Hey Guys,

I've been a long time lurker and very rare poster. I used to be iamjonsharp's brew buddy, but last summer that loser up and moved away to Cincinnati taking all the brewing equipment with him! (Something about getting married and his wife being a rocket scientist and such )

Well, it's been a year long haul slowly acquiring all the equipment that I was suddenly without -- I got married too and suddenly all my hobby funds mysteriously dried up -- but my birthday was in the middle of June and I finally got my all grain setup back together.

I brewed Edwort's Pale Ale today, and things went pretty well. I hit the right mash temps, but the pot boiled over twice while I wasn't looking (I thought 6.5 gallons in a 15.5 gallon pot couldn't do that!). The ants where everywhere and I think one fell into my beer, but that only adds flavor right?

I was able to get the wort temperature down to around 82 with the tap but that's as low as it was going to go, so I have my fermentation bucket sitting in my swamp cooler now hoping to relatively quickly bring the temps down to the upper 60s (the swamp cooler is at 61 degrees).

Oh and I used a double packet of hydrated yeast just because I wanted the yeast to knock it out before any little nasties could breed.

Thanks for the read.