From Fermentation Vat to Demijohns today

What a mess - but now we know: 7 1/2 litres pure must bubbling away in the 2 demijohns.
The Triomphe d'Alsace grapes were really too small this year, but proper spur-pruning in December should prepare the vine for a bumper crop in 2010.

And now: The lively bubbling away of the fresh must is a sound for the Gods! And me.

I have learnt two things recently:

a) It is necessary to add more sugar than indicated in the ordinary tables for Brix vs % alcohol. This acts as a conservation agent during initial fermentation and also brings the wine up to a more modern 12.5-13% alcohol, rather than the previously accepted 10-11%. The rule-of-thumb is 250g/Gallon for sweet grapes; 400g for sour.
b) Triomphe d'Alsace was first created in 1911 as a cross between Vitis Ripara and Vitis Rupestris and Goldriesling in Colmar (Alsace), but didn't appear commercially before 1921-22. The grape is relatively small (Black Currant size) with large pips, which may account for the fact that it is nowhere to be found in commercial vineyards! However, the quality of the wine and its resistance to disease surely make up for these drawbacks in a patio-vineyard!
Jim Page-Roberts' 75m (length of the stem) of vine this year produced 5 Gallons!

There are about 50 bunches of Cascade (?) grapes ripening, ready to be vinified in ca. 2 weeks, depending on a little indian summer. They look marvellous, but the problem with Cascade is clearly that it ripens unevenly and rather late. Some grapes are dark blue, others Chardonnay-green.
I shall leave them until most of them are blue.
The result will be added to the half full demijohn, providing my first mix.
Clos St. Pierre Reserve Speciale 2009 !
....

There is one problem, though: I am not sure any more that it is a Cascade. Comparing leaves it looks more like Brant - more on that later.
If the mix-taste is fine I shall leave it, otherwise it will be replaced by another Triomphe d'Alsace, which I shall plant anyway this autumn!

The most handsome bloke on the block!

- and on 12 Sept. I found out: It is Brant. Picked and vinified 12 Sept. It produced 3 Litres of pulp. Brix achievement was slightly less than the 18% reached by the Triomphe d'Alsace: 16.5%, but for this I compensated with a "chaptalisation" of 170g sugar. After 3 days in my antique French jam glass which holds exactly 3 Litres, on 15 Sept., I filled it into the demijohn that had only become half full by Triomphe d'Alsace three weeks before. It is now bubbling away, promising a delightful mix of a lighter must, as Brant's juice is white.

If the Brant is to survive my critical ambitions, I shall endeavour to harvest all grapes by mid September next year.

Also - a good dollop of extra sugar to get the process going, beef up alcohol content and create a more protective atmosphere during initial fermentation, is one of the lessons I have learnt.

Les Vendanges 2009

Les vendanges sont fini. Here’s the result on display.

The grape bunches ready to be stripped; the green and unripe grapes and stalks to be thrown onto the compost heap; the voluptuous, juicy blue grapes bursting with expectation (or is that me?) ready to be crushed in the cocotte and poured into the fermenting vat.
Two Gallons – not a great result, but fine considering the youth of the vine. Next year no doubt will produce a more consistent crop. And next year. And next year - - - -

The bottle of red-wine is for the crusher.
That’s me too.
Deserved, as picking and crushing actually took 4 hours and gave me a blister on the index finger.

The mix of grapes from two Triomphe d’Alsace vines achieved a Brix reading of 18, with some grapes reaching 20, but weather conditions and ripeness dictated 25 Aug. as the day of picking. I added a minimum of sugar (ca 120g) in an attempt to obtain between 11 and 12% alcohol. Let’s hope for 8-10 bottles!
The Cascade vine will have to wait another two weeks and I shall have to consider how to blend the two varietals, as there only are 35 bunches on the vine.However, the grapes are considerably larger than the Triomphe d’Alsace.

Gorm Danebod - Not Thyra Danebod

(See my blog entries about Gorm and Thyra from June 2009, where the following has been entered in both English and Danish)

Det ser for mig ud som om forklaringen paa tilnavnet ‘bót’ er fundet!
Problemet med ordet ‘bót’ er, at man er blevet taget ved næsen af både Saxo og Aggesen. Det er et typisk eksempel paa et ‘ledende udsagn’, da begge d’herrer tillagde Thyra denne betegnelse, og man identificerede ordet ‘bót’ med betydningen af en glose, ‘but’, der først kendes 300 år senere, i stedet for at læse glosen som ‘bøt’. Man har forgæves ledt efter ‘bót’ på andre runesten, men i betragtning af det begrænsede kildemateriale og indskrifternes knaphed er det vel ikke mærkeligt, at søgningen har været resultatløs. Smigeren er åbenbar, men er det ikke lidt tamt at oversætte ‘bót’ med at forbedre, bøde, hjælpe?
Det mener Johan Lange i Kuml 1982-83, p.213-17 i hvert fald.
Et af problemerne er runen 'U'

Den kan læses som både U, Y, Ø, O.
Hvis man derfor sammenligner med de normale vokalændringer som f. eks. ‘thusi’ til ‘thausi’, der er kendt i runesproget og som videre overgår til ø (laukar bliver til løg paa Dansk), så er parallellen ‘baut’ til ‘bøt’ nærliggende.
‘Bauta’ betyder ‘at slå’ på Old Nordisk, jvfr. Bautasten, med den opr. betydning ‘slagsten’.
I al korthed: Tilnavnet ‘bøt’ bør oversættes til ‘den der slår’, eller ‘en særdeles stærk mand’ – jvfr. andre slående navne som Karl Martel (hammer), Erik Thexla (økse) og Sigmundr Spærr (spyd).
Tilføjelsen 'il' angiver i ON instrumentalis formen, altsaa 'bautil', hvilket saa ændres til 'bøtil' og derefter med blødgørelsen af 'd' til 'bødel' - - en meget 'stærk' mand; et ord alle kender i dag!

Et andet problem er hvor meget Aggesen og Saxo TROEDE de vidste.
Oprindeligt har man i 940’erne udmærket forstået hvem der var den ‘stærkt slående’ – men i de følgende 250 år ændrede sprogbrugen og overleveringen sig, nok til at ‘bøt’ blev til ‘but’ og hægtet på Thyra.

Der er efter min mening ingen tvivl mere:
Det er Gorm der er ‘Tanmarkar bøt’
Kulturelle, sproglige og logiske og overvejelser vedr. indskriftsformerne på runesten peger alle i same retning.

Clos St. Pierre 17 Aug. 2009

A lot is going on in this picture!

The almost ripe Triomphe d'Alsace is hanging heavily from the canopy of thinned leaves. I have had to string a steel wire from wall to wall with a support wire connected to the arbour, as the whole construction threatened to crash down on our heads.

As the 'vineyard' is positioned in a "pit between houses", I have had to consider how to optimise the available sunshine. The arbour is one way, lifting the grapes 2m up, closer to heaven, sun and fresh air. Thinning the leaves is another approach - I may have been too early out this year, but it is both a way of delimiting the otherwise rampant wild growth and a necessity for improved air circulation. Late July for thourough thinning is probably optimal.

Then there are the pigeon attacks.

They can rip the lot to shreds in 15 min. flat!

And then they leave the results on our cars afterwards, as large splats of a severely acid composition.

A thin net, spanned over the patio is a first line of defense (invisible in the photo). The Triomphe d'Alsace on the front wall of the house is easier to deal with; a net, gently draped down from the top is very effective.

For a while I was afraid it would catch butterflies or birds with the intelligence to attack from floor level. But butterflies are smart - they easily find an escape route in the small un-netted areas. I have even seen a "large cabbage white" (kaalsommerfugl) sit on the net and squeeze itself through the small 2 by 2 cm masks! Incredible.

Pigeons? No worry. They are stupid.

And in any case the second line of defense can be seen on guard on the table.

Now for the wasps - my biggest fear, as they don't just go away when you tell them (as do the pigeons).

My secret weapon, the green bottle hanging from one of the branches, is loaded with a lethal mix of Tesco's the best 'Bonne Maman' jam, thinned with water.

Boy, does it work!

I think the lion's share of a still unidentified wasps nest in the neighbourhood now has moved to the bottom of the bottle.

When inspecting the bunches, it is clear that a few wasps have managed to chew the skin and suck the juice out of one or two grapes - but clearly: these attacks on my property have been thoroughly revenged and largely prevented. I may even have to empty the bottle, making it ready for the even fiercer late August attacks, when wasps traditionally go berserk on half fermented fruit juices in the neighbourhood (Apples, Pears, Plums, even figues).

It is particularly interesting to observe that the two other trap-bottles on the vine, filled with a mix of honey and maple syrup, only attract ants and flies, no wasps. Ants? Yes, our ant-plague has been all but eliminated throgh a wrongly designed wasp-trap. But I guess that's normal: you choose the weapon best suited for your prey; grouse hunting with a Colt-45 doesn't work either, or what? So now we know.

Finally, the merrily waving arm of horizontal leaves, bottom left in the photo, is a Triomphe d'Alsace being groomed for 'fountain pruning' - but this will be documented on its own later on.

2-3 weeks max. to go before harvest.

The Human Condition - 1.

One of my favourite poets, Peter Wessel Zapffe, once wrote that humans are born with an overdeveloped skill: awareness, understanding, self-knowledge - exactly what I for years have called "our ability to think in abstract ways", which does not fit into nature's design.
The human craving for justification on matters such as life and death cannot be satisfied, hence humanity has a need that nature cannot provide satisfaction for. The tragedy is that humans spend all their time trying not to be human. The human being, therefore, is a paradox.

Religion, whether expressed through the 3m tall wooden Nerthus/Frej statues from Iron-age bog-finds or more contemporary manifestations, unfortunately reflects this condition in abundance.

Frey from Broddenbjerg, DK

Satisfying the Gods in the past was all about passing on items or behaviour that in the society of the time was considered to have high value, i.e. sacrificing our treasures or something we really appreciated ourselves: gold rings or abandoning a rich lifestyle.

Satisfying God in some of our present religions is all about our own reward: 99 virgins (actually a mis-translation from 99 white raisins, a delicacy at the time) or a place in 'Abraham's lap'.

Humans have moved from exo-centric religions (the Romans' 'do ut des'/ I give, so you shall give) to ego-centric: how will I be rewarded.

....

There was an implicit community feeling imbedded in the former.

Do ut des!

Without we would never have had the rich bog-offerings to the deities in Denmark from Hjortspring, Vimose, Illerup, Thorsbjerg, Ejsboel, etc. and La Tene in the Neuchatel lake, to name just a few.

Churches and mosques represent the same feeling: built to the honour of whatever God is in fashion - something that for the individual, by the way, still totally depends on where and when you are born.

Compare that to most religions today: it is me - me - me, wrapped in credit cards and a severe competition about whose God is the right one, and a plethora of rules, created by humans, with little emphasis on the God herself, rather on control of the people.

Hjortspring spear heads

As Seneca said: "Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful",

or Einstein, whom religious people wrongly take under their wings, saying: even Einstein was religious.

No he was not.

Here's what he said:

"I never imputed to nature any purpose or goal or anything even mildly anthropomorphic."

Have we become wiser in the past 2000 years?

OZ3CF 1961 - - How time flies!

That was the year that was!!
1961.
I was 18.

It was when VS9 was Aden and Oman.
When South and North Rhodesia existed.
And when I had contact with Yuri Gagarin: 17/4 1961, a week after his famous space flight and before his autographs became automated (so mine is the real one).

Not to speak of my QSOs with the famous Ernst Krenkel of M/S Chelyuskin fame and polar expeditions.

An 11 tube home-brew super-heterodyne RX, a 100W double 6146 driven by a Geloso VFO and a 40m long wire antenna + stacks of TVI - - - -

and this is what it looked like in 1963

And then raising a 3-el Yagi on a summer house in 1999.

Triomphe d'Alsace 4 Aug. 2009

- Developing just fine!!

I have arranged a net, 2 cm masks, over the

arbour and in front of the house.

The effing pigeons have already been there!

I hope they choked on the pips.

Fimbul-winter in the year 536 CE?

This was the year humanity could have perished, leaving the planet intact!

I shall rewrite the text later with references, events, etc. - suffice a few bullet points at this stage, as this event has a strong bearing on the history in the post migration era, the so-called dark ages.

- Chronicles from Europe and Asia describe how the sun was blanked out. Consistent reports mention the sun's power as equivalent to that found during an eclipse. I remember the eclipse in 2001 and was surprised how cold it felt.

- The moon could hardly bee seen and the stars disappeared.

- The Scandinavian soil is replete with gold-offerings. Hmmm - perhaps it worked after all?

The sun did return, didn't it? Maybe the Catholic church should create a sainthood for Odin and Thor?

Adding a couple of veterans to the 5136 other saints shouldn't be a big problem - and if anything deserves a sainthood it must be bringing the the power of the sun back!

- The 'nuclear winter' of 535-36 caused panic, hunger, upheaval - and change.

The immediate effect (of whatever caused this situation) lasted 1-2 years, but it is likely to have had a 10 year impact.

- Volcano or Meteor impact? I shall come back to that shortly - but look at these pictures for a start - taken from the web-site http://www.ees1.lanl.gov/Wohletz/Krakatau.htm.

Here's an interesting poem - Darkness - by Lord Byron, written 1816. The eerie likeness to a 'Nuclear Winter' has been misused by many of those, who see a mystery in the most banal events, from UFOs to Marilyn Monroe's death. Yes - banal is the word, as the most likely explanation also carries the highest probability for an explanation:

Darkness

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

The bright sun was extinguish'd,

and the stars did wander darkling in the eternal space,

rayless, and pathless,

and the icy earth swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;

Morn came and went--

and came, and brought no day,

And men forgot their passions in the dread

of this their desolation;

and all hearts Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light:

And they did live by watchfires--and the thrones,

the palaces of crowned kings--the huts,

the habitations of all things which dwell,

were burnt for beacons; cities were consumed,

And men were gathered round their blazing homes

to look once more into each other's face;

Happy were those who dwelt within the eye Of the volcanos,

and their mountain-torch:

A fearful hope was all the world contain'd;

Forests were set on fire--but hour by hour

they fell and faded--and the crackling trunks

extinguish'd with a crash--

and all was black.

......

The poem is longer - but this gives an impression.

'Nuclear Winter' forecast?

Rubbish.

1816 was the year the volcano Tambora exploded, creating a year without a summer.

It was a massive cataclysm, a model for the even more powerful 535 CE Krakatoa event.

Lord Byron experienced the effects.

That simple

Does EU and Gordon Brown never stop goofing?

This man never listens - and then he is forced to make a U-turn later.
10p scandal; Gurkas; you name it.
Here's the latest.

Broadband over Powerlines (Power Line Telecoms/ PLT) may provide a cheap method of watching TV over Broadband and connecting other digital equipment but is has some very serious interference pitfalls. Despite these shortcomings, the EU, supported by the UK Government, have treated with contempt legitimate complaints from some very respected organisations NATO, BBC, ERA Technology & York University plus many in Europe.

Why is this? It was recognised from the outset that PLT had inherent technical problems with respect to interference but such was the onslaught of the commercial interests that it was agreed Regulations would be ignored in the interest of Broadband commercial success.

Will the misguided politicians and bureaucrats never learn?
Is it not that very same attitude that has devastated our rainforests, cheap fuel, gas guzzling cars and over burning of coal in power stations, that has resulted in unacceptable levels of pollution?
All largely in the interests of commercial success and allowed to run amok by those self same bureaucrats, who now desperately try to make themselves look good by solving the problem.

And they wonder why we do not trust them.