Bill Bryson is in his fourth year as the Head Brewer at the Willoughby Brewing Co. Prior to that he worked with the John Harvard's Brew House in both Cleveland and Pittsburgh. This will be his fifth GABF ('99-'03) as a brewer and his first as a judge. His beers have won three GABF medals.

» Sept. 4
"Lost two brew days to the power outage and one of our beers was not yet ready to bottle."

» Sept. 5
"Once in the bottle, the yeast metabolizes the sugar and the result is a naturally carbonated beer. The advantage, theoretically, is that the yeast scavenges any oxygen that may have found its way into the package, thus preventing oxidation/deterioration of the beer."

» Sept. 8
"As if to prove a point, in my hurry to get to the shipper before they close, I drop a box — not out of an airplane, just about two feet — and watch as rivers of beer flow out!"

» Sept. 9
"What a relief when I see no beer leaking from any boxes."

» Sept. 10
"The rest of our week can be spent gameplanning the week before we leave and all the things we need to get done."

» Sept. 15
"We will both be leaving for Denver the following Monday. No one will be in the brewery to help us out."

» Sept. 19
"I guess I would rather have all the problems while the bottles are still in my hands! At least then I can repackage."

» Sept. 21
"It always shocks people and they think it is the grueling part of the whole event. It is not. After all the other stuff, it is a relaxing and delightful way to see the country, forget about all the work you just put in, and mentally prepare for the week of beer in which you are about to partake!"

» Sept. 22
"It was hard-slogging through the rain until we arrived in St. Louis at about 1 p.m."

» Sept. 23
"Getting to meet people who have been in this industry for so long and really made a lot of this possible was the highlight of my week!"

» Sept. 24-26
"You are limited by the volume of beers available and sometimes miss some good ones, but meeting so many of the men and women behind the beer, you really get turned on to some great ones."

» Sept. 27
"Can't ask for much more, can you?"