wasting my wort?

i just had a fantastic extract, and i plan to ruin it.

hold on, let's back up a bit. two weeks ago i brewed a disappointing, experimental IPA. i got 60% extraction from my mash, and i tried a method of hopping called "late hopping" -- i added no hops prior to -30 minutes. i added upwards of 4oz of hops in the last 30 minutes, and i dry hopped it just this morning. this was supposed to bitter it adequately but load up on the hop aroma/flavor.

in my case, it gave me an overly sweet beer, with cidery qualities and nearly no hop flavor/aroma at all. where did it go? i don't know. i certainly put lots of hops in. the flavor just didn't make it, i guess. hopefully dry hopping will shore up the flavor and a little aging will mellow out the cider. maybe not.

so today i'm brewing a beer with two goals: to use cluster hops and find out why people don't like them, and to try repitching yeast from the above beer. the cluster beer was to be a smallish beer, around 1045-1050. instead, based on the pre-boil gravity, it appears it will be around 1062. why so high? because i got 85% mash efficiency. what? how did that happen? my usual is 60-65% with one outlier at 75%. but 85%?! unheard of!

but that's cause for celebration, right? well, normally, sure. but i really wanted a small beer -- haven't made one in a long time. and this is gonna be a great wort, whereas the one i'm dry hopping may well be no good, but i'm planning to ruin it with unsavory hops (and they surely do smell different from my usual citrusy hops) and contaminate it with geriatric yeast.

all this for the best wort i've ever had the pleasure of boiling.

sigh. so it goes.