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My First Home Brew
Also, your carbonation should also improve over the next couple of weeks. It can take about a month or 6 weeks sometimes to get to levels you would like.
I have actually already noticed an improvement in the carbonation.
There is one problem with waiting, though - I am already running low on the beer! Thankfully I did not drink all of it on my own (I had the help of several curious friends). Both the wife and I are having a few - she actually likes the beer more than I do! 
I do like the suggestion on taking notes - the next brewing will take place at someone else's home who is curious about brewing, so I will come more prepared.
The low PH? That is probably a good guess. The tap water I have here is a extremely hard and full of questionable minerals. Most everything we have ends up with a white dusty and crusty surface on it from the water, so I was very hesitant to use this on beer. Instead I went to the store and bought 5 gallons of purified water thinking this would be better.
I think its about time I actually read in depth some of those home brewing books I have. 
The pH point is a pretty good one. In an all-grain brew you're counting largely on the large volume of grain to help adjust the pH of the comparably smaller volume of water. So steeping a grain bag in a large volume of water might allow the water to remain at a ph above 6, and some tannin extraction. There are lots of ways to adjust the pH, I'd get some lactic acid and add a couple drops before steeping. Your water (by federal regs) is going to hover in the 6.8-7.6 range so depending on how much grain is in the bag you are likely going to need to adjust the water down to below 6.
For some reason I thought the issue was with water PH being too low, but there is a reason I am an electrical engineer and not a chemical engineer. Either way, I do know this can cause problems, as I have a few friends from other parts of the country that have had this issue. A bit of water PH correction as you mentioned can make a difference.
I always have trouble talking about pH becuase of the low-high thing, and I typically get it backwards. I call 1-4 high 5-8 mid and 9-12 low, I try to put in the numbers whenever possible to avoid confusion.
OK, I think that we were saying the same thing, just differently. I always refer to a PH in the range of 1 - 4 to be low, above 7 or 8 to be high. We are thinking along the same lines, just a bit different way of looking at it.
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