A CASE OF THE VAPORS: Labor Day, 2001 These are the days when I wake up of a morning, and remember what time of year it is because I can smell the fermenting of dark grapes on my skin. Just beneath the surface of me, where I’m pulling on a clean T-shirt and wondering how […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:Lord Willin’ and the Crick Don’t Rise So, let’s see; it’s the third of October, now, and day 50 of crush 2000. Who (as the song asks) knows where the time goes? In a couple of days we’ll receive the Syrah from the Parmelee-Hill vineyard, and pass the halfway point for tons crushed […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:Rainy Day, Man This has seemed like a difficult year to gauge ripeness. I hear reports, from everyone I know who makes wine, of high sugars, most often concurrent with high acid levels in the grapes, and low pHs.(Usually, as ripening proceeds, the heat that pushes sugar levels higher also serves to lower […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:The Wheels Come Off There was a car manufactured in Germany years ago, called the Borgward. It was a solidly constructed car, as sturdy, surely, as a Mercedes, and capable of cruising on the highways and autobahns at speeds upwards of 100 mph, yet so smoothly that you never noticed until you saw […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:Good to the Last Drop “Ain’t it funny how nothin’ ever turns out just the way you had it planned?” –Bob Dylan, “Brownsville Girl” After the Syrah from Fenaughty vineyard came in on October 25, the weather was dismal. It rained the night those grapes arrived, and all the next day. The grapes […]

WHOLE LOTTA SHAKIN’ GOIN’ ON A man can get himself in a lot of trouble in a very short time, I keep discovering. It’s only 2 and 1/2 weeks since the last time I wrote here, and I’ve managed to find all kinds of new places where I feel achy and stiff. Since those two […]

Listening Events Steve Edmunds’ collection of self-penned songs, Lonesome on the Ground, makes me wish I was in California… warm and easy feeling, making music with good friends. (I think people who say unkind things about California are mad, because they’re cold.) Steve’s album was produced by Laurie Lewis, who also accompanies him, along with […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:Read ‘Em and Weep! Maybe it’s all the CO2 in the winery during crush–it feels like there’s a different kind of energy that runs me at this time of year, and I’m surprised I haven’t noticed it before. Then again, human beings often seem to be exceptionally good at not seeing what’s right […]

UPDATE: VINTAGE TWO-TRIPLENAUGHT:Dancing with Lunacy This morning it became official. The inevitable sense that comes, sooner or later, in every harvest, that “all hell has broken loose” arrived in every muscle in my body. Some time during the night, last night, as I lay sleeping, the white flag was waved and the surrender took effect. […]

Hospice du Rhône 2000, Revisited Probably if you’ve visited our site before, you’ve noticed the announcements about and references to Hospice du Rhône, and if you have you have wondered what it was all about, and what it would be like to be there, I’ll try to give you a little of the flavor, having […]