Whine and Wine on a Friday

Oh, what a day.  I'm like a broken record, really, when I talk about how lucky I am to have such wonderful babies.  But it's on a day like today that I realize how lucky.  I mean, they are almost 15 months old and this week was the first week that I REALLY had to deal with a child with a cold. 

Thank friggin' gawd.

Today was particularly trying, as both girls seemed out of sorts and neither were on the same page at the same time (which makes for a particularly crusty mommy).  Alex, still sick, wanted LOTS of sleep and when up was at best unpredictable, alternating between laughter and inconsolable tears.  Hailey, perhaps feeling sickness coming on (?) was irritable, didn't nap well, was a picky eater and just generally wanted a lot of attention.  *As an aside, I chose today to get us all out of the house for a little trip to IKEA.  Ha!  SMRT.

In any event, 5pm hit, and upon return from work, husband was hit at entry with the dulcet tones of whining, whimpering, full-on temper tantrums and other fun.  An early bath, early bottles, and both were put down to bed, also early.  They didn't go to SLEEP early, mind, but Mommy and Daddy had other plans.

BBQ filet mignon, and a WONDERFUL bottle of wine. Seen here:

Yes.  This is what we used to do before our wonderful, blessed additions arrived.  Felt like old times.  Except, of course, for the monitor that showed several decibles of sound were coming from the bedroom. I say showed because the volume was muted.

The wine was velvety, jammy, earthy with dark cherry, a hint of anise. 

Bin 790 - A Mommy Review

So let's talk about something other than the babies. Well, kinda.  Because the only reason I even tasted Bin 790 food is because we had babysitters for the night - our first night out without the babies - and we wanted a nearby restaurant to hit, which in fact was plan B, since I am still dying to see Harry Potter, but the damn thing isn't playing on the weekends anymore. Boo.

But I digress. Bin 790, from a Mommy's perspective?  Great get away night restaurant. Fabulous ambiance. Small intimate tables (not great for large groups - in fact, impossible with so few tables). Okay, well, this Mommy had a tough time finding room on her table for the requisite iPhone display area!

Some cool things about the restaurant are that it is a Spanish Tapas restaurant, it has a good wine list and even a selection of wine flights (although no Spanish flights - I would have liked to see that).  They had an excellent Spanish Tempranillo/Cab Sauv blend that I ordered by the glass, and they accomodated that even though it wasn't offered by the glass. And, they even had one of my fave desserts - sticky toffee pudding - on offer!

The service was excellent, the prices tolerable (not cheap or overly expensive) and this particular Mom managed to occasional talk about something other than her babies. 

However she did NOT succeed in keeping her photos of the babies to herself...the waiter we had has now seen quite a few of them...

So.  I give this restaurant 4.5 out of 5 soothers. They lost points only on the slightly uncomfortable seats, a bit of a draft from the door where we sat, and because their Spanish wine list was a little lacking.

For the record, we had the following dishes:
Zambuca shrimp - yummy, creamy, sweet. 5 large shrimp
Bacon wrapped beef tenderloin - sooo good. 4 little bites with a bit of salad on the side
Green curry mussels - good portion size, very buttery and garlicy sauce, but in my books, that's great
Pulled pork areta - one of the best items on the menu; excellent
Ham croquetas - two of them, and delish!
And of course, the 790 antipasto platter.  Very frustrated that I forgot to get the names of the cheeses and one of the meats they served us.  Wanted to be able to look for them for our own presentation some day. May still ask...

In writing this post, I found this blog...looks to be an awesome source of recipes and info about tapas...

Although we loved our meal, and even had dessert, we were home within 2 hours, and when I took my daughter Alex into my arms, she promptly fell alseep, all cuddly-like. Tapa-what?

Quick hits - recommendation for three wines for a friend

Just got asked by a great friend of mine for my recommendations for wines under/around $10.  She didn't care if they were red or white, but just wanted them to be "yummy". What did I recommend?

Well, you would guess the first two, if you had read previous posts reviewing these wines.  The first was the Pedro do Monte from Portugal ($8.95). The second was La Casona from Spain ($9.95), but I thought I would mix it up for the third and throw in a white wine that hubby and I really like, the Birchwood Estates Niagara Gewurtz/Riesling blend at only $10.95.  We love this blend, especially for casual sipping, appetizers and spicy foods.  Yumminess.

Was flattered to be asked for my input, but kinda wish I was going whereever she going to be able to enjoy what she'll have on offer!

Want an amazing Chardonnay? Look in our back yards...

okay.  it's not the cheaptest wine you will ever have, but if you want a seriously lovely, buttery, toasty, nutty, balanced, fresh citrus peel, yummy yummy yummy chardonnay, you only have to go 2.5 hours from Ottawa and about 1.5 hours from Toronto to hit Prince Edward County and Huff Estates.  I can't say enough about how goooood this wine, the 2007 South Bay vintage, is.  It's LOVELY.

While you are on the site, take a quick look around.  They really get what they are supposed to be about down there.  My husband and I went and stayed there for their wine futures weekend, on a special package deal that included discounts on advance order wines and a tour and some barrel tastings with their very suave winemaker, Frederic Picard. Combine that with a great dinner deal that came with the package, home-cooked hot breakfast included, etc. etc., it was a really lovely, romantic weekend getaway.  Highly recommend.

Wine pairings:  This would go great with buttery lobster and any number of other meals, but our pairing tonight was with a blackened cajun chicken on a bed of white wine and cream linguini with peppers, garlic and onion.  Damn fine meal.

Here's to a great weekend - hope you all had some good times, great food and some time to relax.

The unsophisticated palate

So I was thinking about this after sacrificing any ambitions toward dieting for today to make way for chicken pad thai. (So. Good. Totally. Worth. Every. Morsel); I was think about the absence of limes to squirt on my dish, and this morphed into a thought about the fact that I can totally tell the difference between lemon and lime in cooking, but in a blind test, would I really?

(Don't ask why I was having these thoughts - never ask why a woman thinks random thoughts at all times of the day, awake or asleep - they just do.)

Here's the thing. I know from experience that I naturally have a strong sense of taste and likely a great palate, but it's not a TRAINED palate, you know?  I can safely say a wine is jammy, or smokey, or has chocolate notes, but I couldn't tell you if a wine is from the Roija region or the Ribera del Duero region of Spain, or whether it was aged for 2 years or 6 months in American and not French oak, and I CERTAINLY couldn't pick the vintage.

But you know what?  I love wine.  I know what I like. 

So, likely, do you. 

So what is the sophisticated palate good for? Well, I think it's good for helping OTHER people know, via the 'Primo Palateer', whether or not the description sounds like something you'd like before you buy it! 

What do you think?  Do you crave a more sophisticated palate, or are you fine continuing to sip, slurp and even guzzle what you like, without a thought in your head about spitting and then describing what you are tasting?

I'll go halfway and say I want to go ahead and learn to describe, but I still have trouble picturing myself spitting, ya know?

In which idea girl cries over technical lack of know-how

So I said I would chronicle my challenges in the Me 2.oh realm, right?  Well, today has been a day.  I'm friggin in TEARS just trying to do the simplest of things -  nothing I try to do is working out today, and I am one of those people who gets incredibly stressed and upset when every move is delayed by ignorance of what to do in the face of hiccups.

Take my efforts just to add an offline reader and bookmarking app to my bloody iTouch.  I'm trying to load and try out the Diigo app, which says that it will allow me to read articles offline but still bookmark them so that I can find them again in the future and tag them as valuable for certain subjects.

It's not working out. 

(as an aside, I am finding my iTouch a bit of a tease, as it is an incredibly useful mobile personal device, but mostly only when you are somewhere with Wireless internet access.  This GENERALLY means that I have to be at home to truly use it, and I can use my laptop instead, so ...  it's just kinda half cool, really.  I want to access, bookmark, read, load, communicate and engage while on the bus and wherever I am throughout the day, you know?  And honestly, social media gets really overwhelming quickly if you go for several hours without monitoring and listening.  When you finally get back online, there is TOO MUCH INFO.  So yeah..that's my whoeisme bullshit whine for today. Boo hoo I have an iTouch instead of a full iPhone.  If that's my biggest issue, then life is bloody good....)

So yes, anyway, what's wrong with the Diigo thing is that I have to go online through Safari to add my bookmarking tool, and as I am following the instructions, I get to a point where I add the "Save to Diigo" part, but then it gives me instructions to access the bookmark, then edit the URL that shows up to remove some of the characters.  The thing is...I can't EDIT it.  The cursor is dead over that spot.  And I keep trying to figure out here and there what I might be doing wrong, but every time I go through the process, it adds more and more "Save to Diigo" bookmark screens, but NOTHING CHANGES folks!  I am utterly frustrated!  These things just drive me nuts.  totally bonkers. Full out tantrum, people!  I toss aside the iTouch, scream, tears fill my eyes, and then I say I will come back to it again and figure it out next time.  But I've done this three times now, and I just can't STAND it.

So yeah. 

Fun times.

What to do, people?  Who has the solution for me? Maybe there's another iTouch app that I can try instead?  ARGGGH.

time for a glass of wine and, I think, time to put the bloody tech tools down for a while.  Sigh.

Tapas time out - La Casona, Friday night, and a less than $10 price tag

ROCK ON - it's Friday night.

I arrived home and was met with plans for a night of Tapas - Serrano ham, chirozo sausage, a smoked roasted red pepper sausage on the Big Green Egg, with a selection of cheeses, fresh baguette and salad as a side. If I haven't mentioned it lately, I have a great husband. I had to do nothing.

So. Perfect, unplanned evening fare to go perfectly with our final wine in the Top 10 under $10 series from the LCBO; La Casona Monsatrell 2007 from Yecla, Spain.


So, admittedly, after a VERY long week at work, I opened this wine with breakneck speed and, giving it a perfunctory sniff, dove right in. Yes, I got some cassis on the nose, and deep cherry and all that stuff, but for all that, it was just good, rounded, plump and juicy wine. WINE. oh, yeah....wiiiiiine.

This one has some nice tannins, and nice finish. This is a GREAT value for $8.95. If it was a blind tasting, I probably would have been able to peg it as Spanish...it just has that slightly gritty, earthy, round and yet fruity characteristics. Would I have been able to pick out that it was the monastrell grape on not a tempranillo? No...

Hey. Sorry. A little break. Just saw that Toronto is eating what Washington is dishing and it tastes like 1-6... ha!

So yes. Great value wine. of the 5 wines I have tried, it's number 3 on the list, I think.

So here's my ranking folks, after all that:

#1 is the Portugese Pedras do Monte Castelao 2007
#2 is the The Castillo de Monseran Garnacha Spainish treat (so unique)
#3 is tonight's La Casona 2007 from Yecla Spain - it's as good as any $15 I have tried
#4 has to be the Mezzomondo staple from Italy that I have been drinking for a while when looking for a bargain deal.
And last on the list was the Italian Casal Thaulero - not bad at all, but it was the only one on the list that had that slightly sulphery 'cheapy' kind of layer to the tongue. I have no idea how else to describe that 'element', but it is something I can both smell and taste. Maybe something that happens with the sulphites in cheaper wines? Not sure.

Okay folks. Now you have the scoop, or at least my interpretation of the wines I most wanted to try from that list. It was fun to do, and I hope you all don't go out and buy up all the damn Pedras bottles, 'cause I want them, dammnit!

And...the Caps "steamrolled" the Leafs tonight. Happy Friday everyone!

What's behind door number three? Part 3 of the 10 Under $10 reviews

Okay. Before I go any further than this, and in the interest of transparency (and just in case you haven't guessed, laughing at my musings on what I am tasting and fully disagreeing with me), I am NOT a wine expert. I am a wine 'souse' to use I term my Mamma would use. I LOVE it. I have a 'bit' of a nose for it, but no formal training. And...I simply know what I like, people!

Without further ado...The Castillo de Monseran Garnacha from Spain! Only $8.95 folks! And Spanish - some of my favourite wines are coming from Spain these days.

Big. Long. Pour. Tonight. Work was a drag today and it won't be better tomorrow.

Okay. When I first stuck my cute little delicate nose into this glass tonight (it's kinda crooked, actually, and not really all that cute, but...you don't know that, so...) the first thing I got was, I thought, raspberry, but then I swirled it and wow strawberry! I purposefully didn't look at the notes on the article again, and guess what? I was right! Yay me!

Then, the taste. BOY is this fruity! Almost sweet. A very different, unique tasting Garnacha, which I am more accustomed to being more gritty, with more aggressive tannins. This is a cooooool tasting wine, man! I can see this thing actually going with a myriad of dishes - I bet you could even have this with a wilted spinach, goat cheese, strawberry and toasted walnut salad or something. Very interesting. Certainly a nice, light, sipper, but don't expect and long, lingering finish. It dies out quick on the tongue. But then...I want more almost right away, so...(maybe my work day is affecting my appetite for it?)

Very different for me, but yummy. I'll buy this again for sure!

So....I have other stuff to do tonight, but wanted to the the next 'instalment' out there. Last one, the La Casona, remains. I've been told by my closest wino pal that it's a great wine value, and so that is high praise indeed!

The incredible benefits of coffee and how hangovers make it tough to taste wine

So I had these big plans today. Was going to have some fun with a good friend, Sean Moher, the creator of Groovy Grapes wine and food pairing events and many more wonderful things. Thought it would be fun to open bottle #3 of the top ten under $10 series for us both to try, and get his thoughts on it, but I don't think I can do it, given my impromptu Karaoke romp last night with my neighbours @westendchiles.

That said, coffee does wonderful things to help revive you on a morning like this. How bad does it suck that I plan to give it up again shortly, and mentioned my intentions to my husband (so now I'm accountable)...

For now - yay for caffeine!

The Under $10 travels to Italy

Trip to a new LCBO today (I went right, husband went left to the Beer Store to prepare for a night of drunken guy stuff with his volleyball team) landing me three of the remaining 4 bottles to try that a recent e-newsletter claimed were the best LCBO values under $10.


Number two on the list was the Casal Thaulero Merlot/Cab Sauv blend, listed as only $6.95, but I guess the word is already out that this is a good wine, 'cause it was actually $7.45! EGAD, but that is soooooo pricey! I had to dig deep deeeeep into my little change purse for that. (Does anybody actually have a change purse anymore? I, as always, used plastic and claimed my Air Miles, thank you very much!)

So, on the nose, you won't get old world Italian. This is a bold wine, which is generally my preference. I'm certainly not an experienced wino, but I DO get the cedar - I feel like it's a kinda wet wood/cedar, actually. Yeah, a little black licorice, but not so sweet as that. Blackberries, but not fresh - blackberry jam, I'd say. The vanilla is there, but not prominent. It's not a bouquet that makes me salivate, like some are (like the Lucky Country Shiraz, by one of our favourite winemakers, Two Hands, for instance. SO GOOD.)


Finally, time to sip...Okay. This one has more fruit - it's more forward than the Portuguese from last night. That said, the balance is still not bad. It's got a tannic kick to it, and the finish lingers a little bit. Not as much as the Pedras Do Monte from earlier this week.

Is it good? Yah, it's pretty good. Is it great? Well...it's $7.45, so yeah...it's a bloody good deal people. What do you want for $7? Jeez!

I think...(another sip)...it may need just a little more depth, like a third, earthier varietal of grape to give it just a bit more oooomph!

Nevertheless...it'll be a nice wine to sip for the rest of this evening and into tomorrow.

I have to ask, though...what else is out there? Who thinks that THEY know the best value wine in the LCBO? Is it on this list? And if you've had these wines, what do YOU think of them? Would love to know.

Happy weekend, everyone. Hope it's a good one!

Wow..what a nose...bottle one of my under $10 traipse through the LCBO

Yesterday, I received a newsletter in my inbox from TorontoLife magazine. Now, I don't live in TO, but I often visit, and I like to know what's goin' on, where to eat, where to drink and what to do...okay...where to shop, really. This particular edition had a juicy title that simply jumped off the page.

Now, I will preface by saying that the Mezzomondo is one I already buy copiously. Great value wine. The others I am going to try, I need to find, first, since the Rideau Centre LCBO didn't have (or was sold out) of the cheap wines. Coincidence?...

I did find bottle one, though. Just opened it, actually. Highly appropriate, since it is hump day, and what I love buying these wines for is my Dr. Pam recommended "take one glass in long, slow sips each night" prescription throughout the work week.

But I digress. I just opened it. It is item number five on the list, the Pedras do Monte.
Wow. Boom Boom Pow on the nose, man! It has been a long time since I had a bouquet like this! So what am I getting? Well, for certain, I am getting the licorice mentioned - and realizing that THIS is truly licorice as opposed to anise, which has less sugar/sweet on the nose and is a bit more subtle. Ain't nuthin subtle here. Lots of rips wild blackberry on the nose - no pansy strawberry here (I disagree with the reference to vague blackberry...I think there is lots here). And on the nose, I am not getting all that much smoke, but a bit of fresh tobacco...sure.

Okay. I've let it breathe plenty. Yay...I get to sip now (and now, I never spit, sorry - that stuff is gold and meant to be swallowed, imbibed, enjoyed).

Okaaaaay! I would NEVER guess at the price of this wine! It's full bodied, a bit aggressive on the tannins, but then, I like those. I'm getting the vanilla from the oak, especially lingering on the palate - great finish. This is great. Hmm....I think I have a new fave cheapie.

Gosh...can't wait to taste the next 5 or 6 I have earmarked! Until then...cheers!

For all you winos out there!

I finally get it. I understand the value of Twittering! Today, I decided to do a twitter search on my favourite topic - wine - and it was amazing the kinds of resources that came up, posted by other winos. They directed me, for one thing, to my new online cellar - www.cellartracker.com - it's fantastic. Got wine at home and want to see the tasting notes? Want to manage the value of your cellared wines? Want to build a wish list and refer to it later? Ya can do it here, and that, my friends, is cool. As is the cellaring notes and optimal maturity dates, etc.

I am still working out how to build a proper network to get the most out of this social networking tool, but I can see the value in getting information you want quickly. I think the big problem is that most of my pals are not on Twitter, that I know of. None of you are, are you? If you are....ya gotta tell me, because there is only so much that Jamie Oliver or Bobby Flay can say of relevance in a day, you know?

What is it about this summer, man?

I need to rant about the fact that ALL SUMMER LONG, any plans I make have been thwarted! I think that at LEAST 5 or six well-laid weekends (some of them full weekends-worth of events and happenings) have fallen through at the last minute or have been sabbotaged by weather or just some sorta unforseen issue/event. Add that to a few months that have just seemed to be rife with bad news - seriously bad news - and I just, you know, have kinda had enough!!!!!!


ENOUGH MAN!

This summer sucked.

At least I get to stomp on some grapes on Sunday. Hey! Do you wanna sponsor my team? Go to this site to get the details...all the money goes to fighting Cancer!

I wanna be the Thirsty Traveler

What a job. I was just wondering aloud to my hubby just how often the host of this show gets laid. But seriously. How fabulous to be paid to travel around the world and ask the following question "What kind of alcohol d'ya got around here?" wherever you go...and with all that booze flowing, I'm just thinking that 'things' just happen. A blonde chick in Sweden, and sultry black-haired minx in Morocco, a buxom babe in Northern Ireland.

But I digress.

I've thought more about it, and really, I don't think I want to be him. No, thanks. He's forced, or asked politely, to drink and eat some pretty wacky stuff. And what if he doesn't FEEL like drinking? I'm fine just to crack a good bottle of wine if and when I want a sip or two or ten.

But none tonight, because I have a big day of beach volleyball tomorrow, and need to be ready to go. Can't wait!

The mixed bag day

You know what I am referring to, don't you? The day that has some really great moments and some crapulous ones. The day that makes you feel like life is sometimes just a roller coaster and now that you are on it, you just have to hold on and if necessary, close your eyes (or ignore what you are seeing)...

So what was good? Lovely sunshine. Time on the deck with a glass of wine while I water the lawn and my now lovely garden. Getting some errands done, including freeing up credit on our Home Depot card in preparation for our very exciting kitchen reno. Getting an invitation out to good friends for a full-day social and sport day we have planned on Saturday that starts out on the beach volleyball courts and ends with drinks and food at a friend's home - very much looking forward to it. Great stuff, right?

Then there's the tough moments. Unhappy coworkers and a tough work environment. Taking a multitude of busses to get around town because I didn't have a car today, but I DID have an appointment. Which brings me to the really tough moments. Any time I now go to my doctor's, I face kids. Babies. Pregnant ladies. Lots of them. It's not a fun environment for a woman who has had two back-to-back failed pregnancies. And then the big moment, when my doctor calls my name out, and I look up, and SHE is pregnant. So pregnant that while I was suffering miscarriage, she was happily pregnant. Jeeeeeez. C'mon people! Ya gotta stop! Every day on Facebook - pictures of babies, pictures of growing bellies, status updates about baby heartbeats...and then....visiting babies at work in the hallways...it's a steady stream of reminders. All. The. Time. Over. And. Over.

Okay. I'm done. I am fine. I am sure that we will eventually have a family. I have lots of hope.

And sunshine, a garden and a new kitchen to enjoy and/or look forward to.

Duelling Qs

You know that the summer has officially launched the first night that my husband and our next door neighbour get together to plan and execute an elaborate BBQ meal. It's not REALLY a competition, but they sure seem to try to step up their game constantly.

This Saturday was that night. Slow smoked pulled pork shoulder with a cumin spiced coleslaw, warm rosemary grilled potato and green bean salad for the main, and three different types of grilled dessert pizzas (with some cocktails and wine thrown in)... soooo gooood!

Great friends, great food and the great outdoors...fabulous.

Day three

I guess today is communication day. Time to get on the phone, and talk to key people about what has happened and buy some time to work through it. It will be the first day (hopefully) where nothing too hideous happens - it SHOULD just be status quo, which is something I can handle. Blessedly (but not happily) the belly seems to be flattening out a bit, which can't happen fast enough for me right now, and I guess it is time to eat breakfast. Total lack of interest in this, of course, but we're going to go to Home Depot this morning in order to keep 'doing stuff' while the sky is overcast. If the weather forecast holds up, I will be back outdoors a little later, and just keeping busy.

And maybe, just maybe, tonight I will have some wine, since that is now allowed.

Time marches on!

When monopolies are great things...

Okay, so I admit that I am a Food & Drink junkie. I am a foodie, a wino and love every single glitzy, glamourous, glossy page of this bi-monthly magazine. This, of course, is in direct contrast with the fact that I feel for the independent and small winemakers in Ontario and other parts of Canada and the world who suffer because of the insane restrictions and regulations and politics behind the LCBO. But....I love Vintages and I ADORE F&D.

How much do I love F&D? Each year I never fail to contact the LCBO via email to ask for the exact release date of each of their issues, then add them to both my home and work outlook calendar so as not to miss picking up the latest issue. Because they are seasonal in nature, for MOST people, it is just serendipity (or a propensity for imbibing a lot of wine and/or spirits) that brings them at the right time in through their controlling doors to light upon the rack of quickly dwindling printed recipes, photographs and mouth-watering culinary dreamyness that is this magazine. Oh, to have the time, money, a kitchen, and wine cellar space to support this ever-growing addiction...but in time (because I keep every issue I have ever picked up), I will have some of these, if not all...

But I digress. The Spring 2009 just came out, and OMG - get out to get one before they are all gone. Seriously. A feature on fantastic healthy but oh-so-tasty recipes awaits you as does a lazy stroll through incredible Spanish and Portuguese wines and succulent recipes from the old country. And believe me, my husband is going to be uber-happy about that, given that ever since our honeymoon to the Spanish countryside in September, he has been obsessed with anything and everything that originates from that stunning country. Sprinkle in a feature on clam classics, and various cocktails turned into - yup, you guess it - jellied nibblies a la 'jello shooters', and you've got a great issue.

Yup...sometimes monopolies are a good thing....yummmm....

Of wine and words

So I am reading a book I found on the shelves of our 'SAS library' at work called A Fool and Forty Acres about how a Toronto urbanite picked up his family and moved to farmland in Prince Edward County (an unlikely, but increasingly popular new wine region in Ontario just around the start of the 1000 Islands area in between Kingston and Toronto) in order to plant vines and see what happens.

I am not usually much for memoirs and non-fiction in general, but the premise of this man's journey intrigued me, and for obvious reasons, the subject appealed to me. And it is a good read, as I reach about the half way point. I can't wait to discover how his initial attempts to graft roots and vines and manage all the natural elements pan out. I also like his slightly poetic, lilting style of writing - it almost conjurs the pace and feel of the life and land around him.

What I don't like has been the occasional and painfully long segments of the book that break into history lessons, reviewing Loyalist settlers and colonialist mindset back in the 1800's etc. I am reminded (oh, gawd, it was hell) of suffering through Susannah Moodie's Roughing it in the Bush for our Canadian literature class in my first year of university (it was a requirement for journalism students - ???). I'm sorry, but I don't care that it was extremely rare to have a female settler of the day actually able to read and write, let alone write 600 pages of SCINTILLATING day to day stories of the trials and tribulations of life in Canada at the time. Actually, you could have just told me about how cool that was, and that would have been all I needed to take away from that. Hated. it.

So yeah...I love this book, OUTSIDE of the Moodie-esque ramblings. When he gets back to tales of his travails and the characters he comes across live and in person, he's got me. What's especially cool is that just this week I received an email from Huff estate and inn offering a great weekend stay and 'play' package, and to celebrate our first wedding anniversary, husband and I are heading there in person to explore unchartered territory, and visit some of these estates and try these wines. And in doing so, a lot of the people mentioned in the book will likely be kicking around the community when we get there. I think that is pretty neat, and it is adding a whole new dimension to why I am excited to go. We love Niagara, and I am curious to see how the wines of this new region measure up.

I just love how little layers in life converge, making for fun and meaningful memories. Should be fun.

Sunday Slam

I gorged myself on reality TV today. Each Sunday repeats of all the television I miss during the week play, and on those lovely, lazy last day of the weekends, I plunk myself down on my cozy couch, pour a glass of wine, cover up with a nice fleece blankie and watch the most hideous, peurile and indulgent crap that is on offer on television...and love it. Not surprisingly, the bulk of it is on MTV, and I wonder if they realize this secret demographic that exists of highly professional, approaching middle age (okay....that doesn't sound good, but I guess it is more the OLD middle age than the new) intelligent and active happy women are in love with the crap they pass as programming.

I mean, it was fabulous! Brody Jenner found romance with a new bro from Boston. Whitney had ethical pains trying to decide between siding with a fashion mogul critical of the emancipation of a model, and the model herself (aside: is that not a bit hypocritical of her? She hires them and works in that industry...????). OOOOOO - and the best was that Rikki and Nikki picked the love of their life, except that it was the same dude. Poor bisextual Nikki...losing out on love by the hands of her also bisexual sister. What is a bisexual to do? I know....go back on reality television with a new concept and another search for love!!! Any guesses as to what the show will be called and how soon it will be on? Yup - A Double Shot at Love has to be the worst show I have yet to see on television. FANtastic.

So...what shows do you catch up on on Sundays? How do you recover from a long week of work and relax to face another?

And if you haven't seen any of the above shows...how could you miss them????