It's not just us that's trying to do everything bigger and better this year. William Angliss is coming to the party too.

Andy and Simon went and met with the venue guys the other day and can report the following:

• Lighting has been upgraded.
• The projector and surface have been upgraded, so that projection with natural light is possible. No more blackout!
• Audio has been upgraded.
• The big one: the air conditioning has been upgraded!

With a bit of luck they'll let us run Club Night a bit later too, but that's still to be negotiated.

Dave from Qld brewed the Mechelen beer the other day, following Lacambre's method exactly apart from the 12 hour boil. Soft.

It was an 11 hour brew day apparently. He's going to write up his experiences at some point, for his club newsletter and hopefully for the conference as well.

If we ask nicely maybe he'll bring us some to taste at the conference too.

Onya Dave!

We should hopefully have some video up shortly, but in the meantime here are a few happy snaps. The turnout was excellent, even if you can't tell if from the photos.

Geoff and Dan came dressed to impress

I always knew cold beer was evil. Now I have proof.

At the last ANHC committee meeting at the Courthouse we were discussing something like the relative merits of bi-fold vs tri-fold flyers or corflute vs pull-ups when BANG, Mark J's half-full beer glass just exploded right there on the table. The bar guy said he'd seen it happen with their water glasses but not a beer glass. It was just your garden variety pot glass, if you're interested.

Other than the exploding glassware, the Courthouse experience was again great. Best bar meals I've found in Melbourne, plus tap beers from 3 Ravens, Stone & Wood, Red Hill and Little Creatures the other day.

[Nice wine list too, but don't tell anyone.]