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I think that's pretty normal for highly-flocculant English strains. Wyeast 1968 looks like cheese curds.

Absolutely. Give another yeast a shot (US-05, Notthingham) before you think about giving up on homebrewing. You'll be glad you kept at it and well-rewarded with awesome beer.

I've had a beer or two turn out less bitter than planned. Carbonation helps a bit with 'perceived' bitterness though and both turned out far more balanced than I had originally thought.

If you're successful in removing fusel alcohols, I'm confident that you'll also be successful in removing 100% of the beer's finer qualities right along with them. Right now you have a beer that is not perfect, but perfectly drinkable. I bet most of us have at least one of those in our home...

Sounds like you're off to a great start! Water pH and mineral content are hugely important in brewing, but it's not something to worry about when using extract. As long as your tap water tastes good, it should work just fine. Best of luck with everything!

I planted Centennial, Cascade, Northern Brewer, Chinook and Willamette last year. The wind beat them up pretty badly last season, but this year I plan on supporting them better. I don't expect much in terms of yield this year - but am very interested in trading cones/rhizomes once mine get...

StarSan IS available in Japan. You will, of course, pay far more for it than you would in the U.S. - but if you're careful, it lasts a long time and is by far the best sanitizer for our purposes in my opinion. www.homebrewing-service.com

It's hard for me to get liquid yeast here in Japan, but when I get my hands on 1968 I re-pitch that stuff for as long as I possibly can. Although it can be a little 'moody', it's truly amazing yeast.

WLP002. S-04 will definitely work in a pinch and is a great suggestion, but to me it has far less of that beautiful English character that you're looking for if a recipe calls for 1968/002.

That same article helped me decide a while back. I never really worried about trub too much, but I worry about it even less now...

When I first started brewing, I probably bottled my first 5 plus beers straight from the spigot because I just thought that's how it was done. At that time, I enjoyed the hell out of those beers and didn't know the difference. Glad to get that off my chest. Now that I've learned how to do...

I think you'll be fine with what you have. On a different note, and not to be a jerk, I think it's worth pointing out that Maris Otter is not a 'brand' of pale ale malt at all - as suggested above. It's an English two-row varietal often used by a number of maltsters.

I wouldn't think twice about just doing it in primary. I always dry hop in primary and have never had any issues. Why make things more difficult than they have to be, ya know?

The thought never crossed my mind, but I've never had issues with El Cheapo winged capper.

Can't decide between Cascade and Simcoe.

Absolutely agree with Chadwick. You have to gelatinize the starch before you can proceed any further. Check out this article in BYO: http://byo.com/grains/item/94-adjuncts-explained Hope it works out!

Not to over-simplify, but could at least part of the issue be that you're comparing a not-so-attenuative British Ale strain to a machine of a dry yeast like SO-5?

I couldn't agree with you more, and often do the same thing. But seeing as the OP seems relatively new to the hobby, I went ahead an assumed that a vacuum sealer isn't an option at this point. Assuming that's the case, using them sooner rather than later is probably for the best.

Ideally, use them as quickly as you can. Within a few weeks if possible. That being said, I once found 4oz of Willamette in the back of my freezer that was more than 2 years old and used them for bittering in pinch. I would never PLAN to use 2 year old hops but the beer was great.

You could use a free online recipe calculator like http://www.brewersfriend.com/ when building recipes to determine approximate IBUs, but I don't think there's any tool where you type in a couple of ingredients and it spits out recipe ideas for you. That's up to you man! That's the fun of this...