How hard could it be?

Last year my friend started brewing his own beer. I was doubtful that anyone could produce a drinkable beer in their basement. My dad experimented with a U-brew place years ago and even with professional help, it didn't go well. I'm pretty sure it went bad within two months of being bottled, and being a proper cheap Mennonite, he refused to pour it out. I endured one bottle, and that was plenty. So when this friend dropped off a sample, I was curious but not optimistic. As it turns out, if you do it right, you can make really good beer in your basement.

After a few batches, it was obvious that either this hobby was going to progress very slowly or he was going to quickly develop a drinking problem, so he pitched the idea of a collective to a few friends. He would continue to brew and experiment, while we would contribute money for ingredients and receive a portion of the finished product. I've never had so much beer in my house, nor has it ever been consumed so quickly. If I was drinking it all myself, I would be a disaster. Thankfully, the beer is good enough to bring along when we visit friends and serve when people come to our place.

The most exciting part for me is that I've started growing hops in my backyard to use in the beer. I had never knowingly seen hops growing before, but I had a garden already and figured "How hard could it be?" Like all projects that start with such a phrase, the answer is "Quite." Commercial hop yards use posts pounded into the ground with cables strung along the tops of them. Strings are then dangled from these cables and the hop bines (square shafted vines) climb the strings. You can buy rhizomes from existing hop farms, which are basically just pieces of root that you plant. It's not complicated, except the posts are generally around 18' high. The plants will go to 30' if they have something to climb, so I built this:

My wife is thrilled.

I ordered four varieties online and planted them this spring. All 8 plants came up and a few even made it to the top of my 20' structure with harvestable fruit to boot. The neighbours have been good about it, and their guesses about what I was building were pretty wild: an Easter bunny trap, a roller coaster, a gallows... For such a benign purpose, the construction was the scariest thing I've ever built. Standing at the upper reaches of my very extended extension ladder trying to hold boards and drill and my balance while reaching a little further than I ought to have done while the yet unsecured frame wobbled in the wind was very uncomfortable. Mama went inside so she wouldn't have to watch, but realized if she looked out the upstairs windows, she was looking straight at me. I'm told future yard projects are going to take some negotiating before materials are procured.