(NOTE this list will be updated frequently with peoples submissions from the follow up posts in this thread, and be the 'official' list, with citations of course
)You know you are a Shiner when…
1. You buy liquor from the liquor store just to “keep up appearances” (Fester)
2. You walk the aisles of a liquor store and call every other bottle “Heads or Tails” (Fester)
3. You open a store bought bottle and the smell alone tempts you to add it to the faints jug (Fester)
4. You check every store-bought bottle for its ABV (Fester)
5. Your closest friends have no idea if you bought it or made it (Fester)
6. You have stayed up to 3 A.M. polishing your column (Fester)
7. You woke up at 6 A.M. the next morning to get the polished column tarnished again (Fester)
8. You are on your 37th generation of UJSM, yep, same yeast (Fester)
9. You buy a liter of bourbon and calculate how many liters you could make with the same money (Fester)
10. You have no patience standing in line at the liquor store but will spend hours milking a few liters out of your still (Fester)
11. You accidentally spill a half liter on the floor (the devil’s share) and oddly it means almost nothing (Fester)
12. You get excited when someone gives you their old whiskey bottles (Fester)
13. You know exactly how much is the deposit on an empty beer keg (Fester)
14. You collect copper fittings like never before in your life (Fester)
15. You know what the tax is on a gallon of store bought booze (and calculate how many gallons of booze you could make with that much money) (Fester)
16. You have at least two gallons of something that contains high proof alcohol in various jars with charcoal and oak in the bottom of the jars. You made it. But you are no longer certain if it is some heads, all hearts or some tails. But it tastes OK to drink, so what-the-hell… (Fester)
17. You spend more time polishing copper than you do polishing your car (Fester)
18. You have learned to solder (Fester)
19. You can spot a bargain on sugar but have no idea how much vegetables cost (Fester)
20. Your friends know that you will always be busy every Friday night and most of Saturday (Fester)
21. You have more respect for good booze than ever before (Fester)
22. You have no tolerance for some inferior name-brands that you used to like to drink (Fester)
23. You keep the best-of-the-best and dole it out to your wife. (You do this for you, not for her.) (Fester)
24. You keep a list like this one (Fester)
25. Recycled glass taking over the extra fridge and pantry. (LWTCS)
26. Every thing in a hardware store, kitchen suppliers, and recycling shop, looks like potential parts for a still. (HookLine)
27. In the garage, you have room for 6 empty kegs, several big pots and pans, fermenting barrels, carboys, a couple oak barrels, and a huge supply of bottles, but the car sits in the driveway because there is no room for it. (Husker)
28. When they know you at the feed store by name,, but you don't have a animal on the place. (Dnderhead)
29: You have spent more money and time on your new still than you can afford. But it is worth every penny. (Fester)
30. You search ebay for "copper" in the vain hope that you will find the ultimate still piece (Aces High)
31. Your other half refers to you as the mad scientist (Aces High)
32. You spend several days a week in the garage "working on the lawnmower" but the lawn has not been mowed in months (Dnderhead)
33. When you have replaced your daily newspaper / news site with 'view active topics' on home distiller... (kiwistiller)
34. When friends and family treat any unmarked colourless liquid around the house with due care and suspicion (kiwistiller)
35. When people who walk into the shed remark 'wow, that smells... yeasty' and you can't smell it anymore. (kiwistiller)
36. When you are automatically emailed new trademe [think ebay] listings for glass storage containers, copper pipe, and kegs EVERY morning. (kiwistiller)
37. every jar in the house is filled with bits of clear liquid (blind drunk)
38. When your worried that your kids might say somthing stupid at school. (pumpman)
39. When your friends call wanting some likker instead of wanting to go fishing on your offshore boat. (pumpman)
40. When you have to run to the store at 6 am to get your baby some more cereal for breakfast cuz you used all of it for yeast nutrients. (pumpman)
41. When your family vacations are now planned around moonshine festivals, out of the way places all known as "the moonshine capital of the world", where other persons of like interest can be found or bourbon distilleries. (Hillbilly Rebel)
42. An old waterbed at the swap meet/yard sale looks like a fermenter to you (Fester)
43. When many of the local catering people know you by name, and keep several 5 gallon buckets of old 1/2 drank mixed drinks, wine, beer, and 1/8 full bottles for you to collect after their event. (Husker)
44. when you start looking at anything organic and wondering 'would that work as a feedstock?' (kiwistiller)
45. oh, and when your fridge looks more like a yeast farm than food storage (kiwistiller)
46. when you cannot bus / bike / walk to the shops any more because the quantities of sugar you are consuming is not movable without a car. (kiwistiller)
47. You no longer notice the strange looks at said supermarket. (kiwistiller)
48. You (barely) resist the urge to collect bottles from the side of the road (gsmedia)
49. you know what Dixie Crystals are and know how to use them... (1fourme)
50. You know who John Lee Pettymore is... (1fourme) (edit from Fester: I had to google it)
51. You burn the hell out of a piece of oak... just so you can flavor your favorite drink... (1fourme)
52. You have an overwhelming desire to announce the birth of your new still on homedistiller' forum.. (1fourme)
53. You have an overwhelming desire to learn how to upload pictures of your new still...but not of your family... (1fourme)
54. You have more canning jars then anyone else in the county...and the stores send their customers over to your place when they run out... (1fourme)
55. your sheds occupied, your house is used for storage and your basement resembles a laboratory. (stuartashers)
56. you can just about recite the lines from the Dukes of Hazard (stuartashers)
57. you keep finding new hiding places for your still collection (stuartashers)
58. when there's a knock on the door your not at home (stuartashers)
59. When your personal library has more books on moonshining, distilling, ethanol, bourbon, cooperage, prohibition, rum row, (and so on), than the entire State Library combined. (Hillbilly Rebel)
60. When you check HD before your e-mail (tinboat)
61. You buy the high dollar dog food at the feed store as cover (tinboat)
62. and you wonder, "Can you mash dog food?" (Hack)
63. you have mashed Fruit Loops.. (1fourme)
64. the wife needs something from the store... and you volunteer to go... (1fourme)
65. your wife doesn't ask anymore, and just heads out to the shed to retrieve her cooking utensils... (1fourme)
66. You get a set of Measuring cups, Strainer, and large spoons for Christmas... (1fourme)
67. You tell yourself your stuff costs $3.00 per bottle (tinboat)
68. after you figure you can't [mash dogfood], you wonder how it would taste since you spent all yer money on copper, barley and corn. (blind drunk)
69. just ordered a case of panella blocks/bricks after cleaning off the shelf. Grocer staff members have that "you don't look south american" look on their faces. (LWTCS)
70. Your wife bursts into the study to try and catch you looking at porn and finds you looking at stills (Aces High)
71. You wife wishes you'd stop looking at stills on the internet and just look at porn like an ordinary person (Aces High)
72. You know you are a Shiner when you can remember your stills names but not your kids (nedscreekkennels)
73. when you understand what people are talking about when they use these acronyms: DWWG, UJSM, BOP, WPOSW, BWSW, FFMW; and when words like strike temp and azeotrope no longer confuse you; and when you understand the difference between dunder, lees, mash, wort, and backset. (kiwistiller)
74. And you've learnt more about chemistry in 6 month than you bothered to learn in your entire school career (Aces High)
75. When ya ask store managers for the pallet price on sugar. (tater)
76. When you dig out your first still and you get a little choked up and there is that far-away look in
77. You speed through traffic to catch up with a truck thats carrying a load of copper, just so you can see whats on there! (Aces High)
78. When you show every time on poker night with clear glass bottles of hooch with no label, and all you can do is give them a blank look and shrug your shoulders. (MuleKicker)
79. [it is] like a addiction ,, You keep swearing off but you keep doing it anyway , even though you got enough for the hole town for the next 5+ years (Dunerhead)
80. I'm beyond help.I have addiction to alcohol (that is making it.) (Dnderhead)
81. When you can make great booze that is not for sale at any price. Panty Dropper in custom blended flavours for example. (Fester)
82. When you finally prefer your homemade to store bought. A real milestone but it will absolutely happen when you are serious about this hobby. (Fester)
83. When Pintoshine, Uncle Jesse, goose eye, hawk, Husker, Dnderhead or some other heavy-weight says: yes, you are right, well done, or some other that gives you the big head. Aint happened to me yet but there is always hope. (Fester)
84. When you go into your "wine cellar", pull out a bunch of wine you've been aging for about 4 years, and run it through the still cause you just can't wait any longer for your wash to clear. (blind drunk)
85. When you set your home page to "home distiller.org".....AND......Your wife doesn’t even bother to give you shit about it! (Mule Kicker)
86. When your runnin a batch through the old glory pot and Posting reasons when "you know your a shiner" (Mule Kicker)
87. when ethanol is such a common substance in your house, you regularaly use it as a cleaning agent (violentblue)
88. You make a deal with the hogs ,, that they can have all the SLOPS they want if you git to use the grain first (Dnderhead)
89. You wake up at 4am, but instead of going back to sleep you lie there thinking about what you can do to improve that batch you've gotta put on tonight (Aces High)
90. then log on to HD and spend the next 6 hours reading/researching, only to be 2 hours late to work, but with a smile on your face. (Husker)
91. when HD forum is down and it leaves you with significantly more time in your day (kiwistiller)
92. I spent a lot of time convincing my wife that I need a boat. Now, I think of reasons to leave the boat in the garage and 'try another recipe'! (Artemisia)
93. the old lady is making strawberry jam and needs pectin, mason jar lids and "4 bags of sugar because we're out", and you go to the store and buy all of it although you've got four packs of lids and sixteen 2kg bags of sugar hidden in the garage that she don't know about. (goinbroke2)
94. even though you hate her garden, tilling, hauling compost, etc you get all excited seeing rhubarb coming up for the first time. (and answer "no reason" when she looks at you questioningly). . (goinbroke2)
95. When someone offers you a fifth of Crown Royal and you graciously decline and in a drunken lapse respond that you have gallons of better stuff at home. (trthskr4)
96. when... you overhear someone say -anything- bad about ;shine or 'shiners, and you jump-in with hard facts about how it isn't so. (Barney Fife)
97. you drink store-bought because you ran out of yours while on vacation, and awake with a headache, which makes you realize your product doesn't cause headaches! (Barney Fife)
98. People that are interested in things about moonshine are referred to you by the local police. (Hillbilly Rebel)
99.when you just spent a week on an alaskan fishing vacation, but just cant wait to get back and still out your next batch of hooch (MuleKicker)
100. when you give up a week end with your sweaty to make a run with your still. (Dnderhead)
101. Kick self in ass for going to visit mum-dad in Idaho and not having anything fermenting while you are gone (tinboat)
102. I have an alcohol problem......... I have 40 gal to still and only a 16 gal boiler! (MuleKicker)
103. I don't have an alcohol problem,,,,,,I MAKE MY OWN! (Dnderhead)
104. You take the dogs for a walk at an old 19th century gold mining area - now used as an illegal dump - and come home with a spare propane cylinder, a wheel rim for a more efficient boiler base and a handy length of 5/8 diameter copper pipe. (blanikdog)
105. When your so pumped because you just scored 2 55 gal drums of frosted flakes from the local cereal factory, and it was thrown out because it had too much sugar in it! The best part is, "come back anytime you need more!" (MuleKicker)
106. You know your a shiner when you go through the phone book looking for factories that might give away spoiled goods you can ferment (goinbroke2)
107. You get invited somewhere and all you say is your busy, and they don’t need to ask doing what. (Woody_Woodchuck)
108. You can tell by sticking a finger in the mash what the end result will taste like. (Woody_Woodchuck)
109. You can tweak the final product by tasting the mash while it is working and adding to it accordingly. (Woody_Woodchuck)
110. You can tell by a finger in the mash how many jugs you need for the run. (Woody_Woodchuck)
111. You can tell when a mash is ready to run by look, taste and smell. (Woody_Woodchuck)
112. If you’re busy you can postpone running a mash for up to a week by tickling it a little. (Woody_Woodchuck)
113. You find it more relaxing to sip coffee and listen to the warm, old copper pot gurgle than listening to your old favorite albums. (Woody_Woodchuck)
114. Your old pot responds well to banjo playing (clawhammer of course!). (Woody_Woodchuck)
115. You can tell how the run is going by the sounds of your old copper pot and make temp adjustments accordingly. (Woody_Woodchuck)
116. You can tell what stage of the run you are at by smell. (Woody_Woodchuck)
117. You gave up drinking green licker because you know better. That’s how much better it will be given a little time and care. (Woody_Woodchuck)
118. Everyone knows what their Christmas present from you will be, and you know what their preference as far as recipe is. (Woody_Woodchuck)
119. You’ve got a few special jugs stashed away to be opened at your funeral. (Woody_Woodchuck)
120. fermenting cornflakes smell really good! (MuleKicker)
121. When your wife asks your 4 year old, “where’s daddy” and she answers, 'in the shop making likker.' (ct1870)
>updated July 24, 2009<
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no. 39 = 