstock, the “night of geek and music” in San Francisco where Wil Wheaton, Adam Savage, Paul & Storm and some other silly people do things on a stage for a sea of nerds.  Alyssa went to the show. I didn’t. Even though San Fran is one of my favorite cities, even though it would be a great time, I am poor and live in Pittsburgh and plane tickets cost a fortune.  I did deeply consider going, but if my wife and I want to have enough money left to do some of the home improvement projects we’d like to accomplish this spring, it just wasn’t going to happen.  So instead I got jealous and cranky.  I was sad and powerfully envious.  Especially once I found out that Anne and Alyssa intended to meet up at some point during the evening for high-fives and Where’s Waldo.

Alyssa promised she’d make up for the fact Laura and I wouldn’t be able to come.  She reminded me for weeks about how bummed she was I couldn’t be there, and what she would do to make me feel better.  She had a bunch of thoughtful ideas.  I was relying on her honesty and kept my phone nearby all night.

Instead, what happened was something like this:

She promised me roses, and delivered a rusty aluminum can filled with urine.

I spent all week thinking “Well, that Alyssa is a stand-up gal.  She’s got something up her sleeve, I know it.  She said she’d be sending texts and calls.  She said she’d carry around a paper cutout of me and put it in pictures so I could pretend I was there. She said something cool would happen.  She said she said she said she said she said she said.”

Alyssa ended up with a picture of her, her husband and Wil alone, as well as one with Paul & Storm, Chris Hardwick and others all together making crazy faces.  She even got Wil’s story notes from his set!  I ended up with a lot of tweets to Nerdy Baker about how we’re losers and live on the wrong side of the country to do fun things, and a belly full of frozen pizza and foul-smelling gas.  What a horrible monster Alyssa is.  I bet she’s never even read Memories of the Future.  Phony.  If it weren’t for our tag-team gangup on Anne Wheaton on Twitter, her evening wouldn’t even have been possible.

That’s what kind of scumbag she is.

Based on her Tweets, w00tstock didn’t wrap up until 30 minutes before my early-rising ass on the East coast got out of bed for work Monday morning.  Meanwhile in California, Alyssa and her husband are still asleep, recovering from an evening where they became cooler than me.   Now I’m here at work, in an office building, drinking water that tastes like it’s from a mall fountain full of pennies.

There’s only one way to fix this.

There.  In all honesty, her husband is pretty innocent in this debauchery.  So we’ll leave him to enjoy his moment.  Now I can remove her deceit and gain two things I always wanted: A picture with Wil, and to see what it feels like to have to haul around giant boobs.  My goodness.   I think I do them justice.

Of course, this is all in jest. Alyssa is still great, and it’s totally awesome that she got to meet all these lovely people she admires.  I’m so happy for her and still adore her and think it’s really great that Anne and everyone are willing to give their attention to fans.  I’m sure it was a thrill beyond comprehension, and I’m just insanely jealous and needed to virtual-punch her in the butthole to feel better about myself as I sit here in a cloud of neverending frozen pizza fart still waiting to meet these folks.  Hopefully we have another opportunity to do it soon.

As for w00tstock, it sounded like a great night and I’m glad everyone had fun and made friends.

…bitch.

There’s a little film that Laura has, until this past weekend, never viewed.  It’s been around since 1977 – longer than we’ve been alive.  It’s got some droids (though not the ones you’re looking for) and some hairy beasts, an old guy who vanishes when killed, a mouth-breathing menace who sounds like Mufasa and a whiny son of a Sith Lord.

Yeah.  That.

I’ve spent 7.5 years proposing that she watch Star Wars with me.  I never understood how she avoided it all her life.  In my opinion, watching Star Wars has nothing to do with being nerdy or a geek.  It’s just a social requirement.  In the ever-long spirit of qualifying every nerd as either a Star Wars or Star Trek geek, I’m obviously a Trekkie without question.  I’m not even really that big a Star Wars fan.  But this goes beyond any of that.  Having an appreciation for American cinema requires watching and gaining an appreciation for certain films, and the original Star Wars trilogy is unarguably part of that list.

When I proposed watching it this weekend (roughly my 116th proposal to date), I expected her to decline as usual.  Instead, her response was “as long as you rub my back.”

RUB YOUR BACK?  That’s it?  I do that every weekend.  What’s the occasion this week?  Exclamation points shot from my skull like a surprised Metal Gear Solid henchman that just realized cardboard boxes don’t walk.

I threw her on the couch, got popcorn and drinks and anything else she might need so we wouldn’t be interrupted, pulled out the DVD, wiped off the dust and put it in the player.  John Williams gave us his warm embrace and text began to scroll.   Leia is on the ship.  A message gets recorded.  Jawas show up.  Tatooine.

“…and why don’t I have to start with the first one again?” she asked.
“This is the first one.”
“It said Episode IV”

Awww.  How cute.

In the end I asked what she thought of it.  “It was fine,” she said.  “Cheesy as hell but fine.”  Not exactly the reaction I was hoping for.

I guess the Nerding My Wife process still has some road to travel.  Hopefully it’s not another 7.5 years before we watch The Empire Strikes Back.  Fortunately it’s the best film, so it has the best chance to get her to describe it as something a little stronger than “cheesy as hell.”  It’s my only hope.

I recall watching one years ago with my wife.  Like most Lifetime movies I don’t have any idea what it was about, because the years have taught us Lifetime movies are rarely memorable.  The one thing we both do remember about this particular film was a quirk with the cinematography, where every single scene before a commercial break ended with the camera panning up to the corner of the shot and fading to white.  There was never anything interesting up there.  It was just the corner.  You’d see the edge of a ceiling, a light fixture, a tree, whatever happened to be in the top left corner.  Every single commercial break.  Tilt away to the corner and fade out.  It was silly.

(Come to think of it, it may have been Fatal Lessons: The Good Teacher starring Erika Eleniak from Baywatch.  Even if that wasn’t the movie with the tilting camera, it still sucked hard.  The first on-screen casualty was the adorable family dog, which is a terrible way to start anything.  And ffs, the lead is Erika Eleniak from Baywatch.  Shauni McClain.  You know that’s crap.)

Fine, expressive acting.

Couple absurd filmmaking practices with pretty much every movie having the same plot (woman meets man who rapes her and punches her daughter and does cocaine and has sex with zebras and murders the neighbor and waves his penis in traffic and sets fire to the house while painting pictures of tortured leprechauns on the chimney and smashing whiskey bottles in his underpants – or something like that) has put Lifetime movies into their own genre.  They’re what you watch when you’re home sick from work and have no other options in the middle of a weekday.  They aren’t to be taken seriously.  It’s Television For Women, as they say.  Specifically abused, pregnant, teenage, homeless women at their most vulnerable.

UNTIL NOW.

Last weekend my wife and I had a few days off due to not feeling well and we watched two Lifetime films.  The first was Sexting in Suburbia, starring the hot-and-almost-40 leggy Liz Vassey, who nerds like myself know as Captain Liberty in the live-action version of The Tick with Patrick Warburton, and as former Vegas CSI tech Wendy Simms during seasons 6-11.  This film follows a grieving mother uncovering secrets about her daughter who decided to hang herself after being severely bullied for sending a naked picture to her boyfriend to alleviate his boner she pushed away at the beginning of the movie.  As mom comes to terms with her daughter’s death and interrogates the town, people smash the windows in her house, cover the school bathrooms in graffiti, write WHORE on her daughter’s headstone and all sorts of other nasty things.   Wowwie wow!  It’s basically what My Girl should have been in 1991.

A harmless text turned deadly. *thunder*

The second gem was Walking the Halls, a flick about high school girls who dabble in prostitution, focusing primarily on one innocent cutie who joins the gang because the lure of degradation and making some quick bill is way more enticing than the boring life of a straight-A student with dysfunctional upper class parents.  The title makes no sense because there are like two shots of a school during the whole movie, but whatever.  There are guns, an attempted murder-suicide and plenty of young girls in skimpy outfits.  It’s basically what My Girl should have been in 1991.

$2,000 per night. But "don't call them hookers."

THE POINT IS BOTH WERE AMAZING.

I was all like this:

When the girls in the movies were all like this:

Strangely, I saw this tweet the next day from @hateyouprobably:

Which was followed by this:

That’s right.  Rob f’n Lowe.  In a movie about psychopathic former Illinois police sergeant Drew Peterson.  He’s in real things.  And Kaley Cuoco.  Also in real things.  We’ve come a long way from needing to cast Erika Eleniak in leading roles and tilting to the empty corner of shots to segue into commercials.

Sure, Drew Peterson isn’t changing Lifetime’s plot format too much.  It’s still a biopic about a guy who has (probably) murdered two of his wives, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be all sorts of worth it.  I’m pretty sure Lifetime is working on expanding their operation and putting more money into their films.  It’s time to get more husbands watching.  Hell, you’d think they would want men to get into these movies.  They’re like training videos on what not to do in life.

Television for women?  Pah-lease.  I am a member of the Pen15 club and I’m going to be all over Drew Peterson like chimpanzees on plastic buckets.  (Note: I have a cousin named Drew Peterson, so that last sentence is sort of weird and incestual out of context.)

Watch their films.  They’re better than you think.  And even if they’re not, you know one thing is true: they’re going to keep making them anyway.  You can’t stop them.  They’ve been doing it for decades and they will do it for decades still.  That’s power.

Perhaps they need a new slogan inspired by their own material:  Lifetime.  We’re untouchable, bitch.

This entry is written with completely equal amounts of honesty and snark.  Both are fully authentic.  Lifetime productions are that dynamic.

If you didn’t just say “Fine then, I don’t have to take that from you!  I’m going to go sit in an empty bathtub and lick the back of my hands!” and close your browser, then hello!  I’ve got some words for you.  And apparently sitting in a dry bathtub licking one’s own hands is what my brain thinks is the epitome of disinterest and having nothing to do.  I’ll admit, it does sound pretty bad.  Good job brain.  I also like how I examine my own thoughts from a third-person perspective as if the brain that came up with the bathtub scenario is separate from the one writing the rest of this.

SO…  Beermaking.  Homebrewing.  Good times.

I finally got my sack of dry malt and couldn’t help myself but get started on my first batch the evening it arrived.  I generally have one night per week that I choose to deem my “short night,” for the sake of maintaining sanity, and only work 11 or 12 hours that day instead of the regular 12-14.  On Wednesday my malt arrived, so I decided it would be short night, and brewing would commence.  (Note: I’m not sure the sanity thing is working, but stick with me.)

A watched pot never boils. Literally. Never.

After cleaning and sanitizing all my brand-spanking new equipment with Star San, I put the starting water on to boil.  This took much longer than I expected it to, so during this period I ate some tilapia and watched the “Transfigurations” episode of TNG, which is the one with the seemingly immortal guy in the white unitard that gives Beverly a boner, accidentally kills Worf, revives him by touching his arm, and goes on to be a regular on “All My Children” before moving to Asia to abuse drugs.

When the water finally started boiling, I added a little over 3 lbs. of liquid extract and then the dry malt.  Immediately after that went in .75 oz. of Northern Brewer hops.  I won’t get too technical with my details from here out, because you probably don’t care, and I don’t want to type them.

I purchased most of my brewing equipment from a store called Northern Brewer (just like my hops!)  They are a large volume chain of stores in the MN, WI area and have flat rate shipping of $7.99, which was nice for my large initial order that would be heavy and horrible to pay for normally.  I spent weeks searching the internet for different starter kits to the point where I was questioning the quality of many of them and everything was getting very confusing.  There are a lot of commercial kits out there, like Mr. Beer, which just seemed lame and too suited for certain specific types of beer.  I went with Northern Brewer because they have a big inventory with quick turnover and sell brewshop-designed starter kits, not commercial packages, which I’m pretty sure is the way to go.  If you have local homebrew stores in your area, they may have their own kits designed based on their stock that will likely be better than a lot of other options.  Otherwise you can find some online like I did.

The gear. I love my enormous spoon.

My pot boiled for 45 minutes and I added 1 oz. of Cascade hops to finish.  That’s how you make the wort.  I don’t like that word, but hey, I can’t change what it’s called.

I chilled the whole thing in an ice bath in the kitchen sink to get it down to room temperature.  This required about 12 ice cube trays worth of the delightful firm H2O, and I cycled out about half the water in the sink every 5 minutes or so as it warmed, replacing it with cooler stuff.  After maybe 20-25 minutes, it was chilled to where I needed it to be.  Next time I’m hoping there is snow outside so I can just go chuck the pot in the lawn.  During the chill I also rehydrated my yeast for 15 minutes in 100 degree water, which looked great.

All that’s left is the combination. I picked up my massively heavy pot of fluid and dumped the wort into my nice sanitized bucket with vigor, and did not filter out the hops.  I let out a roar of accomplishment and poured it back and forth between the bucket and the pot a few times to aerate.   The bucket was carried to the spare bedroom, the yeast was pitched in, the lid was placed and the airlock inserted.  That’s going to be beer, kids.

Even though I had no mishaps with the brew, I was worried that something had gone wrong, as people tend to do when trying something for the first time.  While this process isn’t overly complicated, it requires a fair amount of detail and meticulousness in sanitizing everything.

Not 24 hours later, I came home from work to find my airlock bubbling steadily.  Now another 24 hours later, it is bubbling with even more fervor.  I must have done it right, and as the title says, made science my bitch.  There’s all sorts of fermentation going on in there.  And in two very long weeks I’ll be able to bottle it and start the second half of the waiting game.  Then I’ll have made something new, had fun, been nerdy, and pwned science to the max.  All while that other guy went to sit in his bathtub and lick his hands.

Check out this video of my bubbling airlock – sideways, because I forgot to rotate it and don’t really care.

Here is the quick list of things I learned while making my first batch:

• A 5-gallon stainless steel stock pot with 2 gallons of water in it, on an electric range, takes an entire hour to boil.  This was very boring.
• Turn on the kitchen fan or else the entire house will reek of hops for 12 hours, an aroma similarly found in the places Lindsay Lohan wakes up on Saturday mornings.
• My wife hates that smell.
• Don’t rehydrate yeast too early.  I left out the part where I ruined the first packet rehydrating it waaaay too early because I didn’t realize my pot of water would take 9 years to boil.
• Liquid malt extract comes out of the jug slower than a one-legged man runs through a swimming pool.  Warm it slightly to encourage pouring.
• Homebrewing can be done without making a mess.  I experienced no boilovers, no water on the floor, no spilled ingredients.  Told you.
• I end up with a giant gurgling bucket that scares the poodle, allowing me to take naps in the spare bedroom without interruption from her.

I know – I write a lot about Wil and his wife.  Mostly I do it for humorous purposes, as my “obsession” with Anne has become somewhat of a shtick between me, her and my readers.  Anne and I communicate on a fairly regular basis at this point and I enjoy writing things that put her in the light of some almighty, untouchable entity of exotic awesomeness.  (Which if you’ve witnessed her patience with Wil’s PUTTING ON THE RITZ video, you’d know is actually the truth.)   The other times I mention Wil are purely out of respect and appreciation for his work, the way anyone likes to pass credit and kudos to someone who does things they enjoy.

Though I have yet to meet him in person, Wil strikes me as a truly stand-up guy who is passionate about creating great things and being a nice person.  He puts so much excitement and commitment into everything he does that I find it impossible to not respect him.  I’m a tremendous fan of Wil because of all the things he has made that I’ve come in contact with, whether it was books, TV, movies, blogs or podcasts, I can completely connect with his work and feel his passion coming through.  I am very inspired by his general excitement for creativity and am grateful for him being a down-to-earth nice guy in the few instances he and I have exchanged words.  He has a believable passion that I just don’t feel or even believe exists in too many people, and his interest in spreading that passion to encourage others is wonderful.  So to him, I say thanks for going against what people expect of famous folks and for living up to Wheaton’s law.  You’re a swell dude, and I’ll take my head out of your ass now.

So all that is what encouraged me to make beer.  Not simply because I like beer and wanted my spare bedroom to be filled with barrels full of its bubbling and popping awesomeness that can scare my tiny dogs, but because the way Wil talked about it on his blog with such enthusiasm made it seem incredibly fun and like something I needed to try.  It was also something I had never previously thought to do, so that made it doubly intriguing.

Who needs a motivational poster with a cutout of the Wheatons' responses to my first-ever post about them taped to my office wall?

A few weeks ago I sent Wil a tweet asking for his recommendation on what would be “the” book to buy about homebrewing if he could narrow it down.  He had just done a video tour of his office on ustream and mentioned his beer library, so I knew he had read many books on the subject.  I didn’t really expect him to reply, as he was dealing with a Wil Wheaton vs. Paul & Storm show that was canceled that evening due to a power outage at their venue.  Despite that, about five minutes later I got a tweet back suggesting “How to Brew” by John Palmer (which I’ve since discovered is pretty much the gold standard for homebrewers) and The Complete Joy of Home Brewing by Charlie Papazian.  I thought it was totally admirable of him to take a minute to make those suggestions to little old me in the midst of figuring out what to do about his canceled show that night.  (Re: earlier ass-head insertion paragraph)

I bought the books, got the ingredients for the Cincinnati Pale Ale outlined by Palmer at the beginning of How to Brew, bought two 6 gallon plastic buckets, siphons, bottles and caps, a thermometer, a 5 gallon stock pot, a hydrometer, Star San, cleaners, a bottle brush, an airlock, a strainer, measuring cup and everything else I needed to get going.  I stayed up this past Saturday night re-reading chapters on boiling worts, rehydrating yeasts and happy fermentation.  I studied up on gravities and sugars and malts and read until I was too tired to retain information, even though I was too excited to sleep.  I had dreams about buckets of murky brown liquid sending farts through a plastic airlock.

Ok, that sounds really gross.

Please note the creepy painting of my great-grandpa is still lurking behind the piano.

When Sunday afternoon came and I had the kitchen cleaned and prepped, I moved everything in there to get started.  I put it all out on the counter, had my camera ready to take pictures for the blog, and put the pot on the stove.  Anne told me Wil tends to make a mess (to put it nicely) when he brews, so I was determined to do it as carefully and cleanly as possible.

Then I noticed something.

I was missing dry malt extract.

I can’t make Palmer’s Cincinnati Pale Ale without dry malt extract.  And since the only homebrew store I’m aware of in my entire relative area is about 30 miles away and I had plans that evening, I didn’t have time to go there, get home, and still make the beer before it was time to leave.  Ultra disappointment happened instead of nifty brew creation.

And thus, here we are.  Lame and depressed.  I will have to wait until next weekend before I have enough free time to brew.  Meanwhile I will sit in my office and stare at all my nice, shiny brew stuff patiently waiting to be used.  And weep.  Weep sudsy tears of sorrow for the beer that should have been.

Soon, my friends.  Soon we will make beer.  Until then, try counting all the bumps and crevices in the skin on your elbows.  That should keep you busy for a while.  And for Christ’s sake, would it kill you to moisturize once in a while?  Those things look like mango pits.

The two of them rest in the peaceful living room as the snowflakes fall outside the window.  The temperature continues to drop but they don’t know.  A gentle tapping noise persists from outside as the wind steadily blows against the house an electrical cord dangling for the front Christmas lights.  The dogs’ minds race around thoughts of warm spring days chasing rabbits and wrestling each other in the grass.  Both look angelic and innocent, relaxing peacefully without a care or responsibility in the world.

Suddenly, something happens.  Their heads bolt up.  They hear something.  They forget all about napping and bunnies and warm spring weather.  In a split second, they simultaneously flip out and stand up, springing from their sleepy states and popping to life with extreme intensity, like a switch being flipped that jolts them to life.  The poodle lets out her incessant high-pitched barking, a surprisingly powerful sound from such a small frame.  She stares with determination at the window.  She barks continuously, loudly, and as she forgets all about being tired and napping, leaps off the top of the couch and tears through the house.  The schnauzer follows, bark-screaming behind her, wailing and carrying on as if she is charging into the front lines of battle.  Her facial expression changes from sleepy to fight-ready.  The perfectly-placed blankets get flopped to the ground with disarray in the scuffle.

The dogs tear through the house and fly through the kitchen, their back legs moving faster than they can control on the laminate flooring as they scramble and shuffle and slide into the kitchen cabinets, all the while barking and carrying on with intense ferocity.  Both arrive in the other living room at the far side of the house, and within a split second are perched on the back of the couch there, faces poking through picture window curtains as they growl and snarl and howl at the driveway.  Their eyes are full of fire and excitement.  Their barks and growls are extreme, constant, explosive.  No living creature passes by this home unnoticed.  They will defend.  They will see whatever is out there, and will not let it approach.  This is their house.  This is their territory.  And they won’t stand for any nonsense.

Meanwhile – somewhere down the street – someone shuts a car door.

It has been an incredibly un-called for (41) days of winter since Nerding My Wife last reared its shiny silver head, and only a few seconds since I made a poor joke about a Zooey Deschanel movie title.  I blame the holidays for the lack of content in recent weeks.  And Words With Friends.  And my burning need to win games against Anne Wheaton.  Remember the days before Words With Friends when people actually got work done?  Me neither.  But who would want to?  Seriously people, get with the program.  This is what we do now.  This is why we are here.  It’s all about getting two intersecting J words connecting at that little orange box of heaven labeled TW.

Laura has also started playing, so good for her.  She’s awesome.

We visited her parents over the holidays.  They live a little shy of two hours away, which gives us some quality car time together as long as I can manage to keep her awake.  The drive is pretty easy.  The dogs sleep in the back seat, except for the one inevitable moment during every trip when Luna barks AS LOUD AND AS SUDDENLY AS POSSIBLE to scare the living hell out of us, then goes back to sleep.  Laura and I don’t play any stupid car games based on the radio or license plates or street signs.  We chat, which makes us happy, and we sing songs.

On our recent trip, she loaded up the Dr. Horrible soundtrack.
“Let’s practice our harmony,” she said, turning on “My Eyes.”
“Is that something regular people say?” she asked.
Probably not.

Nonetheless, we sing, and pretend we’re as good as NPH and Felicia.  I seriously assume we are not.

I was given The Wesley Crushers t-shirt from Big Bang Theory by my mother, which was ultra cute.

Sporting it with correct Big Bang Theory fashion - with a long-sleeve shirt and an entirely inappropriate color scheme underneath.

I also received an RC helicopter from Laura which has caused Luna to knock most of the ornaments off the bottom of the Christmas tree as she runs and barks in extreme fear of its aerial torment.  Additionally, I got Saints Row: The Third, which when opened, encouraged Laura to say “Oh, I like to watch you play Saints Row.”

You may have watched me play 1 and 2, but with that statement, I’m going to get YOU to play this one, little girl.

Laura is one of those people who thinks they can’t play games because they “don’t know the controls.”  The only Xbox360 she’s experienced is the point-and-click CSI games, where I admit it’s awesome fun to mock whoever fails badly at doing Marg Helgenberger’s Catherine Willows voice, but isn’t really “gaming.”  She hasn’t actively tried to play anything since the NES, where she was one of those people who moved their entire arms up and down and shook their bodies all around trying to make Mario jump.  It’s like watching a wounded rabbit try and escape traffic.

That's the goal we're going for.

The book Alyssa sent me  is chock-full of all sorts of random facts and things that range from strange historical tidbits to chess techniques to speaking Klingon to other nonsense.  I already knew that 17th-century French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully died from a gangrenous wound after he stabbed himself in the foot while tapping a long staff like a metronome, but alas, it’s in the book.  The idea seems to be that if you remember everything within, you can hold your own against any type of nerd.  It encompasses all facets of nerd-dom, since none of us but Wil Wheaton are fluent in all respects.   Which got me thinking…

I’ve been having trouble defining how to nerd my wife, and whether or not filling up the “nerd glasses meter” makes any sense.  It’s not like there is a checklist you have to hit to be a nerd (aside from watching Star Wars at least once at some point in your life, whether you like it or not, which she hasn’t freaking done yet.)  Some people are book nerds, some are roleplaying nerds.  Some like WoW and some like checkers.  Some like math and science, others like literature and drama.  Some of us play video games, others build paper airplanes.  Some listen to Morcheeba and some to Frontalot.  And one group might not know anything about another, but that’s okay.  Together we are a community, we share a respect for the passions and interests of others, and that mutual admiration is what keeps us together and builds friendships.  So how do I know when Laura is a nerd?  And how do I know she isn’t already?  And why am I trying to quantify it?

This led me to a realization.  None of this is really about making her a nerd.  To the average person, I’m sure she always was.  And she always will be in her own way, just like the rest of us.  Nerding My Wife has always been less about making her a nerd and more about trying to develop her interests in all the niche things I am very passionate about, so that I can share them with her.   It’s about combining her interests with my own nerdy style.  It’s about giving things a try, breaking the stigmas and misconceptions she has had about certain things and helping her realize how awesome they really are.  We are very much the same person, but over the years there has been a set of things that she just didn’t understand.  While she’s always respected my interests and (obviously) encouraged them, she didn’t always share them.  And in my opinion, no matter how much you enjoy something, you never enjoy it as much as you do when shared with a loved one.  And that’s what Nerding My Wife is really about.  Not defining people, not changing behaviors, but sharing and embracing a culture and different art forms and media that aren’t always the “coolest.”

And to that, I’ve been doing very well.

Things I used to have to do on my own are slowly being shared with my favorite person.   Now, on the occasions when I watch aliens kidnap Picard and replace him with a duplicate that sends the Enterprise to a pulsar and she’s there watching with me, even if she doesn’t really understand what’s going on, well…

I’m really glad we make time to practice our harmony.

It’s not quite Narnia, but it’s a chronicle:
Nerding My Wife 4
Nerding My Wife 3
Nerding My Wife 2
Nerding My Wife