Hobbies

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This is a continuation of my hobbies page, including ones that aren’t as interesting, or, that I’m not actively pursuing anymore.

Go

I have in the past enjoyed playing Go, although I don’t play much anymore. I was around an 8kyu rating when I was playing regularly.

Board games

I have always enjoyed playing board games, with friends, family, or work game nights. While my game collection has grown and shrunk over the years, some of my favorites have been:

  • Illuminati. I first played this at a camp. The two players who’d played before told everyone that cheating is allowed as long as you don’t get caught. However, this is an optional advanced rule and made it very complicated to understand for everyone else, since there are already a lot of rules!
  • Roborally. There’s a newer version that I have never owned, but I have played and think is an improvement.
  • Bang. A fun spaghetti-western spin on the classic mafia/werewolves style hidden role games.
  • Settlers of Catan. One of the first board games I played with new friends when I got to college. As with many, a first introduction to me for modern board games.
  • Diplomacy? I have tried a few times to get into this game, since in theory it is so interesting that it doesn’t have any element of random chance. It is hard to find a group to play with, since it does not make a good party game.

Video Games

I have played many video games, mostly single player, or co-op. I never really approached the multiplayer war games, or MMOs. Some of the games I have the most memories playing were:

  • Starship Titanic. A humor puzzle game written by Douglas Adams, author of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. My brother and I would watch our dad play this game before bedtime when it came out.
  • Diablo 2. This was my go to game for a long period in high school and college.
  • Minecraft. The alpha version came out while I was in college, and I played on an early social server. The game has evolved a lot since the early days.
  • Mount and Blade: Warband. Another game I came across in college. A perfect combination of first-person sword battles, and risk-style campaign mapping.
  • Diablo 3.
  • Stardew Valley. As with a couple other games I played, I first heard about this when it was referenced in an xkcd comic.

Homebrewing

Welcome to Bowline Brewing! I’ve named my homebrew adventures after my favorite knot, the bowline! I also try to name each style of beer after a knot as well.

I used to brew in 5 gallon batches every few months, and package into a two tap kegerator mini fridge. I mostly made recipes from the book: Brewing Classic Styles. I used a converted cooler mash tun to brew all grain batches.

All the batches I’ve made are listed below, with knot names in parentheses when used.

  1. Peach Wheat: Wheat beer using whole peaches from the palisade peach festival.
  2. Spruce Ale: Another recipe from the homebrew magazine, using new spruce tips from my neighbor’s tree.
  3. Porter (Prusik): Remake of the previous porter.
  4. Lime Hefe (Half hitch): This one was from the homebrew magazine, made by adding simply limeade to the brew.
  5. Saison (Sheepshank): Used a yeast blend from the white labs yeast vault for this.
  6. Cream Ale: This one was a clone of Terrapin’s Golden ale
  7. English Chili Pepper Ale (Hangman’s Noose): An English blonde ale mashup, with chili peppers. For a contest at Mockery Brewing.
  8. Scottish Ale (Carrick Bend): First Submission to a contest.
  9. Smoke Ale: First time using a starter with a stir plate. Based on something I tried at the White Labs tap room. Followed the Rauchbier recipe, but used WLP003 and fermented as an ale instead of lagering.
  10. Red Ale (Reef Knot): First time brewing in the morning instead of afternoon/evening. I’ll try to do that again, it was enjoyable. Used the Irish red ale recipe, but with Imperial Flagship yeast (WLP001). Worked out well.
  11. Extra Special Bitter (Windsor): Pretty Good.
  12. Robust Porter (Prusik): First beer using all grain, with the brew in a bag method. The best beer I’d made yet, by a long shot.
  13. American Ipa: First recipe from Brewing Classic Styles. Under-fermented and not much at all like an IPA. Very sweet.
  14. Amber Ale: First Kegged beer! No more bottling! From the Clone book.
  15. Brown Ale: Moose Drool Clone from the clone book.
  16. Scottish Ale
  17. Sweet Stout: The first brew, made with my Father and Brother. Under-carbonated.

Disc Golf

This is a great hobby because of the low barrier to entry and cost. Especially if you can avoid courses with water hazards. One of my offices had a course just down the road, so a few of us would play there regularly. We even joined the weekly tags nights that the club ran, but never did all that well.

Boating

Canoeing

I was a staff canoe guide at Northern Tier for two summers during college, as well as a participant before that. This involved a lot of paddling, portaging, and camping.

Kayaking

In college, I joined the kayak club sports team. We met weekly in the pool for roll practice, and would get out on the local rivers in Colorado in the spring and summer. The club sports association would always complain that we didn’t do enough competition with other schools, and I believe the group was removed from club sports some years later. We also took a spring break trip to the Carolinas and Tennessee.

Sailing

In scouts, our venture crew had small boats that we would take out on the reservoir.

Later, I briefly owned a catamaran, and did a lot of repairs on it. Eventually had to sell it due to how little I was able to take it out.

Backpacking

Areas I’ve backpacked in are:

  • Colorado
    • Indian Peaks Wilderness
    • Arapaho National Forest
    • Maroon Bells
    • Rocky Mountain National Park
  • North Carolina
    • Appalachian Trail (sections)

Reading

Most people like reading books, I do as well. I’ve kept a list of the books I’ve read since mid-2018.