I'm back...sort of...well, getting there

I'm starting to think this virus went from my sinuses up into my brain.  I'm no longer actively sick, but just have this lingering funk going on.

So this weekend was interesting.  There was this:

As one friend wrote on facebook, "the dragon is eating the sun".

I took the photo through welding goggles.

I didn't see any more of the eclipse live because the sun set prior to the annularity.

In addition The Lovely Spouse and I brewed this up:

Microbes hard at work.

Left to right: orange wine, red ale and IPA.

The wine and red ale are 100% The Lovely Spouse projects. The IPA (or India Pale Ale) is mine with The Lovely Spouse lending A LOT of guidance and helping out tremendously.  What you see is also known as primary fermentation.  The little white bucket is filled with water and the tubes coming out of the brown bottle and Ale Pail are under the water. This prevents bacteria from going up the tubes as the brews bubble. During primary fermentation the force from the gasses escaping are too much for something as small as the vapor lock you see on the wine's pail.  When the bubbling slows down or stops we'll transfer the beer to secondary fermenters, add in some corn sugar to feed the yeastie beasties, and for the IPA we'll add in another bunch of hops (dry hopping is adding hops during secondary fermentation, in addition to the initial brewing/wort).  I'll add more details to a later post dedicated to this.