Electrobrew - About me

GDSever I am not an electrical engineer, and have for most of my adult life have considered electricity and electronics the black magic around me that powered most of the modern world. My university studies on the subject were about as useful as those types of learning environments typically are - just enough to skate by with a passing grade, only to be quickly brain-dumped in a flurry of post-finals binge drinking. My parents are so proud, to be sure.

I am not a professional beer judge, nor do I desire to exact that level of criticality upon my own creations. I brew beer that I pray satisfies my family and friends thirsts, and pleases their palates more than someone who aspires to compare my concoction against a typically deficient commercial example. That being said, my pride has prompted me to enter in some competitions, and so far have won a couple of prizes in the two competitions I have entered.

I am not, nor do I claim to be, a smart or resonable man either. Just because something is impractical or unnecessary has ever kept me from yearning or striving to make it reality. I often pour money down bottomless pits called "hobbies" at prodigious rates, at least until my better half steps in and reminds me that our kids will need to go to college someday. For me expense is a mostly secondary consideration to whether something satisfies my own internal motivations. Thank heavens I am not a legume enumerator for a living.

There are many things that I am not... which begs the question of what I am. I am a chemical engineer, 10 years graduated, that has forgotten nearly all of my bought-and-paid-for knowledge. I continually find myself re-learning things that should be at my beckoned call. I am a cog in a large chemical corporate machine that churns out lots of value to its shareholders - or at least that is what our bigger wheels tell us little cogs. I've hardly done chemical engineering professionally a day in my life since graduating. Everything I have learned in life that has been worth knowing was principally self-taught through reading or doing, from my understanding of homebrewing to my ability to program in Visual Basic. I am a person that relishes the struggle of learning, and typically view seemingly insurmountable obstacles as challenges to overcome. I am also a relative newcomer to homebrewing, having only began in April of 2004, and switching to all-grain in 2005.

These projects fall into that category. I undertake this effort to not answer "WHY?", because from my perspective that is irrelevent. I can brew good beer with a bucket or cooler, and I know this - But a bucket sure doesn't impress guests as much as a giant shiney thing with lots of blinking lights.

This is about answering "HOW?", and valuing form over function to the greatest degree possible. Brewing beer is principally an art form, and I aspire to make my equipment as much part of the artistry as the end product.