Hah! How are you, Chainmail? Funny, your name popped into my head while I was driving home, and for some reason it immediately translated into Charlie Mike...:)
There is something about military people and all things pineapple, including the juice. When I read your account of creating that primitive fermented brew, it brought back memories...:)
When I was a kid, my dad used to serve us pineapple juice all the time, but...since then, the only time I see it is when I seek it out. Nobody in the civilian world seems to drink it.
Just last week, my weight just dipped down below 185 for the first time in at least 35 years, and that particular weight made me think of when I was aboard ship as an 18 year old, I got sent for a month or so to the Chief’s Mess. Those guys always had the best food on the ship, and I had been 165 before I reported to duty there.
I was eating like a hog! When I was working in the scullery, I remember taking those huge shallow aluminum baking trays, full of pineapple upside down cake with the cherry in the middle of each ring on each square, and using a spatula to scrape them off into that huge garbage disposal that was at least a foot wide. As I tilted it on edge to shove them into that gaping black hole, I grab off great handfuls of that cake and shove it in my mouth, eating the whole time! (such a shame to put it down the disposal, but...that was what was done. I guess they didn’t want to keep it around or share it with anyone else)
Then one day, as I sat eating breakfast, I looked down towards my feet and realized with horror...I had a huge gut! I weighed myself, and I weighed 185 lbs!!!!
Well, when I got out of Mess Hall duty, I did drop back to about 170, but my days of being 165 were gone forever!
It does make be sigh to think of all that wasted Pineapple Upsidedown Cake!
My book is in final review before printing - so it'll be ready soon.
My son has proven to be a prodigy with precision shooting, so I bought him a Hammerli AR20 match air rifle and I set up a 10 meter range in the back yard. Dang thing is amazing! Postage-stamp size groups at that range.
Hope you are doing well! "Charlie Mike" - I like it!