My Brush with Fame

Do you know who I sat next to on my flight home Friday?  Do you?  Do you?

I sat next to Erin Glass on the way home from TN.  Can you believe it?

It is possible you do not know who Erin Glass actually is.  Erin Glass is the one and only wife of the one and only ... wait for it ... wait for it ... Gary Glass.  Can you believe it?  Yes, the one and only wife of the one and only Gary Glass sat next to me on the flight home from TN.  How cool is that?

And, yes, it is possible that some of you do not know who Gary Glass is either (other than being the one and only husband of the one and only Erin Glass).  I suppose he is probably not even the only Gary Glass in the world.  Perhaps Erin is not the only Erin Glass in the world either.

So, for those of you who do not know, Gary Glass (at least the one married to Erin, the lady who sat next to me on the way home from TN) is the Director of the American Homebrewers Association (AHA).  You're pretty jealous, aren't you?

Erin is actually a high-ranking member of the AHA as well.  The Contact Us Page on the AHA website lists her as the Brewers Association Membership Coordinator & Brewery Detective.  She told me one thing she does at the AHA is work with homebrewers who want to go that next step to actually starting up a commercial brew pub or microbrewery.   I'm sure she does many other fun beer-related things on a daily basis.  Sounds like a fun job to me.

The reason that Erin Glass, one and only wife of the one and only director of the AHA, was traveling back from TN was because she took her very small (and very cute) daughter to visit family while Gary was up in MN for the National Homebrewers Conference.  The very small child was not very happy most of the trip, and Erin spent most of the first hour apologizing to me about the loudness of her daughter's cries.  I kept telling her not to worry about it.  It was not that long ago that my children were that small, and I totally understand how hard it can be.  The poor mother ordered some wine, which was a mistake, as most of it ended up spilled.  I, of course, ordered a beer.  And, she mentioned that usually she would have ordered beer as well, but really was not wild about the choices on the flight.  It came out that I homebrew and then she mentioned who she was and we had something to talk about for a few minutes while both her daughter, and my 5-year-old finally slept.

She, of course, knows most of the big-shots in home brewing.  She told me what a nice guy Jamil Zainasheff, author of Brewing Classic Styles: 80 Winning Recipes Anyone Can Brew, is.  I, of course, have Jamil to thank quite a bit for my Quarter Life Crisis and my Buckwheat's Belgium Pale Ale. She told me that Charles Papazian, author of The Complete Joy of Homebrewing, is still pretty much a stove-top brewer (which sort of surprises me).  Apparently, Charles has a new daughter as well.  And, of course, she knows John Palmer (How to Brew: Everything You Need To Know To Brew Beer Right The First Time) as well.  I'm sure she knows other big shot authors in the homebrewing world, but those were the ones she mentioned.

Erin also told me I should join the AHA, and that I should attend the NHC in San Diego next year. 

Anyway, that was my brush with fame for the weekend.  It was nice to talk beer on the way home for a few minutes.