Soon... very soon... I hope...

It's the last week of November, and everything is still under construction. But it's almost there. The contractor told me everything would be finished by this Wednesday. I don't have any more pictures to add just yet, even though things have slowly moved forward. The walls are painted, the doggy door that the previous owners installs has been removed, and the cabinets are stained (although the doors and drawers are missing). However, the fridge is in the living room, the ceiling fan is in the garage, the washer/dryer are in the backyard, and I have exactly zero functional kitchen appliances. I've had to use my friend's facilities to do two laundry cycles and prep food for a faculty potluck gathering. I'm tired of eating out. I miss having a working kitchen. I miss watching TV in my living room.

Okay, I take it back. Here are a couple photos since I'm on the topic of TV:

This is what an 80" TV would look like in the entertainment area, sitting on a 2 foot tall entertainment center. The stick you see is a yard stick. There's no way I'd ever go that big. It's like a wall of TV, or being in a movie theater. It's absurd and far too expensive.

This is my TV gradient... or maybe I should call it a TV rainbow. It sizes out (approximately) TVs from 80" down to 50". I'm probably going to end up with either a 55" or 60". I'm not a huge movie guy, audiophile, or gamer, so TV for me is just about being functional. A good TV for a good price is what I'm really looking for. I'm doing a bit of reading on TV purchasing because it has become incredibly complicated in the last several years.

Things at school are cruising along. Some search committee stuff, some other search committee stuff, E-Learning Task Force stuff, E-Learning Remedial Math Work Group stuff, some teaching observations, more progress on the summer TFI work, and nothing new on the 3rd grade curriculum front. That's the quick summary.

I brewed beer for the first time this past Saturday. The overall process is surprisingly simple. Of course, to get consistently good results, you need to carefully control all the variables. But at least the general idea is simple. We did an all grain brew. The process starts with milled grains, which are steeped in hot (155-160 degree) water. This extracts sugars and other flavors from the grains like brewing a tea. After about an hour, the grains are strained off through a mesh, and then water is poured over the mesh to wash off even more sugars that might be on the surface of the grains. The whole mess is then boiled for an hour (adding hops at various points) to concentrate the sugars. The resulting liquid is then chilled and moved into another container where the fermentation will happen. The yeast is added, and then everything is sealed up with a little one-way valve to allow gas to escape and prevent wild yeasts from entering. This sits for 10 days to ferment. And this is where things are in the process.

I don't even like beer that much, but I enjoyed the process and found it to be fun and interesting. Maybe I'll grow to appreciate beer more after this, or maybe beer will continue to be the thing I drink when it's offered.

Sunday was the annual small group Thanksgiving dinner. This year, we fried two turkeys because one wasn't going to be enough. We ended up with about a half turkey left over. It's rare for me to have a home-cooked meal these days (see above), and so it was nice to be able to eat a wide sampling of homemade foods. And it was good to hang out with friends and to watch the craziness that happens when multiple children in the 3 years and younger range get together. They must have spent 15-20 minutes just running back and forth between two parts of the house. Over and over again. And screaming. Lots of screaming. But it was still fun and entertaining.

I left out a lot of work details and didn't talk any church stuff this time around, but I'm done typing tonight. So I'll just leave it at that.