Once I've made a few quid in the rat race, I'm thinking about opening a brewery & making the kind of beers that I like🤪.

Cumbria being a hotbed of modestly exciting activity as normal. We haven't long had the World Marmalade Championships & the Hedge Laying Grand Prix can't be far off now.

'Gays Too Precious To Risk In Combat,' Says General

subscriptions >>> shop.viz.co.uk/viz354bs

Been out along the Honister Pass this afternoon.

This is the best West Coast IPA I've had in absolutely ages. Clear, clean, grapefruity, pine resinous, bitter & dry. Not a cheap can at £3 from Asda, but it puts some much pricier cans of WCIPA to shame.

Finally bottled my lager this morning. A SMASH beer with pale Munich malt & Hallertaur Mittelfruh hops. Despite the AMG enzyme in the mash, the final gravity was 1.010. It has a faint diacetyl flavour, but that will disappear over the next few weeks. Now the waiting begins...

With Helles style lagers being all the rage & the label Pils stuck on everything remotely golden & fizzy, I was intrigued to try a Dortmund Style Lager. It has a good mineral, flint-like hardness to it. Plenty of bitterness, with just a little malt sweetness. This tastes like the real deal.

If you are fed up of breathing polluted city air, then escape to Cumbria where the air quality is... questionable. This is the seaside at Maryport at about 13:00 today.

Took my kid into their first ever Polish shop today. Much like my first time they scanned every strange bag of crisps, chocolate bars & curious sweet package. I looked through the mental strength lagers & picked up a bottle of relatively pedestrian strength 8% porter.

World poetry day You say? #WorldPoetryDay

Need to brew soon - I can't fit all my malt & hops into my igloo box #HomeBrewProblems

Gone differently sane with my spends this month & got some of the pricier hops for brewing.

It is 07:25 and already I've decided it's "let it lie" Saturday as we're all friends on this here BlueSky.

Been out to Crummock Water this evening.

If you turn right at the bottom of my road, the first pub you get to is the Kirkstile Inn.

My new homebrew ingredients arrived today. After the Saison with bergamot is brewed there will be; an all Citra Brut IPA, a Red IPA with all Cascade & a cherry wood smoked malt, bretted beer.

My Belgian Blonde ale refermented with the sediment from Boon Gueze & Saison Dupont bottles has been in a bottle 10 weeks now. It is definitely in the Saison category now. Well carbonated, gentle alcohol warmth & a spicy flavour. Worth the experiment.

The tribes of Britain c. 540 in the time of Gildas.

Ironic that Trump doesn’t believe in global warming but is doing more than anyone to move us all to renewable energy resources.

If you’re thinking of attending our Cumbrian breweries tasting please book as soon as you can so we know how much beer to order. £30 for 6 beers cheese, free raffle - and @beer4john.bsky.social

It's like a mini-Munich here is the big smoke of Carlisle today. Sort of. Kind of. If you squint.

I recently received some money I wasn't expecting & it's taken me three weeks to think the obvious - buy some Citra hops!

My rye stout is drying out a little now, but still plenty of sweetness from the crystal rye, amber & CaraGold malts. It also pairs well with pizza.

I don't usually drink this early in the week, but had written & given a quiz about fictitious astronauts that culminated in Duck Dodgers From The 24th & A Half Century.

A quid in Morrisons at Penrith! Gave it a go as I like Ghost Ships IPA, Double IPA & NA. It is a lovely, easy drinking beer with the flavour of Citra hops like the other versions.

Aah Cumbrian post. Two - supposedly weekly - New Scientist magazines & a letter from the council about the forthcoming roadworks that started yesterday.

I've not once had a work device without boxes that you have to insert random data into as nobody back on the office uses that, but you need to populate it to move forward through the process.

Wish I'd bought every bottle in Kendal Sainsbury's now - of which there were three - instead of just the two. This is super stuff. A vanilla fragrance & a little sweetness like candy floss. Gentle alcohol warmth. Just leaning towards a Saison, but not too weird. Quite happy, but in a trad hop way.

After six days in the primary fermenter, I've just transferred the all pale Munich malt, all Hallertaur Mittelfruh hopped lager into a secondary fermenter. I'll bottle it next weekend.

Allonby on the Solway coast this arvo, between the rain.

Things I say that get me in trouble, part 7426: "No but I'll sponsor your partner to look after your children while you train for it".

Happy Mothering Sunday!

First beer of Saturday night / Sunday morning.

On spesh at Sainsbury's today (in Kendal at least). This is great stuff, super smooth hoppy beer with a little candy floss sweetness.

I don't mind if you are a multinational beer factory if you use your economies of scale to make truly smashing beer at supermarket prices.

The gasometer on Rome Street in Carlizzle this arvo.

Guy Ordering Nonalcoholic Beer Has Either Seen A Ton Of Shit Or No Shit At All https://theonion.com/guy-ordering-nonalcoholic-beer-has-either-seen-a-ton-of-shit-or-no-shit-at-all/

My rye stout this evening. I've got loads, but it's not my best - a little sweet & the head retention is poor. It's perfectly drinkable however, I should have just made less wort at a higher gravity.

Listened to a new podcast series today - Life Without with Alan Davies. In episode 1 - life without the moon - he says that Tatooine had 2 moons. Despite that I listened to them all & it's OK. It's a poor man's Infinite Monkey Cage or Curious Cases though.

#Brewday was supposed to be a relaxing time while the rest of the household are at work / school. Boil was almost an hour longer while I dropped kid off at lunchtime & chiller stopped with lager wort at 18°C so I could collect my offspring at chucking out time.

The long weekend ends with a #brewday. A lager using pale Munich malt & Hallertaur Mittelfruh hops. Obstacles have been thrown in my way, but I am overcoming them & the boil has only been extended a little while a 2nd (successful) attempt at delivering my kid to school occurs #homebrew.

Another jar of something fermentable containing no yeast inhibiting potassium sorbate found on a supermarket shelf. Stashed under the stairs for a future brew.

It was my birthday this weekend, so I went to the seaside & bought some fancy* cans to drink with my Chinese takeaway. I'm not about to stop brewing my own beer anytime soon. *pricey.

I'm getting about a bit this weekend. Maryport this arvo in the gloom of west coast Cumbria.

I'd been told this wasn't being brewed anymore, but I found it in the Crooked River taproom in Cockermouth this evening while waiting for my takeaway a few doors up. Tractor Shed Jinny Howelt Helles is quite possibly my favourite British brewed lager.

Waiting to collect a take away, so no time to loiter at Jennings riverside beer garden. Collect a couple of cans & away.

St Bees this arvo.

Careful now.

We can learn a lot from nature.