Home Made Booze Takes A Walk

The other day my pal X24 called me to wish glad birthday tidings. He interrupted my first attempt at making beer. See, in Florida you have a great choice of beer, you can get all of them-- Budweiser, Miller and Coors. Sometimes you can find something different, odd or independent, but it is rare and expensive.

My sister bought me a homebrew kit for Xmas and I thought I'd fire it up. I gave the homebrew craze a decade to dissipate, now it was safe. Remember back in the early 1990's when every geek decided to spend a lot of time and money making carbonated pissy scumwater? I sure do. Luckily for us the internet came along in the late 1990's and gave them free porn, Klingon Discussion Forums and international gaming. The homebrew niche sagged, now I can make my own and not seem like "them". I'll report on this later.

X24 reminded me of when we tried to make booze by fermenting various juice products in a cabinet in my college apartment. It seemed like a good idea, hell, if they could do it during Prohibition we certainly could do it now. Soon the bottles swelled with pressure, the high-alcohol swill concocting within. The liquid smelled like hell-- the sharp stench of spoiled fruit loaded with alcohol, potent poison that would even repel Kitty Dukakis. After 6 weeks of fermentation, we decided to abort the plan. We took the dozen 2-liter bottles to the curb in front of our apartment to abandon them.

We moved the last bottles outside and a woman walked up and inquired about what we were up to. "What's in the bottles?", she asked.

"I don't know, smells like booze", we said.

"Are you guys going to take it?" she asked.

X24 and I looked at each other and at the same time replied, "Nooooo".

She started to pick up the bottles, looked at us like we were idiots and said, "What are you, FRESHMEN?"

Her insult fell flat with us. We didn't reply, we just smiled and watched her gather up rotten juice. She waddled off with the products of our fermentation, intent on making a cocktail or two, or two hundred.

Turn the clock ahead 17 years to 2005. Right before Xmas I walked by a Salvation Army kettle and I had to look twice at the bell ringer. The blind woman was strangely familiar, but I could not figure out from where... I dropped a bottle cap and a button into the kettle, she acknowledge the ping.

I asked, "What are you, a FRESHMAN?"

The jingling bell ceased. Perhaps her booze bottom feedling and insulting demeanor were not so visionary after all.