I watched another episode of "Winds Of War" and had some of my homebrew last night. Also cooked up a dinner of beef, scrounged zucchini, other veggies, and of course it was good.
My happy little jugs are doing well. The one that had inspired me to come up with a blowoff tube system is completely calm now and I can't even make much happen in the airlock if I swirl it vigorously, which is recommended to "degas" the cider. So that's about ready to put into bottles. The sour cherry and peach one is still doing the yeast dance, and the tomato one I started last night is doing amazingly. The bubbles coming out of the blowoff tube are coming less than 1-second intervals and what's nice is the krausen, or foam on top, hasn't risen to the top which is what a blowoff tube is good for - it won't clog like an airlock will.
I used a pound and a half of sugar in the tomato one because that quantity was in the recipe I found online. People who have made it say it really doesn't come out tomato-y but I figure worst (best?) case I end up with something that will taste like a bloody mary with a dash of hot sauce.
What I'm also noticing is how this stuff, so far, is more gentle on my body. I get mellow but it's a different feeling than with store-bought alcohol. I'm swallowing a fair amount of live yeast, too, due to drinking this stuff so young, but other than being a little more farty lately there's no effect. I'm beginning to wonder if commercial alcohol, especially the stuff I can afford, has all kinds of nasty crud in it due to the makers wanting to get every last drop into the bottle to sell.
But anyway, I came up with an invention today before I'd even had my coffee. I've been using my little Vietnamese "phinn" coffee maker with a coffee filter, the smaller size, which I've had to fold and shape to fit it in there every cup. This makes cleanup a lot easier. I'd run out and tried making coffee without the filter and it was a pain. The larger granules block the little holes and it drains super slow. But, since I didn't get any more filters yesterday, I'd put up with it. When I brewed my cup just now, though, on a whim I put a piece of paper towel into the bottom of the coffee maker, just to cover the bottom, and it works great. This is really neat because I'm thinking I can buy coffee filters but I can just cut little pieces to fit in the bottom, thus getting 4 filters out of one and not having to do the stupid folding and shaping step. And in a pinch, paper towel works.
I haven't been out busking because, although a lot of people are back out there, so's the virus. It's not responsible for me to go out playing for money if I have other things I can do, like my job.
I headed for downtown at about a quarter to 4. I went to Nijiya and got some fried chicken, a can of beer, and a few odds and ends like some baby bok choy (cheap veggie) and ate under the trees at the benches. There was an apparently homeless guy camped out in front of the Japanese-American museum and there was more fried chicken then I wanted to eat so I packaged up what I had left neatly and rode by there, stopped and left it on a bench there, and took off. He seemed like a young guy and looked like he was reading a book (probably staring at a smart phone) and that way it's up to him whether he wants it or not - if not some other hard-up type will pick it up. Japantown, unfortunately, has zombies too.
Nijiya only had those fancy brown Melitta coffee filters that are shaped like a cone, so I got those just so I'd have *some* coffee filters. Next stop was Smile Market where I looked around - that place is really random! - then asked for rubbing alcohol at the checkout. The lady said she has to check, called someone else, then appeared back at the checkout with two quart bottles of 91%. I asked how much, she said $18, and I forked over a $20. At the rate things are going, I may want to look in Chaparral Market for that "Mexican Everclear" and see what it costs, and just dilute it down to 70% for cleaning. I can adulterate it with methanol from an auto parts store to make sure I don't get tempted to drink the stuff.
Really, though, at the rate things are going, I might want to look into getting a thing called an "air distiller" which can be used to make booze, and for cleaning purposes just keep the "heads" since it would be for cleaning not drinking.
For some reason, I felt like going to Lee's Sandwiches for a couple of egg rolls, but when I went in there was a bit of a line and the egg rolls etc were wiped out. I got a sweet rice with chicken and pork etc on top thing and since it was two for one, got another one and a bottle of water because there was a guy sort of camped out by the side of the building and I'd told him I'd get him a water anyway, and if it's two for one, some food. He asked about chopsticks or a fork or anything and I said I'd asked and they gave me nothing, so we'll both be eating with our hands. "That's what the water's for, to wash your hands before you eat!" I said.
I went over to the college and sat on a bench in the shade and tried to get a squirrel to trust me enough to check out the bits of sweet rice I tossed to him, and while there was hardly anyone around, there were some happy sounds of people enjoying the green grass and the relatively cool air. I ate the goodies and some of the rice, and 2/3rds of the rice is out for the birds here now.
On the way back I decided to look for fruit, and I found a bunch of little plums, some limes, a big lemon, and some apples gone brown but I think OK. I'd bought sugar for less than $1 a pound at Whole Foods, another bottle of their fizzy water, the bottle to be used to "rack" my next settled-down brew into, and other odds and ends.
I'd gotten to Whole Foods at 7, and I noticed that the petition-signing people were all gone, but there was a fair flux of people passing through. And they're open until 9. In the past, those had been good busking conditions as anyone going there after dinner-time was probably there for last-minute things, or in the mood for another bottle or two of wine, and the donations had been really good. If I have my donation box a little distance from me which I generally do anyway, I might be OK.
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