This is why I love having the home page on  Sylrynn's laptop set to randomly browse wikipedia articles. So, here's a shout out to all the dozens of furries that certainly must live in Mitteldithmarschen. I'll pour myself a dark lagger and think of you all. Also, planting hops in the backyard tomorrow. :3 I have female clones of Columbus and Northern Brewer. Both equally suited as bittering and flavoring hops. Righteous.

It's that time of year again. Taxes, and this year uncle sam was kind. So, the down payment has been made on Apo 2.0. Going with  TwinkyArts again. I was satisfied with my partial, and she's gotten a lot better since then. I'm going with a full digigrade suit this time, follow me eyes, and claws. Oh yeah... He won't be ready for AC but with a little luck maybe for FF.

For the next week I'll be out of Burlington and in my home town sugaring and house sitting, cause it's that time of year too.  Sylrynn will be joining me for a good chunk of that time so while I'm bummed to be away from him for a few days on either end of the week, I'll have him here Saturday through tuesday night.

Behold

http://www.watchcartoononline.com/a.....b-jake-the-dad

You will have to sit through an add but it's worth it. Nine minutes and 40 seconds into the episode it happens.

Also, Happy Easter!

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!




It's been over two years as of a week ago, and it's really late so I can't really go into much detail but this is the best St. Patty's day party I've ever had. He totally surprised me, and I cried, of course. I'm the happiest man in the world tonight. I'm off to bed though I don't know if I can even sleep. I haven't had anything at all to drink this St. Patty's day cellebration. Just had almost 30 furries over at the house. We celebrated a day early. Anyway I'm rambling but holy hell, getting hitched. *bounces* I'll tell my folks in the morning.

I can't possibly put it into words how excited I am about this new car. Its a 98 Impreza RS that I got for $600. It was totaled after hitting a tree but it runs and drives and just needs a new radiator support and hood to look like nothing ever happened. It's black with gold rims and custom gold interior trim. Dargon (aka  Sylrynn ) is putting on unequal length Borla replica headers, a custom welded Stromung mid-pipe and a dual tip muffler. The vanity plate I'll be applying for tomorrow is "APO FOX" so wish me luck that it isn't already taken. In time I'm going to also rubber wrap the hood, roof, and trunk in bright orange. It will be a VERY foxy car.


It has only 85K miles on it so I know I need to save up for head gaskets, but I sold my old car for 2500 cash (see icon) so I kind of already have saved up for replacing them.

I'll be posing with it in suit later for pictures you can be sure.

So I was juicing two pounds of fresh ginger to go into a real alcoholic home brewed "ginger ale" when half of the ginger pulp from around the juicing drum (thing that spins out the juice) got knocked loose by a chunk of ginger, leaving the drum unbalanced.


This is pretty much what happened next all over our counter.




No lie.

Some of you don't know how to put on a fur suit. Allow me to educate you.




Also, I had to learn about this meme the day we filmed.

1. Are LONG

2. Feature me within the first minute.

3. Are set to "We can make the world stop" by Glitch Mob

4. Are of me in the same outfit walking down the same hallway.

5. Slow down my movements in time with the bass.


Way to be original guys.

Look for me at 29 seconds here


And at 48 seconds here


Of course I feature elsewhere in both and both are worth watching from start to finish.

In other news, I'm sick. Really really sick. Tomorrow I'll be leaving for my home town to march in the winter carnival parade with my little sister  ColumbineCrux and I hope I'm feeling better by then.

I will be going to AC this year, and shortly therafter to Cape Cod to work as a commercial striped bass fisherman with my brother.

Sort of. At least we made the Burlington Free Press facebook page!

Check it out! http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f.....=3&theater


There's even some footage edited together of us clowning around!
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/.....CFRONTPAGE%7Cp


For the record, I had a BLAST! It was a fur meet that started with just me wandering around wondering why everyone was late, and snowballed to three suiters and a total of 13 furs at the peak of the meet.

Does that time work for everyone? Again I'll be teaching bottling and racking techniques.

The best day for me would be Saturday unless there are any objections The focus of this class would be to teach you how to move beer from a primary fermenter to a secondary fermenter under clean conditions, as well as how to bottle a batch. Right now I have a single stage fermentation finnish style ale with juniper berries and rye malt bubbling away in the bedroom. The imperial IPA still has to be placed in the secondary fermenter, and Saturday would be a good day to do it.

Any takers? If it's your first time to one of my beer classes I'll be more than willing to go over how to start a batch. As per usual there will be beer to take home and a tip jar that will go exclusively towards the brewing of more beer to share.

If Saturday doesn't work for you I'll try to announce all my brewing projects well ahead of time so you can learn.

First of all, I LOVE sharing my beer. So in the coming months as I get into a steady brewing regiment I will probably be sharing a lot of beer. If you can't afford to put something in the tip jar (see this journal http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/4171304/ ) do keep in mind that bottles cost money, and I prefer to TRULY recycle them. In a day and age where glass recycling means breaking the glass down, melting it, and blowing it again, I like to be able to just wash the bottles and re-use them. When you finish one of my beers, there is likely to be a sediment of yeast at the bottom. I swish it around and drink it for the B-vitamins but if you are not one for drinking beer dregs just blast it out with a shot of hot water and leave the bottle to drain. I can do the sanitizing. If you drink beer out of other dark brown bottles that aren't twist offs, be they bombers or regular 12oz bottles I will gladly give them a new home in the ever turning cycle of beer bottle re-incarnation.

So the official time is 5:30 ish if that works for everyone. Sorry for the late update. Hope you all have a great new year!

Who's with me? I will work around people's schedules. I work until 11 AM but considering I will have to be up and at work by 4, a nap would be prudent before I start brewing. When is the earliest people think they can show up? I have already purchased the supplies.

That brings me to my next point, money. No, I will not charge for classes, nor will I charge for beer. Morally I can't charge for the former and legally I can't charge for the latter. But brewing beer isn't a cheap hobby. If I only brewed for myself, I'd be saving money by home brewing, but brewing for others get's costly. If I wasn't already trying to start a home business making soap I wouldn't so much mind but I was thinking... Voluntary donations, not even in exchange for beer, but if you come over, and you have some, and you like it, drop a few bucks in a jar, which will go right back into making more beer to share with others. As you know we throw some swinging parties at our house, and a few bucks next time you come to one of those wouldn't go amiss. I would NEVER put a door charge to my beer tastings or to our get togethers, nor would I even bat an eye at someone, if not most people, attending without crossing my palm, but I'm gonna leave it open to people. I do, after all, work at a minimum wage job. If your situation is such that you want to attend and can't afford a few dollars that's totally fine, I know, I've been there. I think I'm rambling at this point, but if I come even half way towards breaking even I'd be happy.

This beer I've decided to make, is a Belgian style Imperial India Pale Ale. I've spared no expense on this batch, buying eight pounds of light malt extract, a pound of "candi sugar," four ounces of leaf hops (Zeus and Palisade), toasted oak cubes, and the finest Belgian abbey style yeast I could find. I will try and keep that strain of yeast going since it's prohibitively expensive. It came to $60 to make five gallons, but it should be a very potent beer. Thank you for all the suggestions on what I should brew.

Well, I've had a pretty good one this year. Santa was more kind to me in the checking department than in the quantity of physical presents department which is ideal, but I never realized how much like a little kid I was till I saw all the other pups running around with gifts to still unwrap when I had already scoured under the tree. I got some nice shoes, a really nice jacket, a stuffed fox from  ColumbineCrux to add to the hoard, and a bunch of other cool odds and ends. Next weekend I'll be coming back to Saranac Lake to see the other half of my family.

After that though it should be time to move what's in the primary fermenter to the secondary fermenter, and to brew a new batch. So far the vote seems to be leaning towards IPA, my personal favorite beer. I'll have a more exact date for the beer brewing once I get my work schedule. I'll be hanging out with  doniago on new years eve but new years day might be a good day for the brewing lessons. I generally get out of work at three. More details as things move along.

(Edit)  columbinecrux wants me to mention (don't know how it slipped my mind) that my aunt, who is a professional artist, did a pencil sketch of this photo http://www.furaffinity.net/view/8695570/

She'll be uploading it shortly.

For those of you who weren't watching me a few years ago, you may have never even heard of the Hopping Fox Brewery. Once upon a time I used to brew vast quantities of home-made craft beer. I pushed the envelope of beer with exotic brews like my Catnip Hefeweizen which gave its drinkers vivid and often nightmarish dreams, or my Imprudent Imperial Stout which was 17% alcohol by volume. In any case most everyone agreed they were good beers, and two moves later the Hopping Fox Brewery has re-opened. I just bottled up five gallons of a sinfully dark porter with cardamon, and I have another five gallons of smoked stout in the fermenter. If you've ever been to one of our house parties, then you know what a blast they are, and now, I think they're about to get 20% cooler.

I'm also out of ideas for what my next beer should be. When I get back from visiting my family for christmas it should be about time to move the stout from the primary fermenter to the secondary fermenter. This will leave me free to start another batch. I'm going to put this to a vote. Tell me if you want me to brew...

A. A Pale Ale
B. A Bitter
C. An India Pale Ale
D. An Amber Ale
E. A Red Ale
F. A Copper Ale
G. A Scotch Ale
H. A Stout (in production already)
I. A Porter (bottled and ready in two weeks)
J. An Imperial Stout
K. A Barley Wine
L. A Wheat Beer
M. Something else you suggest


Keep in mind I don't do lagers.

If you would like to drop by when I'm brewing to help/see how beer is made, comment and I'll see what I can do. If you want to drop by for a taste just let me know.


If anyone wants to get into brewing their own beer as well, I'm willing to teach, and there is a fantastic brew supply store in Winooski.

So I don't know how to type in an "enyay" on this computer which some of you may know as the N with the ~ above it. Point is, I've had this idea for a while now. What's stopping me is the time, money, skills, and danger of being beaten to death by children hoping I have candy for guts. I REALLY want to do either a colorful donkey, or a colorful version of my fox character with fabric cut into little overlapping tabs so it looks just like a Pinata, with cone ears and a cone muzzle.

You're thoughts? Anyone know suit builders who do pinata characters? Anyone know if such suits even exist? This is all partially inspired by Renard_V's character "The Quick Brown Fox" which he releases speedcore music through. I just picture the character being much more animated than my Apo character. Apo is kinda crazy, but he tries to play some things off cooly. Apo is the guy trying to be one of the cool kids. I imagine a pinata character as being excited about everything, and much much more energetic.

So, if you're wondering why you are getting new watches from people like  dingoos and  cutewolff it's cause they're bots. There was a bout of this earlier, and it's easy to tell them. One, the first day they sign on, they watch about 800+ people, in an alphabetical order. Two, the first day, they make two favorites from the same artist. Three, a bunch of people who thank people for watches without actually taking a second to LOOK at the page.

Now I like getting watches, I really do. When someone watches me, I take the time to look at their gallery. Sometimes I realize I know them, and then I usually watch back. If not, don't feel bad, I still feel special that you watched me, and appreciate it, but I have a hard enough time keeping up with my in-box. I just wonder what the hell there is to profit from ghosting in accounts here? I just feel bad for the admins who have to sort through all this.

First of all, sorry for the triple exclamation points. It was excessive and I am sorry, I just wanted to catch your attention was all.



In the next video you have to skip ahead to 9:40 to see the confused fox running around to Yackity Sax

So, where to begin? I'll try and keep it short and sweet.  Sylrynn made it to the con and suited around as  Subaroo which was a blast! Having him around however didn't stop me from hanging out with all you wonderful people who had offered to hang with me should I be missing my better half for the con. I didn't get to hang with nearly everyone that I wanted too, but I still spent a lot of time hanging out with people this year, meeting a few that I hadn't before, you know who you are and I WILL find you somehow.

What was different about this con for me. This year I didn't try to market my notoriety so much. Looking back on past cons I was very obsessed with people learning who I was, and getting to know as many people in as short a time as possible, suiting whenever I had the energy for it, and trying to get in all sorts of pictures. This year I didn't take a single picture, not one, and I'm sorry for that, but I have some good memories, and the time I could have spent fursuiting till I was more dead than alive was spent with friends. Overall it made for a much more relaxing con experience. Don't get me wrong, I love suiting, and I probably get more pleasure out of seeing pictures of me in suit posted than is prudent, but it's nice to detach one's self from all that and get down to what matters.

Now on to the disasters everyone's talking about. At about 4AM as many of you now know, some "inspired" individual unleashed his artistic creativity in the medium of Dry Chem Powder from a fire extinguisher in one of the stairwells. The fine particles triggered the fire alarm, and the great furry exodus from the Crowne Plaza Hotel. At first we were moved up the hill towards the parking garage, then re-located down towards the road. The core group of well known dancers that were in attendance set up an impromptu dance-off which was almost as good as the second row seats to the dance competition Syl and I had. It was a great way to pass the time, and we were almost a little sorry to hear that we could return to our rooms when the building had been cleared.

As for Hurricane Sandy. I don't want to jinx it, and I am sure that it's a serious problem in some areas, and has stranded many a fur in Cromwell, but so far turned out to not impede our travel whatsoever. We left early before closing ceremonies in order to beat the storm we haven't even seen. In the future we will DEFINITELY be staying from Thursday night through Sunday night to make the most of this wonderful con.

Okay so I FINALLY have everything worked out for FF. I'm too tired to do the whole meme, but here's the plan.

Leaving at 4:00AM on Friday to get to FF Cromwell in time to get in the reg line.  Sylrynn MAY be coming. Things are looking better in that department.

I/we will be rooming with  Renault_Callahan in the Crowne Plaza.

I/we will be leaving late Sunday night.

It's a much shorter stay in Connecticut than I would have liked, but if it let's my dragon get his wiring done so he can come then it's a sacrifice I'm more than willing to make.

Now onto soap.

Did you know I make soap? If not, where have you been? We are open for quotes on a custom batch of soap over at  KettlePondSoaps so check out the journal posted there. Commissions will open after Fur Fright.

First for the bad news. Because we had our attic insulation removed,  Sylrynn and his father have been busy re-wiring the shoddy electrical work in this house. As it's getting colder, the sooner they finish, the sooner we can re-insulate. If it isn't done in time for FF, he won't be able to go... I'll still be there, but if you know how he and I are, by which I mean attached at the hip for conventions, it's gonna be rough on both of us. I may need some extra company as I'm finding out that some of my best FF buddies won't be going either (you know who you are and I am seriously gonna be missing you) and I apologize in advance if I end up being desperate to tag along with people more than usual. There is a chance he can still make it, and I'm pitching in wherever I can to make the work go faster but there isn't a whole lot I can really do.

TLDNR version: may not make it to FF in which case, fox may cling, so carry a spritzer full of water.

Now for the aforementioned video.



If the squeaker has you memorizing what I look like so you can avoid me at FF don't worry, I only squeak around children in public because it's fun for them, while I know it's annoying to most of us at this point. This video is part of a series and I suggest you check out the others. Big props to  Camo_Husky as both a performer and a film-maker. Studying my body language compared to his in suit, I can see the professionalism he brings to suiting that I don't have (yet!) and yadda yadda I could gush on and on.

Finally, for the sweet arts.  Arrow~Farfetch is doing $20 commissions so he can move up here! I am SO PUMPED to see this dude finally living his dream of escaping the south for New England. Check him out, I think he under-values his work. >.>

In other news, I'm sick. I was so off my game at work today, if you ate at the Pearl Street McDonalds and were waiting for your food to arrive, I'm sorry, slap me when you get to FF.

Yesterday at work I saw something that made my day. While sweeping up broken beer bottle glass in the parking lot I heard a very automotive sounding thud coming from the Wendy's next to us. I looked just in time to see an employee carrying a bag of garbage picking himself up off of the front of a silver BMW convertible, I didn't get to see what model. He appeared to be unhurt by the collision, but I didn't hear him say a word. He gripped the bag of garbage by the bottom, tilted the top into the open convertible, and emptied the contents, then dropped in the bag. With a smile and a peace sign to the driver, the employee waltzed back into the store. The driver quickly parked and ran inside the store, not saying anything either, but I hope going to apologize for hitting the dude.

It warms my heart to see something like that. No faking injuries, no showing up in court with a neck brace on, no screaming match even. Just a quick screw you, and went on his merry way.  Sylrynn knows a guy who works at this particular Wendy's and he was delighted with the story, and is now trying to find out who got hit. I only hope Wendy's isn't stupid enough to fire the poor guy for it. I think you're allowed to be a little rude to the customer when the run you down with their car.

Your thoughts? I thought it was a wonderful way to handle the situation.

Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you to everyone who made it to the party. I think it's safe to call the party a huge success. I had a great time and it was so great to see some people I'd only met once at the last fur meet end up making it. The fact that it was nearly as big as the fur meet, and would have been bigger if everyone in the area who wanted to come could have, makes me VERY hopeful that future get-togethers at our place will really pack the house. This was the first house party I've ever had where dancing just sort of happened naturally, and was a blast, especially in fur suit. You're all invited back to the next shindig we throw so stay in touch.


For those of you wanting to know the soup recipe here it is, more of a method as there are no measurements.

In preparation you should roast your squash or pumpkin. I cut mine in half, scoop out the seeds for toasting, and place the halves cut side up with some butter in them in the oven at about 350 until soft, about an hour or so. Next, either cut the skin away from the flesh, or scoop the flesh out of the skin, whatever works, and mash with a potato masher.

In your pot, caramelize a generous helping of diced onions in butter or olive oil with salt to help the onions wilt faster. Once caramelized add your beer/milk/vegetable or meat stock, or whatever you want to make up the liquid in your soup. I used Long Trail Harvest Ale and water in equal amounts. Add in your squash or pumpkin. Other vegetables that mix well at this point would be baked sweet potatoes or carrots, though I went with just the pumpkin. I then added as much salt as I thought I would need, Cumin, black pepper, and fresh grated nutmeg. Other spices you could add would be cinnamon, allspice, ginger, and clove, with discretion and trying to avoid the whole soup coming out tasting like a runny pumpkin pie. Into the pot I added a number of fresh peeled and chopped baking apples, though any variety of apple will do. I let the whole thing simmer until the apples had softened and could be mashed with the potato masher. To get the soup really creamy and smooth I took a few minutes blending it with a stick blender. If you don't have a stick blender, you can, making a huge mess, transfer portions of your soup to a regular blender, blend it, then pour it into a different pot for the finished soup, one blenderfull at a time. I've done this in the past.

Best served with cheese grated all over the top then stirred in, along with a piece of good crusty bread.

Peace!
Apo