Beer Names: Enter the Neural Network.

Saison is a pale ale, usually cloudy gold in color, with fruity, spicy flavors. Adam Barhan/CC BY 2.0.

Naming beers is a tricky business in the age of the microbrew. America has well over 5,000 breweries, and almost every beer name imaginable seems to have been taken. Cities, trees, weather patterns, and critters alike have been thoroughly mined, and brewers are wringing their hands (or, sometimes, getting embroiled in legal battles) in the effort to come up with a novel name for a new recipe.

Enter the neural network. Following a Gizmodo article about the dearth of new beer names, scientist Janelle Shane decided to sic artificial intelligence on this all-important task. And now, Old National Brewing Company, based in Williamston, Michigan, has launched what’s almost certainly the first beer named by a neural network: The Fine Stranger, a New England Double Dry-Hopped Saison.

[…]

The network allowed Shane to dial up or down the creativity. At its lowest setting, the beers were very (appropriately) French:

Saison Du Bear
Saison Du Farmer
Saison De Man
Saison De Mountain
Saison Du Chard
Saison Du Pant
Saison De Life
Saison De La Mort

[…]

But as creativity was dialed up, “the good ones got better and the bad ones got a lot worse,” she wrote. Until, that is, she pushed it up to full-tilt creativity, and the neural network went bonkers. “I stopped,” she wrote. “Perhaps you can understand why.”

Nerlious
Funky Ever
varumper
Saison De Mage
Clushing
Fleur Dull?
Beoobegie Nard
Stutty Rye
Undonchop
Plop Aged
The Sprong
Greenhunke
Mal?

The brewer eventually chose a name from one of the middle tiers, at the same creativity level as “Burcumber Jane Rad” and “Don’t The Mountain.” The Fine Stranger sounds convincingly like a saison—but great beer names for other styles are still up for grabs. Anyone for a tall, frosty Yampy?

Atlas Obscura has the full story. I think this is a fine idea, for jump-starting stalled imaginations. And ‘Don’t Tell The Mountain’ would be a good name.

Big Mouth.

courtesy of Netflix.

With all due respect to Andrew (John Mulaney), Nick (Nick Kroll), and Jessi (Jessi Klein) the Hormone Monsters are the main characters of “Big Mouth.” Think about it: This is their story. The new Netflix comedy explores how Maurice (Kroll) and Connie (Maya Rudolph) manipulate the minds and torture the bodies of pubescent junior high children. It’s a horror show — a funny horror show, but a horror show nonetheless — and they’re the big scary monsters freaking everybody out. Sure, they’re figments of Andrew and Jessi’s imaginations, but what’s a story of puberty without monstrous hormones?

Oh puberty, a time of nightmares, and they all come to life in the Netflix series Big Mouth. In a time when kids are hard pressed to obtain a good sex education, this might end up sex ed 101.

You can read all about it at IndieWire, but beware, spoilers all over the place, and NSFW stuff, too. The trailer is below the fold, because this probably qualifies as NSFW.

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Odd Things.

A while ago, Datura came up in a thread, and I mentioned I’d post about mine. I have all manner of old medicines littered about the house, this is one of them. The bottle is full, this was never used (and no, I’m not about to experiment with this shit). Davies, Rose Stramonium, 0.15 Gram (approx. 2.5 grains). Alkaloidally standardized and containing 0.375 mg (1/170 grain) of the alkaloids of Stramonium in each pill.* The warning on the side reads: Important: If dryness of the throat, excessively rapid pulse, or blurring of vision appear, the physician should be promptly consulted. The other side of the label reads: Caution: Federal law prohibits dispensing without a prescription. Usual Dose: One pill as directed by physician.

And yes, it has a very odd smell.

*That would be atropine and scopolamine.