COMMUNITY SUPPORTED FERMENTATION

a C_SF. just like a CSA.

hey there! we have so so so much to say about human individual and group behavior. and politics. and ethics. hot damn! what a complicated time!

but. for now. we're concerned mostly about these things:

1) the health of all of the older and infirm people who *any bungalow customer knows or comes into contact with*.

2) our health.

3) our employees' capacity to afford proper healthcare, rent and food for the next several months.

and. with that. we announce one of many new initiatives/products:

*COMMUNITY_SUPPORTED FERMENTATION*

ever join a CSA? CSAs are great for a few reasons. first, if you like farms or farmers or real food or small businesses or your general community, CSAs are *the best* way to support all of those things. they help farmers plan for growing and harvesting. and for labor. they spread the farmer's risk out a bit among the broader CSA community. they help with cash flow. etc. etc.

this is actually quite common in the craft beer community, too. it helps brewers a bit with cash flow and risk. but also creates a lot of camaraderie and connection between breweries and their customers. and among the customers themselves.

what we're launching is modeled after CSAs and CSBs. but since ours includes beer, bread and pizza. we're calling it a CSF. for community_supported fermentation.

cuz, you know, all wild things are wildly good.

for the next couple weeks, we'll work through a pilot program with the first 20 of you who sign up. we hope you'll be generous with us. and patient with us. and constructively criticize us so we can open it up to the rest of the broader wilderness of chicago.

note: for now, we only offer pick ups. once per week. but we'll expand to offer delivery quite soon.

visit middlebrowbeer.com/communitysupport to sign up. 

as i said last week: we have deep gratitude for your support this past year. and we hope you have a little more time and budget to support us these next few months. so we can continue to run this modest place as the community hub it's become.

we love u.

and u can wild 2.

unnamed-2.png
unnamed-1.png

middle brow \ citizen how /

two dimes.

i've written myself a lot of emails about the democratic primary campaigns this past year. and i don't think they've ever really crossed over into any modestly memos. and i think the reason is that i didn't want to commit. i really didn't know who i liked best for a long time. i sorta hated every last one of them. they all sorta weird the f out of me. still do. none of them is actually sincere. they're all just power hungry. and solipsistic. including bernie. if you're honest about it.

i guess it's sorta human nature to get pretty self-nuts when so many people tell you how great you are for so long. and then a whole bunch of other people tell you how awful you are. you're part self-nuts and part insecure, which makes you constantly strive to show the world. and yourself. that you really, truly are great.

humans. the best "wtf" flavor in every dish. in every beer. fucking weirdos! so beautiful!

anyway, just the other day things crystallized quite a bit. and i know who my guy is now. but that there's the rub. that anyone would have a "guy". it's silly. and shows a weakness of thought. and a deficit of critical analysis. and an incapacity for understanding human individual and group behavior. to get behind a particular man. sorta like how one should never love a musician. but only her albums.

but let's back up a bit. warren was my favorite of the all-bad candidates for a long time. for a few reasons. which i'll get to below but mostly, probably, because i'm a white, heavily degree'd incrementalist, amirite?!?!?!

so i was particularly tuned into her results and her decisions as things progressed. it was hilarious to hear everyone flip the f out about her dropping out after 4 primaries. SHE HASN'T WON ANY!!!!! of four out of 50 primaries. with 7-8 candidates running in each of them. it was just plain fucking silly and totally disingenuous and blindly hopeful. 

and then, of course, super tuesday happened. and bernie voters flipped their shit. because he failed to convince enough people that he was the right person to beat trump. i mean: it's sorta funny-sad. cuz poll after poll suggests that the policies on which he campaigns are super popular. but they still voted for biden in huge numbers. most new voters, even. voted for biden. at least in texas. which tells you that bernie himself didn't convince people that he was the right person to get the job done. to beat trump. to pass many of his own policies.

and what did the giant bernie revolution say in response? two things that made their lives way easier: the DNC is conspiring against us; the elitist snake elizabeth warren should have dropped out and endorsed bernie. 

both those arguments are massively dangerous. they're easy, yeah. that's why they're attractive. but this terrible tues thing wasn't even close. i mean, in TEXAS bernie would have require like 65-70% of warren supporters to vote for him to make up his deficit to biden. in other states, the number was much, much higher. maine is the only state that likely would have flipped in a near 50-50 scenario. 

but again, back up back up cuz i got a numbered list on this point. for all of my bernie friends.

first, stop reading articles about how warren doomed sanders. just stop. cuz they all rest on massive unproven assumptions. likely disproven, actually. most of the dem primary voters are NOT white college grads in hipster enclaves. or on twitter at all. they're lifelong democrats in industrial tennessee.


second, to comment on that anyway. it looks increasingly like about 40-45% of warren voters' second choice was bernie sanders. who would the rest of 'em flock to? the guy who at the moment was seen as the "most likely to beat trump"? probably. yes. biden might have won by an even greater margin had warren dropped out. the data is just as suggestive of that as it is suggestive of the opposite, easier story. 

third, how can you argue for weeks that warren is an elitist snake. part of the establishment. and then presume that 100% or even 75% of her followers hate the establishment and want bernie to win? that's daft. deluded. a lot of her supporters are indeed elitists!!! and would definitely prefer the status quo to bernie. 

fourth, the problem is bernie. he never had the support that many bernie voters constantly pretended he had. some of us had argued for months that he doesn't speak for enough americans and hasn't done the work to convince enough people that his socialist revolution is the right framework for structural change. if real power is about the people. and he's lost the people in a big way. then what? do we just pretend that, never mind, the power is entirely in the DNC's hands? the people are sheep? how cynical. ...

basic point: it's bernie's fault he lost. so the revolution must shut up and put their heads down and get back to doing the hard work. ACTUALLY GET OUT AND VOTE. convince enough people. ... bernie lovers do have a better understanding of what a just, ideal, possible society looks like. so they should keep doing the hard work of convincing people of that fact. ... but also: remember that people alone don't have the power. you have to govern in a republic. which means deals. tweaks. compromises. ... having the capacity for such. in a campaign and in a government. is immensely important. ...  and then: if you just keep insisting that establishment conspiracies are stymieing your revolution. well, then, it ain't a very powerful one. and maybe you should try something (or someone?) else?

which brings me to my next point.

warren.

our staff is upset w me. because i supported warren for the dem nominee for prez. and many of them are die-hard bernie fans.


now, i'd like to say i learned a long time ago not to be die-hard anything. except maybe a die-hard nature lover. cuz anything associated with a human will inevitably disappoint a die-hard supporter. i mean: i don't even love joanna newsom. the milk-eyed mender is just nowhere near good enough to inspire unqualified adoration. so i make a decision about adoration on an album-by-album basis.

i'd like to say this. but it has a sort of lou-reed-you're-still-doing-things-that-i-gave-up-years-ago vibe to it. i used to be die-hard about lots of things. i'd die all over the fucking place for them. but i was disappointed. and i learned. so some people never learn that lesson. because they're never disappointed. and i envy them. they pick the right things about which to die hard for. like, to get impaled for. but i learned it. and can accept that a lesson for me might not be a lesson for her or him.

in any case, on the bernie-warren debate: i'm a policy guy. much like i'm an album guy. i search for policies that could improve the lives of the working and middle classes, and i poke at those policies until i'm sure they're the best of what's avail. and then i support pols who aim to make laws enacting such policies. and, in that, i really very rarely get into one pol over another. in the case of warren and bernie, e.g., they seem to agree about 90% of the time on policies. 

the arguments for bernie over warren (if our staff and twitter are any indication) seem to come down to: bernie polls better against trump; bernie is a working class hero; bernie has been making these arguments for 50 years and warren's a fraud; bernie will increase turnout; bernie won't compromise on M4A.

and i want to take each of these things in turn:

1) polls. they change constantly. just a couple days ago, every single dem nominee except maybe that who-is-he-really PETE guy was polling better than trump. and bernie was ahead in a shitload of states. 

2) working class hero. what has he done? is he merely an aspiring working class hero? i mean that truly. please respond, if you will, with a link to the things he's done over the years for the working class. i'm ready and excited to learn about them. ... i hope he hasn't merely been arguing on their behalf for years. i hope he's done some real shit. cuz it takes a couple months to organize a trade union where one doesn't exist. and he's like 78. so arm me with that info if you have it! so i can destroy my republican relatives with it.

maybe he truly beats warren on this point.

3) on never changing your mind. 

on making an argument for 50 years and then ending up being right; what happens when his policies are enacted and they're only half effective? will he pivot? what then?

on the logic of republican policies due to human nature and optimism bias. this one's less obvious: humans believe a bright day is juuuust around the corner for them. we all suffer from optimism bias. and this contributes to some thinking. namely, that low taxes are right *even for us* (we working classics). that low regulation is right *even for us* cuz prosperity!!! many humans're happy to be on a team that sells that message. that logical message. contrary to the left's take: working class republicans are voting logically. voting in their own interests. cuz they're gonna benefit one day!

so it's important for someone to speak to that tendency. not to completely ignore it.

on warren's capacity to believe something. execute on it. gather evidence of its having been wrong. and change her opinion. aka: warren's a snake.

4) on lower turnout in iowa than 2008. on bernie capturing less of the vote there than "not bernie". and on bernie getting less of the vote in iowa than he did in 2016. 

all these ^ arguments were made after iowa. and you know what happened? bernie people laughed. they didn't seem to work harder. they seemed mostly to laugh. scoff at the idea that the non-bernie vote was high. "that's not how elections work!" they said. but, you know, sometimes it is. people vote for people. and fewer people were attracted to bernie this time than last time. when it was just him against hilary. and fewer young people cared enough to vote. and then it repeated in NH and NV and SC. and guess what: that's why bernie lost. new dem primary voters were mostly not disaffected or young. they were mostly moderate and scared of trump. 

it was bernie's job to get the disaffected and youth to VOTE. and then TO VOTE FOR HIM. and he doesn't appear to have done it. but i'm open to convincing, data-driven arguments to the contrary.

but maybe we should have run a progressive who spent just a touch more time finding common ground w moderates? or at least figuring out how to placate them in return for their support? or speaking their language? 

5) on compromising: the danger of refusing to compromise is not getting anything. so, you know, not compromising on M4A is wildly silly and selfish. 

but maybe more interesting yet: the danger of refusing to compromise and actually getting what you want means you own the failures and setbacks. if americans aren't ready for it, funding dries up and the progressive policy agenda gets set back big time. 

and that's all. that's all why i believe warren was a better rep for the progressive left. 

--

but here we are...

i'm throwing my full throat and whole non-work life into supporting bernie for the democratic presidential nominee. and for president. 

this country was totally fucked up by *the chicago school* and neoliberalism and goldwater-reagan and milton friedman and all the rest. we must repudiate the last 40 years of socio-economic policy. totally destroy. the paradigm must shift. both dimes, entirely. free markets and free trade are not ethical objectives per se. but only to the extent that their fair.

and whether or not bernie sanders gets any of his agenda passed at the federal level, his republican-democracy-and-socialism-spectrum *revolution* is the best remaining hope we have for making that paradigmatic shift. the shift that's necessary RIGHT NOW. if he loses, the republicans become the party of the working class for a generation. and they quite frankly will take it out at the knees. as they've been doing all along.

i want to be clear about one last, important point: we americans are not capitalists. and we are not communists. we would never want to be either. both are god-awful. and both would be terrible for all the humans you've ever met. the purest examples of the practice of both prove it to be true.

this country is socialist. and has been for decades upon decades. currently, we redistribute trillions of dollars of wealth that results from qualifiedly-free production to the masses. and we redistribute some mass-taxpayer dollars to giant corporations. ... bernie sanders is just trying to distribute a little bit more of the wealth to the working class. and he's trying to take control of the production of a few things that have gone totally haywire. and that we've proven we can't supply/produce fairly. like healthcare. ... and he wants to regulate a few areas of the economy that threaten to harm us immensely in the future. like, you know, industries whose businesses emit greenhouse gases. 

portrait of an artist as a true devil-man, amirite?

oh no!!! no no no!! i have med school bills! and what will a carbon tax do to the economy? it'll destroy us! it'll......... cause deficits? be ineffective? i mean, have you been sleeping during every republican administration for the last 40 years? have you been dead? or pre-alive? get fucking real and honest. you know you're lying. and it's really about the word socialism. and it's about your team winning.

stop playing team sports with coronavirus testing. stop playing team sports with someone's terrible, debilitating toothache. stop playing team sports with germán's life. stop playing team sports with ugly waste and inefficiency and your gas bill. grow the fuck up. acknowledge the failures of reagan and the third way democrats. and put some effort into increasing the effectiveness of policies that even the vast majority of texans support. 

admit you were wrong, dad. (actually, my dad admitted he was wrong like a decade ago and his political-philosophical growth has been a true source of joy in my life and, i think, his.) so.... admit you were wrong, ma. (jk she beat my dad.)

admit you were wrong, uncle paul! but thanks for letting me use your account at sherwin williams to buy a couple N95 masks before we were told that they should be saved for healthcare workers. i'm gonna donate them to the first hospital with an outbreak. but will keep two for polly and i.

we're attending the bernie rally this saturday. if even for a second. and we're hosting a bernie GOTV event next saturday. at bungalow. 

we're all in. bernie represents the right direction for the country. always has, really. and i'm way grateful for him. that he never shut up about it. 

we'll see you on the streets. hopefully with a bunch of other bernie supporters who got over it and admitted bernie's failures and picked up the pieces and organized some fucking voters.

which is the work of the future.

middle brow missions

viva daca. for now.

DACA is one of the saddest damn policies enacted by our jeen govmint. actually, quick bit of history. while obama was president, republicans like marco rubio etc would not sign the DREAM act. a full citizenship bill for immigrants who were brought to the US as children. of no volition. but their parents. outside the formal structures for entering the US.

this means, as dirty and disingenuous republicans like to claim, that they're "illegal". putting asside how stupid that term is—"humans" quite literally cannot be illegal—it's true that their legal status in this country is, hmmm, jeopardized? non-existent? we're not sure how quite to put it. but what are we sure of? it's super fucking cruel. and so fucking dumb.

so anyway, obama tried to be our hero. our pensive please-see-the-best-in-republicans-and-give-them-whatever-they-want-and-one-day-they'll-come-around hero. oh hearts in eyes! whatever you say forever and ever barack! you're so reasonable! you're so thoughtful! you can speak commas! you can speak semi-colons and em-dashes! tell us what to do next! 

anyway anyway. through executive order, obama did one of the better things of his presidency. he enacted DACA. or, deferred action for childhood arrivals. which action was deferred, you ask? ICE action. icy action, maybe? yeah. anyway. these kids, if they volunteered their info. if they came out of hiding. would be granted a sort of immunity against deportation. if they paid the appropriate fees and stayed out of trouble and such. 

and hey! it worked! except, then obama lost the presidency. and democrats are terrible at elections. at getting and keeping power. and so they lost the senate too. and the house. and, like so many of its recipients, DACA was in jeopardy. trump threatened to rescind it. again and again. and continues to do so. and DACA kiddos live in massive fucking fear. that they'll be sent back to a country they don't remember and have never been to as sentient adults.

why haven't they? well, for the same reason they can't get drunk at a robyn concert and take a leak in an alley. and the same reason they can't ask the officer for proof that they were speeding. and the same reason they avoid too much schooling. and the same reason they fear getting a driver's license. and the same reason they smoke pot *only in their own homes*. and the same reason they avoid bernie sanders rallies. and the same reason they never ever ever ride their bike through a red light. even when there ain't no cars in any direction. and the same reason they just generally avoid guns. as a hobby. and the same reason the keep most of their money in cash.

because they have enormous anxiety every single day that they'll get arrested. and deported. or else detained and beat up. and shit, if they left the country to visit family in mexico. like, if they went to christmas at their aunt and uncle god damn house. they couldn't go back home! all their fucking christmas toys would just be sitting under a tree for fucking eternity! a train, rolling around a track incessantly. waiting for its owner to polish it. and fix a track connection. 

ok ok. so i'm angry. i'm way angry. mostly because germán, one of our floor managers, is a DACA recipient. and he's been near tears several times this past year. talking about what trump threatens to do, namely: revoke his legal status.

he's arguably the hardest worker in the house. he knows more about the intricacies of the space than anyone but polly. he starts working before his shift. and when he's sipping on a shift beer after it, with the rest of the shift crew, he's the one who jumps out of his seat to greet a couple who walks in late at night. and wonders what to do next cuz there's no host. he's cleaned crumbs out of the crack in the table out of boredom. he's turned over every single two-top and re-leveled their feet. he works, and he's good. a good god damn human being. and he has to renew his DACA status this year. and the cost to do so has gone up. and is now over $500. but given what i said above, he's not exactly in a position to pay that money.

and so teamed up with the overwhelmingly nice folks at HONEY BUTTER FRIED CHICKEN. our new good friends. and we made a real jeen pizza. garlic cream. green tomato kimchi. honey butter fried chicken. scallywags. and we threw him a big old party. and made mouths water. and worked the f out of the floor on his behlf. and let him play his favorite massage parlor music. and raised the fees for him. VIVA DACA, we said. FOR NOW, we said. until a man (again?) with a heart takes back the executive in this country. and stop threatening it. and maybe even pushes for a full citizenship bill. goddess help us.

but we ain't stopping there!

no!

no no!

we're gonna keep going! we've got a VIVA DACA; FOR NOW party scheduled with MI TOCAYA in march. and with CAFE MARIE-JEANNE in april. and with several more of our restaurant friends as the months wear on toward this ridiculous election.

NEW BEER NOTICE

*WORK THE FLOOR*.

a sparkling wild fermented w native wine yeast.

inside out. side. work side. work that floor. ... we've never seen a better day over here at bungalow. like our hero mike bloomberg. the richest terminal baron ever to run for president. real print shop money. the fucking guy is ROLLING in cash cuz of all the number printing he did. real software jeen. added so much value to the world. such a thinker. monopolized the shit out of trading terminals. an information baron. the original zuck. the original blank starer. the original robotic rich man. here to sweep us all off our feet. just what we need! a rich man! how'd you know?!

anyway, he likes to say "today was the best day of my life, and tomorrow's gonna be better". you know, cuz he's a jeen. and that's how we feel at bungalow most the time. even on hard days when our progressive issues get a little kick to the shins. more on that later. but even on those days we walk around singing and whistling dixie or hot chip and dancing to eccentric soul or alice coltrane. (see below.)

we tapped a new beer last week. it's called *WORK THE FLOOR*. and it's made with rice and sorghum. so it's gf-ish. and get this: it was fermented w native wine yeast! that's right. we harvested a strain of yeast from the grape must and juice in our stoumen negroamaro haul. and banked it. and are now using it on various beers. this one: a sparkling wild beer. with moutere hops.

as with every brett/wild beer here, it's a real "here smell this" beer. you just can't help but shove it in your friend's nose. and she'll lurch away from you first. of course. she's human. or at least mostly so. but then she'll come back to it and order it for her second. it's got orange juice on the nose. and sorta like a lemon-rind semolina cake on the tung. and it sparkles! it moves! across the floor! it works! its effervescence is critical. to the life it gives y'all. 

anyway, this beer is both hyperlocal and well-traveled. come get a little taste of everything. and hold it in your hand as you to-and-fro through our cafe and dining room. as you work the floor.

work it.

good work.

good work.

new foods too!

neighborhood pizzas. and beets. and other wild things.

and we've refreshed our foods menu for winter. with at least two new foods.

our new vegetarian seasonal pizza is squashy. like the native illini would've ate this time about. puréed squash. mozz. smoked potato bacon. sweet potato clippings. parm. crispy sage. and maple-chili oil. the last two being what makes it sing!

our new vegan pizza is a thai coconut thing. squash playing bass. piles of kale. jicama. coconut-ginger-curry yogurt. mint. and cilantro.

(we've also got an insane beet dish. and overnight oats. and two brand new toasts. and a cheese-chard dip. and on and on and on!!!)
 

unnamed-2.jpg

NEW BEER NOTICE

dry bevv.

notice! it's january! and whether you're doing dry january, or dry january 23rd, we got you covered with fun new bevs for piano accompaniment. 

first. for all you folks who go too far in nov/dec: dry january is critical! we're among you. and while we may not have the capacity to dry out for a whole month (job requirements and all), we've done dry january 20th and dry january 23rd. and they both felt great!

we launched a *SPARKLING BARLEY TEA* last week. and it's terrific! grape nutty. pensive. lightly sweet. but, you know, no sugar added because sugar is crack. just a malty sweetness. a safe sweetness. a healthy sweetness. ... the bubbles on this grain tea are invigorating, and the nose makes you feel like some crazy chef-bully shoved your head in one of those giant sacks of brewers' and bakers' grain. and there you sat. soft smile on your face. enjoying the discipline. ... and you want just about as many of these teas as you'd want beers. so you really feel like you're drinking with everyone! and having fun! it's wholesome japanese instrumentation. and 70s topanga canyon. without the cults. 

and our *HOUSE OAK FERMENTED KOMBUCHA* program is on fire! right now we've got a lovely strawberry-pink peppercorn surprise for y'all. it's a staff favorite. it's what we all drank for our shifties on dry january 15th. one day only! but so many of us can't now quit it. we'll never have a "bland january". could never give up the earthy acidity of this kombucha. and wait! by feb we'll have a hard one!

--

*WE GO BACK*

notice! you know all that funk and wild yeast we talk about? like, at this point, maybe 50% of our offerings are wild in some way. including on the food side. we just can't stop. we're wild children. we're wild men and women. we're wild moms and dads. from the future where children aren't scary. they're just other humans. and our beers define us!

there's something about "dark" that gives us anxiety. all of us. it can be comforting: really low light. deep, rich mahogany. that's likely why every damn brewery ever. and many restaurants, are set up like english pubs. but not us. we have an aversion to that ubiquitous darkness. we chase the light! and we chase it in so many facets of our day-to-day. our beers rarely clock in above 5.5% abv. there almost always pale or pink. or the prettiest, lightest orange-amber. ... that's what we most often find ourselves wanting to drink. as if we're farmers looking for bright refreshment. appalachian hippie farmers, if you will. the foxfire set. 

but then: sometimes we crave a roastier, toastier day beer. something that, although light as f, inspires a little woo and shiver and feels like a warm animal-fur blanket wrapped around our shoulders. and that's where caramelized beers (burnt? bruleed? over-roasted?) come into play. we've got a wild burnt beer on tap right now. it's called *WE GO BACK*. it's dark! it's funked up! it's toasty! it's soft caramels and bitter chocolates. swirling around with all the psychedelia of wild yeast. and it was fermented and aged in the foeder for, like 4 months. so it's got a little tannin on the finish.

100% wild caramelized brett beer. lovely and fitting after a day or week or drying out. rewarding and warm after a long day of trudging over the treacherous ice mountains lining chicago curbs. 

deep. the reward of winter. the point of winter, fact.
 
now come make tonight like you're living in adorable copenhagen and some northern farmer brought his weird, wild brown beers down to share at his favorite bar. we can serve you hunks of bread and cheesy butter right alongside. 

*WE GO BACK*. the rewards of winter.

--

*BLOC PARTY PLUMB*

hi. i'm wondering if you still have *BLOC PARTY* on tap. ok. ok great. my wife and i love that beer,. do you have any to go? oh! oh interesting! and can you put one of those 4-packs aside for me? no big deal if not. just, you know, maybe put it in the fridge now and take it out about 10 minutes before 7p. we're gonna order take out and i want it to be cold. but not too cold. and do you sanitize the cans before you fill them with beer? you do? oh that's great! are they made from aluminum? just want to make sure they crush easily in my recycler. ok. ok. hmm. well... no no. this is too much. well. ok ok. is there any chance you could remove the cans from their four-pack holder. resanitize the tops *and* the four-pack holder. reapply the four-pack holder. and then vacuum-seal the entire four-pack? my kid is allergic to air. he's still in my eye. but i don't want to sully my sperm or my wife's eggs with dirty air and then cause him to be all itchy once conceived. 

ok great! we'll be there tuesday! what?! you're not open tuesday??? well you should really be open tuesday. it's gonna be beautiful out!

anyway, it's a rare time. when we have two (2) bloc parties in house. *BLOC PARTY PLUMB* is brand new on tap. tart and fruity. plum. blueberry. cinnamon. blended yeast. some wtf element. a true joy to drink. fun for the whole party. and *BLOC PARTY BOYS & GIRLS* to take away. in four packs. boysenberry. cranberry. vanilla. cacao. rich and northern. and so round of mouth.

come get one or the other! stay here or take it away! pour now or emportay!

we go back.

we go back.

middle brow x holidays

MONDAY PICKUP!

second: xmas + chan + solstice is upon us! and we're here to make add just the right quant of *comeback* to your table and couch-room.

1) two dry, delicate, adorable-and-anotherable lagers! namely, *BUNGALOW* and *MOZART*.
2) one weird beer! namely, *OTHER PEOPLE*. our negroamaro-barley co-fermentation project w martha stoumen wines. this sucker was fermented w native grape yeast. weird and wild both!
3) one wild beer! namely, *SOLARIUM*. our second-gen solera-style saison. aged in the foeder on the tip-top of bungalow by middle brow. our hippie-farmer-sourdough-pizza-den. where we make the wide bulk of our beer.
4) breads! including the classixxx: country and 100% whole wheat sourdough. and a very special, homey holiday bread. namely, smoked peppercorn and parmesan. yip!
5) growlers!
6) gift cards!
7) and, brand new here, bread classes!!!! get one for the loved one. or even the liked one. in your life. a cute co-worker. your upstairs neighbor who tries to avoid the holiday mostly. yourself. 
8) oh right! and you can buy tickets to our NYE dinner too! have a friend or lov'r who digs our joint here? and who trusts us to make a good time? get him or her or them tix to our NYE dinner. it'll be filled w wild things. namely, beers. wines. fishes and crustaceans.

namely: we're middle brow. and we make beers and breads and batches of other things. at our bungalow.

smoked peppercorn + parmesan bread

smoked peppercorn + parmesan bread

talk to other people.

talk to other people.

NYE 2020

bungalow by the water.

so, we don't wanna be long-of-wind. or get you long-of-tooth while reading this thing. for once.

as, we're just chiming in with a few quick things.

first: our NYE wild-beer-wild-wine-wild-water dinner, *BUNGALOW BY THE WATER*, is gonna be way cool. the menu's already stokin' me all up.

get tickets stat! i know it's ante-chan-xmas yet. but get on it! that fast night creeps up exactly such.

and get them here! <-- right there.

https://bit.ly/38EdHgO

unnamed.png

the tens.

this weekend, right? it's gonna be like 50º and sunny. so.... get here! before it all fades and flips and we lose our lids!

come shop here. for your xmas or chan'k gift eks'chng.

come drink here. with your old friends. or your new friends.

come eat here. with your big family. happy or hellish. either way! we're happy to make it mellow!

and then get back to your smartphone to figure out how you're closing out the tens. like with a fish shack wild beer and wild wine dinner. a la bungalow by middle brow.

growl.

growl.

middle brow \ citizen how /

then what is a wage?

you know: we don't read our own reviews. we bust our asses to make sure every single beer tastes good. and every single pizza is cooked perfectly imperfectly. and every single toast is a beautiful mess. and every loaf has a different but special rise. and we have oh-so-many problems. and we know what they are. and don't need a review to distract us.

now, we happen to know that most of our reviews are good. based on the average star rating. and based on word from a lot of our servers. but we try desperately not to read them. but... just the other day, we were poking around google, trying to figure out how to change our holiday hours. and there they were: bad reviews! on no! can we resist?!? did we?! we couldn't so we didn't.

all the (very few) bad reviews out of the many suggested that our prices were too high. and that tells me a couple things...

1) we're pricing things exactly right! if a small handful of people say our prices are too high. and 90% of the other reviews are glowing. then we're pricing things precisely right!

2) the people who wrote the reviews either don't care about food or beer or else lack empathy for the working class.

i'm supremely confident about #1 above. srsly. we charge $7-$9 for 13 ounces of beer. is that a lot? yes! it's more than your average bar. but we're not your average bar! we make beers and other beverages that you can't get anywhere else in the world. but even then: go to any bar and order their most special beers. and you'll pay at least that much. you should! special beers are risky. and expensive. and take lots and lots of time. and in order for a brewery to keep making them, they have to charge a little more money.

and we're a brewery! would you rather spend $5 or $6 for 13 oz of beer? sometimes i bet your ass you would! and sometimes we would! in fact, much of the time we eat elsewhere we do. but we aren't looking for that when we go to special breweries or special restaurants.

ok. so what the fuck does "special" mean? i use it to describe both our model and our product. i'll take the former first.

our latest rustic beer, *NEIGHBORHOOD* is a cheap example.

malts: for this and many other beers we source our malts from a maltster in lebanon, indiana, called sugar creek malt co. caleb, the small business owner who runs the malthouse, sources his grains from his own grain farm. and from other nearby small farmers. we've also been working with a farm in central illinois called janie's farm. harold there is looking for ways to send 3,000 pounds of wheat to caleb to malt for us. caleb pays someone to drive all the grain our way once a week. and he's got accounts as far afield as north carolina! so he's got a lot of folks to pay for similar deliveries. the malts taste good, though. thoughtful. different. and they're worth the money.

hops: for this beer we keep hops to a minimum. we use grungeist. it's green citrus-y. not quite lime-y or lime zesty. maybe key lime? anyway. it pairs perfectly with our yeast profile. and with the richer cereal malts we get from caleb. we et the hops from a farm local to the midwest. it's harder to source all your hops locally, as most are grown in the mountain west. but there's a great hop farm in michigan called hophead farms. their variety is killer for their size. and their hop quality is tops. and they're local. a chicago beer legend, nunzino pizza (that's his name), owns the farm. he's got quite a few employees working for him. farmers. accountants. marketing folks. a sales team. an HR team. a logistics team. and he needs all these people doing this hard work diligently in order to keep his business healthy.

yeast: we actually collected this yeast ourselves. which, if you read carefully above, took quite a long time to do. we collected shitloads of yeast, actually. bryan did. and most of it didn't work to ferment beer. but we kept trying and trying and finally cracked the nut, so to speak. and found a yeast that was reminiscent of belgian saison yeast. go figure. right out there in the wild. we contacted our friends at omega yeast for some help in propping it up and storing it. they agreed. there's at least 6 or 7 people working for omega. there's lance and mark, the owners. there's adi and nate and laura: yeast wranglers and brewers and lab scientists or biologists. or maybe in some cases all four. in on person! but they make special stuff. they aren't satisfied sitting on their laurels and selling a handful of boring but lucrative strains. and we're excited to be working with them for virtually every beer we make. and especially for this very special house-harvested yeast.

the beer then sits in tanks made with american steel by american manufacturers. and all the electronics that control them are designed and built by same. and is then poured by knowledgeable beer servers. who handle a variety of customers all day and night. and then it ends up in your glass. and you down it. and i've only scratched the surface of the people involved in that beer.

and then, the pizza: i won't go on about the pizza. cuz it's getting boring. and it's early for jokes. and i think i've run out. but you get the point. the dough takes 4 days to make. by at least two people. and then gets stretched and topped and cooked and finished by two to four people. and managed by two people. and, you know what pizza dough's made out of? grains. and you know where our grains are got from? farms. in the middle west. and distributed by good local companies with high ethical standards. same as our sauce. same as our cheese. same as our salad greens. and on and on and on.

so yes. we make special shit. and if you're two people and you order a margherita for $16 and a giant salad for $14 and two beers each for $8 and hung in a fun, lively space and had a nice conversation with each other and with your server and the music was perfect background music or maybe even foreground music and you begged to know what it was and where we got the candle holders and the wallpaper in the bathroom and you left with a fresh loaf of bread for $6 and you each shelled out $23 before tax and tip (cuz you're gonna split the bread), i'd call that a steal, actually.

you know how many humans you're paying in that $23? what kind of life do you expect those humans to have? what kind of life do you want them to have? could the grain farmers take less good care of their crop? yeah. could they buy shittier seeds? could the maltster pay his drivers less? yes. he could. but then would he keep them? or maybe he would! but should they be driving four towns over to get their toilet paper at a dollar store every three weeks? or should they be able to afford to go to walgreens once in awhile for the nicer, softer stuff. just like you. he who pays $23 for a beautiful meal and beer and complains.

and what about your cook and server? should neither be able to afford health insurance? what if all the abuse they withstand from high-maintenance customers drives them a little nuts. and they need a little mental health treatment? what if they simply have depression in their family? should they be able to afford treatment? or does the market not value their work enough so [shrugs shoulders]? thanks for your insight there, mr reagan. but there's a reason you're dead. (that is: that time passed. and we've learnt that those arguments are bunk. and that society erupts if you make them for long enough.)

and then let's get to other restaurants in town: piece charges a lot of money for their pizza. why, do you think? could it be that they're also ethical people? trying to balance the same things we are? and lula cafe and cafe marie-jeanne and dos urban cantina and parachute and mfk and etc. why do they charge what they charge? shit... i spend $10 on a fucking burrito bowl at chipotle. and they're cutting every last corner. and they have public, institutional shareholders. who demand they make a certain profit.

so if you're in the $20-$40 range for eating really good pizza and drinking really special beers and wines. count yourself lucky. in fact, we should be charging more money for this shit. we really should.

which brings me to my next point: tips. there's a movement afoot. led by the folks at honey butter fried chicken and cellar door provisions. and we're just becoming a small part of it. to ban the tipped minimum wage in chicago. (if you make tips, your minimum wage is much, much lower.) it's the right thing to do. it may have some scary implications for our industry and our neighborhoods. and i'll get further into those next week. i swear i'll write back next week. about our official OTHER PEOPLE release. (remember from.... earlier today? the beer we made w martha stoumen?) and anyway i'll write more about the ins and outs about that minimum wage issue.

if it passes, prices at restaurants will likely go up as labor costs will go up across the board. tipping, though, will be disincentivized. as it should be. and, as such, front-of-house workers would likely gain the dignity of working hard for consistent pay. and not have to have 47 bosses in one night, some of them abusive and unaccountable to anyone else in the world in a given table-moment.

next week we'll dig deeper. until then. as ever...

middle brow missions

fatty ends.

and here we're amping up the middle always. but the weekends sorta hop off. they get rowdy. busy, yeah. but fun! zig zaggy! you gotta see one!

not zaggy enough, tho. for me, at least. so we added music. to sunday nights. and it's been a massive success to far. we made two new friends! one just started her law career! and also made our joey cry happy tears! and we've hosted so many lovely musicians thus far. all local. health & beauty. shaina hoffman. luke henry. advance base. fran. tenci. leroy bach & dan bitney. the late, great johnny thunder and his quarter mile thunder family. niika. caroline campbell.

d-light!!!! i mean, stunning. the whole restaurant sometimes goes quiet. or squeals. like the pigs did before they were eat'n'm. it's a beautiful thing. scrumptious. glorious. victorious. angelic. satanic. d-light!

so this sunday we're particularly excited. because we're playing host to our first touring musician: INGS, from seattle. she's a trip. she's gonna make'm quiet. and then loud. and do all sorts of things to your ears and your hearts. talkin' both chambers. both drums.

so get here then. jessie winslow is opening. (whose father arranged for polly and i to take over the radio station on beaver island for our post-wedding ceremony boodle. it so happens.)

and special thanks to cousin michael albert. hilger. for arranging all these lucky, simple sets. and for makin'm sound good.

530p. this sunday. in the sun room.

modest in the middle week.

wild city.

we love our beers. and our pizzas. but we also love variety. and we also love experimentation. and so we've made our mid-week a bit more melodramatic. with a couple theme-y days.

first: *WILD WEDNESDAYS*. for the past couple months, we've been making a special pizza every weds. on a 100% sourdough crust. the first one: foraged hen-of-the-woods mushrooms. cream. herbs. whoa. the most recent one: fermented shishito crema. root vegetables. whoa. in all cases, big bubbles. chewy, fruity crust. special in that unpredictable way.

get here some weds sometime soon. if you wanna be part of a wild experiment.

second: *YARD WORK BEERS*. every thurs, we tap a beer that's a total crapshoot experiment. we consistently peel off some gallonage of wort on brewdays. and transfer it to carboys. which we then treat completely differently than the big-batch beer. e.g.: this thurs. last night. we tapped a wild ipa. ... we took our *LITTLE CRUSH* grain bill. and fermented it with yeast that we harvested from *OTHER PEOPLE*. the wine-beer beer we made in collaboration with martha stoumen. and dry-hopped it with vic secret hops. a wild ipa! fermented w native yeasts! nuts!

come visit us mid-week for a real treat. a real unique treat. and beat the weekend crowds, anyway.

unnamed-5.jpg

a time for tables

unnamed.png

table beers. and breads.

table beers. i've seen a little action on twitter about'm. like: some folks trying to make them a thing. or pretending they're already a thing. and i promise you: they are not! we've been making them for 5 years. and they ain't "a thing". they're delicious! they should be a thing! you should all immediately buy anything that says "table beer" on the label cuz it's likely the closest thing in the aisle to a platonic beer. after modelo. but they ain't quite there yet.

in any event, we're gonna take the liberty of calling our two way thanksgiving table beers "table beers". cuz there could hardly be anything better for your thanksgiving table. what all fatty and earthy and rich and FLAT. where's the acidity! where's the uplift! it's adorably beautiful, your casserole. and it makes my stomach actually smile. like, it grows in girth and looks kind of like a smiley face as my boxers and jeans fall down my waist a bit. it's so fucking homey and comfortable and good. but you need some brightness at the table! something to make you laugh! like, hard. so hard you burn them smiley calories right off.

unnamed-1.jpg

*BLOOM*, the first.

the first beer we got for you thanksgiving table is *BLOOM*. as i just said. there in the title. it's so damn cool. we drove out to starved rock. and met w mark at illinois sparkling co. and grabbed a couple giant blue poly drums of his la crescent champagne grapes. and brought'm back to bungalow. and brewed up a quick half-batch of sour beer. and added the fermenting grape kiddos to the whirlpool. and sent the admixture over to our stainless tank-o. and voila!! out came our first co-ferment. *BLOOM*. part wine. part beer. all good. touch tart.

it's a beer brewed w grape must. green grape juice all over it. peachy. jammy. high acid. big summer. lovely autumn. solemn winter. only spring.

get it this lovely'n solemn autumn'n winter. for your table.

pre-orders end tonight. at midnight. but we'll have some avail next week for pickup.

unnamed-2.jpg

*OTHER PEOPLE*, the second.

were any of you watching. or reading. when bryan and i traveled to sonoma. before all the fires? we went there to work with and visit martha stoumen and her team. that supernatural winemaker. that no-intervention winemaker, as she might instead put it. i mean: the wild embrace! the true earth wearer and wanderer! original wine. original beer. original, not unique. like socrates and his whip-smart friends who just happened to ask all the right questions to set plato up for perfect moralistic storytelling! perfectly weird and wild and natural stuff. middle brow's dreams.

so we went there. and we did that. and we talked like socrates's friends. and martha stoumen was the genius at the center of it all. the socrates. without the untimely ending. ... and as we pulled up from the airport, a truck of grapes was arriving. grapes, we'd later learn, for whom we'd take responsibility. who we'd guide to fruition. to a ... more timely... end. grapes we'd nurture into a weird-ass wine-beer beer. the second of our two co-ferments this year. the grapes: negroamaros. deep red. dark rose grapes. rich and spice-forward qua wan. almost exclusive to italy. but no no.. martha has her plot there in northern california. and she's makes a bômm wan out of'm. and she let us take a giant tote off her hands. over a thousand pounds. and so we sorted and processed them. and readied them for pressing by foot-stomping. you heard it. foot-stomping. the whole negroamaro haul. w martha and rosalind watching over us. and tim keeping records. all of them laughing at how quickly we got too tired to go on. tim coming to the rescue.

anyway. by the time the tote arrived back in chicago on a refrigerated truck, it was fermenting. almost aggro fermenting. so aggro, in fact, that we used our prepped yeast pitch on a different beer, and just knocked out a beer onto the aggro grapes. and the yeast present in them grapes just fermented the shit out of the whole solution. the whole admixture. dried it right up. and we got something way fruity. and funky. and ....... original. i mean: unique. just try to find it anywhere else in the world. you won't. but also: original. like, the way the oldens used to make drinks w alcohol in them.

*OTHER PEOPLE*. a natural wine-beer beer. zero intervention. pink funk.

order this one online too. for pickup tues or weds. limit: 3. very limited quantities available. for now, at least.

a table for 22.

hey! and did you know we also make bread?! i mean, the yeast makes the bread. like the yeast makes the beer. but we mix and haul and dump and measure and slide and plop and scrape and push and etc. we do all the other stuff. and the yeast and the heat make some beautiful lacto-fruity sourdough breads. we've gotten, like, massive attention for them. a lot of you beer fans might not even have it on your radar no. but yes. yes you should. if you're gona order beer to pickup, you might as well order some bread too. for your thanksgiving table. pick it up tues or weds. for a thurs dinner. just, you know, cut it up and put a little heat on it 5 minutes before dinner time. big hunks of it.

we like to cut our rounds into quarters. and then slice alllllmost all the way through them. standing up. 3 times. to make 4 tearable slices. warmed up w butter: hardly anything is more gratifying. especially before a sip of a lightly acidic beverage.

order these online too. but remember: the cut off is tonight at midnight.



middle brow \ citizen how /

time moves both ways.

my partner nick's mom died last week. partner is a funny word, as we've been friends since we were 6. that's 30+ years. only 8 or so of which were relevant to beer. so i knew his mom very well once upon a time. she was always a sort of mythical creature. her love for nick was easy to see. a true example of unconditional love. and she cared for us, his friends, almost as much. cuz she was an everyday hero. a community-historical figure.

it's the everyday heroes who understand how time moves. the ambitious (often little-boy-style men, but many little-boy-style women, too) are flawed. in a serious way. starting with their perception of time. that is: ambitious egomaniacs believe that time moves constantly forward. accrues, so to speak. that history is a fixed thing. in other words: that there's any history at all. ... they believe in history. and they want to be in it. part of it. they want immortality through text. through libraries. through ephemera, even. if they have to settle.

but the everyday heroes understand that time ain't so. time moves both ways. not out in all directions constantly, like "science" tells us. but in and then out. it barrels forward and then recedes. advancing and then retreating. creating and then erasing. like a wave. like a pendulum. it's just: the time it takes for that advance and retreat depends on the viewer. the scale of a day or a human life is easy for us to perceive. much harder, the scale of the universe.

stand brave life liver.

an example: a small child. with a small world. eventually becomes again a small elderly-child. with a small world. but somewhere in there. somehow. the two children on both ends are just one. in the middle. and that giant, strong, independent human gets big as hell. and lives in big, big world. the biggest imaginable. to her.

it's accretion and rescission. just like our day to day: we lack. and then we get. and then we give up. it's our whole life long, time moving both ways. in and out. it's our work for money, and then its loss. it's our work for fame or power, and then its devolution.

a smart egomaniac might argue: "but the earth is rotating around the sun. slightly more slowly every time. i mean, imperceptibly more slowly. imperceptible by generations. by thousands of years. consider mutual time dilation and length contraction."

but community-historical figures. everyday heroes. would respond: "are we able to measure the universe that existed before us? of which there's no evidence? it shot out, maybe. expanded. seemingly infinitely. definitely maybe. and then contracted again. to nothing. it rescinded. and then here we. our universe. emerged. advanced. and so all evidence of anything relates back to our universe only. the prior one, now absent."

--

everyday heroes go to work in the morning. come home in the evening with nothing to say. they teach. they tinker. they twist on a bolt all the live long day. they demonstrate love in their grind. they hope and dream, simply, for more hopes and dreams for themselves. and also for their kids. they want to connect. to see something pretty, and then to see something pretty die. ... teachers. like nick's mom. for 42 years. who try to connect with a misbehaving little boy. just once. cuz that one connection might give rise to another connection. and then another one. and they might string together an entire year. and lead to better grades. and better behavior. and a better future. and a better father.

this is what everyday heroes do.

--

i’ve always had an aversion to the individual. as a kid. i remember learning at my shitty catholic school that western culture credits *the individual* for wins and the community for losses. while eastern culture credits *the community* for wins and the individual for losses. i thought latter was so much beautiful’r.

then romney and obama faced off. and “you didn’t build that” made all my republican friends blanche. and made me feel nothing. it was obvious to me that you didn’t. ... i mean, really, though. let's unpack that. first things first: no woman is an island. did you get some help in the early days? from friends and family on the bottling line? and did you get a super cheap quote from a graphic designer for a label? and were you somehow already socially connected to virtually every one of your early customers? you didn't build that early success: your friends and family were generous as shit. and shouted out about you to all their friends and family. and made you known. and got you sales in binny's. and etc. etc. etc.

but more importantly, i wanna talk about roads. at some point a way while back. in the 40s and 50s. the federal government decided to build the shit out of roads. highways and byways and side streets and holler paths and etc. roads for everyone! it was all our tax dollars what paid for them paved roads. funneled through the feds. and now we could drive anywheres we wanted ta.

and who looooved this policy? big auto. why? well, first, cuz it beckoned people to drive and drive, of course! and big oil loved it, too. but all of little auto and little oil loved it too. that is to say, tiny machine shops, making unique bolts to spec for a particular order from ford motor company. they loved that the feds put money into roads! cuz they had tons of new business with all the cars people were buying. and independent owners of fuel stations. and mechanics. they loved it too! we built a whole region up around it: the upper midwest. michigan, sure. but minnesota and wisconsin and illinois and ohio and indiana. and parts of pennsylvania and the appalachians.

and then what happened next? well: big oil and big auto needed people to work these jobs. and black families in the south were facing constant social and physical violence. so they jumped at the chance to move north for better work and better living conditions. ... the work, they got. but they were also met with resentment by white folks living in these northern cities. and what did the white folks do with those new roads? they moved away from the black folks newly in the cities! into the suburbs! they gratified their racist and resentful and downright fearful tendencies and skipped town. "thank goddess for these federally-funded roads!" they said, as they drove quite quickly to work everyday. and away from their new black scapegoats every night.

and then other industries started popping up. finer industries. skilled manufacturing. and they looked around and saw high rents in the cities. and lower rents in the suburbs. but also! also! tons of new people living in the suburbs! and perfect roads for their employees to use to get to and from work. cheaply and easily. by bus or by car. and so instead of spending lots of money on real estate and on quality-of-life regulations imposed by cities, they relocated to cheaper and easier suburban and exurban regions. thanks to the roads the feds built.

so, like i said. you didn't build that. i agreed. the aversion from childhood stuck.

--

and then in high school and college when i read hegel i thought he was sort of a fool. maybe i misunderstood him. in fact, i likely misunderstood him. but i don't care. the way my poorly-educated and poorly-paid teacher taught hegel to me was that hegel viewed history through the lens of unhappy men, mostly. who strove to force their Reason upon the world. for selfish motives. but this strikes me as bull shit. the world-historical figure would more accurately have been a world-historical group. or even a community-historical individual. in my estimation. and i hinted as much in a recent memo about polly. and her quiet, powerful community building.

that's what makes history. some ambitious fool of a man simply rides the crest of a wave derived from the collection of simple actions by community-historical individuals. by everyday heroes who form powerful, local-level groups. and it happens over long periods of time. not during one selfish man-child's reign.

--

but then i’ve gotten a bit nervous recently. watching all these "groups" do such terrible things. political parties. and voters. grouping up to ignore obvious lessons that we should have learnt long times ago.

like, for example: joe biden, the mitt romney of the moment, will not beat donald trump. he's far too moderate in a time like this. he's boring. he's out of touch. he's another old white guy. he says silly things which makes him appealing to regular americans. whatever those are. but he's just.... not good at this.

and like: racism is bad. how did we forget this one? how have we still not learnt it? donald trump has given all sorts of ugly thoughts a little lube. and their slippin' right out of people's minds and off their tongues. en masse! how are these massive groups re-adopting racial resentment as an organizing feature? sad to say it, but we need to find and learn the language to deal with this again. like: "i know you're a good person. and not racist at your core. but that comment was racially divisive." ugh. you can't even call racism racism right now. without inviting more racism.

and like, for example: republican tax policy will damage the economy and the lives of your neighbors. we learned this! well and good! all the trickle down talk? it was a nice video game theory. by a bunch of "smart" men and women in economics PhD programs in hyde park. but it never panned out. and even they admit it's bull shit now. and are looking for reasons to explain it. ... which is absurd? appalling? it's pretty obvious why money doesn't trickle down: humans are loss averse. when they get something. even if they don't deserve it. or even if someone else gave it to them for free. they believe it's theirs. and they'll never let it go. ... how did we not know this in the 80s? in any event, we know it now. but a whole political party, and the vast majority of its voters, still believe it. and shit: probably a third of the other political party also believes it. and a big chunk of their voters, too!

and then beer: it seems that interesting discoveries around things like strike temp and hop timing and infection and dissolved oxygen pick-up and etc are made by individuals. like, someone accidents into a discovery about any of the latter. learns something way good or way bad about an action they took. and then tells other brewers and it travels by word of mouth until it's studied by someone at uc-davis. an individual discovery at bottom.

so.... are groups stupid'r? are they causing more problems than they're solving? are individuals really the important/relevant entity? do we need a word-historical hero to save us?

--

no! wait! ... something is missing in all this chatter. the phenomenon of storytelling! storytelling massively favors individuals. stories need a protagonist. and an antagonist. to help drive a plot forward. ever see a movie about a group? with no main character? unlikely. and if you did, it was the exception to the rule. it's way hard for an audience to interpret meaning from a story that lacks an individual protagonist. so authors and playwrights and directors and the like utilize individuals to make bigger points about history. and about groups. despite individual successes often depending largely on groups.

and what's more: our brains think in stories. that's likely what gave rise to stories anyway! so we interpret paradigm shifts and even small changes as having derived from some one person or moment. no matter that that's hardly ever true.

indeed. the truth is that groups make good things happen. and i see that in beer constantly. one person has an idea. tries it out. fails. but someone else watching him synthesizes some new thoughts from his failure and her previous failures and comes up with a successful, genius idea.

we all like to find the original genius individual. vis a vis an idea. but it's folly to think we can. instead, there's always an original genius group working together to make advances.

--

but what's the relevance of time and it's movement to all of this? the wave can only gather the strength to crest if it's built by everyday heroes who understand that time moves both ways. that death always beckons. and so the collection of each raindrop matters. that is, generosity begets generosity. right here. right now.

life. and all of history. is made and made better by all the everyday heroes. working in concert.

like polly novello marie. and mary ann catherine burica. and alison larkin. and benny and george.

go into your community. tonight. ... even if it's not for pizza or beer. just go find it. it's there waiting for you to join up.