A Guide to Interplanetary Liquor Production

Hey, if you were going on a years long journey in a tin can with absolutely nothing else to do, you'd probably want a good stiff drink as well. Beer might be nicer to drink than homemade liquor, but it takes up a lot more space, and space aboard any interplanetary space vehicle will be at a premium. Obviously, we've been making liquor for a very long time, and even in space, the basics are pretty much the same. But there will be some differences, as you can see here.

The first space liquor probably won't be whiskey. Whiskey comes from corn, and corn needs some space. Rice-based liquor is more likely, since rice needs less space. Or most likely, it'll come from whatever plant material the astronauts happen to have lying around. Nobody said it was going to be good liquor.

Fermentation will be a little tricky, but not spectacularly so. Yeast doesn't care about gravity, but a basic centrifuge would be necessary to ensure the yeast gets everywhere throughout the mixture.

The big problem is distillation. Back on Earth, you distill with fire, and there is steam, and chemicals are released. These are things you don't really want on a spaceship. However, you don't actually have to distill liquor, according to the article. There are other, safer ways of doing distillation's job using pressure differentials. And wouldn't you know it, there's a whole vacuum outside the ship! How convenient.

I don't know about you, but I'd drink space booze. I'd drink space beer too. It wouldn't matter how bad it is, and I'm assuming it will be pretty bad. It's space booze. You gotta drink it.

A GOLF.com Story on the Pro Life Before the Big Tours

This is a story about a guy who dreamed of making it to the PGA Tour. He was good at golf, very good. But there's the thing about professional golf, or professional sports in general. Very good isn't always good enough. And talent isn't enough, you need more than that. Having money to throw at it is helpful, but even then, you need to be incredibly resilient and patient, and having a bit of luck helps.

Anyway, it's an excellent (and long) story, and I enjoyed reading it. You should go read it too.

Picture(s) of the Day #7

So I visited a friend who lives near Boston this weekend. The drive took a ridiculous amount of time since I had to go three hours in the wrong direction to pick someone else up. Also, it was absurdly cold and we hit several severe snow squalls as we drove up. We went into the city on Saturday, but were stymied by even more severe cold and very strong wind. We're talking wind chills well below zero. And I forgot to bring my good camera. So, as a result, not a lot of pictures were taken. Well, that, and the fact is, I'm sure I'll get back to Boston at some point, preferably when the weather is nicer. Clearly, after the road trip to Chicago at the end of 2015, I wasn't clear enough about my road trip policy. But I'm putting my foot down this time. If I participate on a road trip during the winter, I'm going south. The end.

Anyway, here's the pictures I did take. The bar was a place downtown that had several dozen whiskeys on tap. It was very cool.