The desk is piled high with unopened mail.

The light on the answering machine is blinking.

There are a dozen faxes sitting on the fax machine.

The email inbox is full.

Vacation must be over.

Not that I don’t love you guys and the wine biz, but it is really tough to sit down and (have to figure out where to) start working.

So…

When the going get’s tough, the tough go to Napa to taste wine.

I’ve had tastings scheduled for the last couple of days — a very pleasant way to “ease” back in to the business.  I am sick of the traffic on I80 and making the 140 mile round trip two days in a row.

The wines are showing great.  I was especially pleased with the 05 and 06 Baconbrook.  Those two wines have opened up in the last few months and are really singing.  Additional cellar time would still be optimal, but drinking them now with a good amount of air time would not be a crime… in fact, they are great.

Alas… sigh… boo hoo…

Tomorrow, I start working on all this stuff on my desk.

I promise.

Unless I get distracted.

Congratulations to our local gourmet grocery, Mulberry’s Market in Piedmont, California.  They were voted Best Gourmet Grocery in the San Francisco Chronicle’s Best of the Bay contest.  They beat out some stiff competition from other local favorites like Berkeley Bowl and Rockridge Market Hall.

I wonder if that’s because Mulberry’s carries Match Vineyards wines.

Yikes!

Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.
-Fran Lebowitz

People may forget what you say, but not how you make them feel.

“What’s the use of a fine house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?”
– Henry David Thoreau

A very quick useless link for your watching entertainment this Saturday morning:
Soldiers Performing Telephone

Good read: short essay on life as an SR-71 Blackbird pilot

What happens when two tennis legends get on the court with two current superstars? The old guys behave badly. Watch the video.

Please don’t sign. The California Secretary of State has cleared for circulation a proposal by Josephine and Kent Whitney to collect signatures to include a Measure on California’s November ballot which raises the excise tax on alcohol . If the Whitneys are able to collect 433,971 signatures, our often misinformed electorate will vote whether or not to impose “an additional excise tax on alcoholic beverages, increasing the excise tax on each six-pack of beer from 11¢ to $6.08, on each 750 ml bottle of wine from 4¢ to $5.11, and on each 750 ml bottle of distilled spirits from 65¢ to $17.57.” Hey, I know the state needs money, but this proposal seems nuts.

Yesterday, I ran a special promotion that started on Facebook and spread around the interwebs. Today, I’ve got a big pile of wine orders on my desk. THANK YOU! So, for your viewing pleasure while waiting for a receipt for your order, I give you an example of what some people will do for fine cheese.
Headline: Gloucestershire has cancelled their annual Cheese Rolling this year due to safety concerns. Check out the video from last year to see why.