entombed in the shrine of zeroes and ones

I've been spending more time with Hallcrest: i prepared yeast and added it to a tank of chardonnay i helped harvest; i showed up at 06:45 one morning to help sanitize the bottling machine; and last weekend, 2wanda came with me to help pick a bunch of cabernet sauvignon grapes (we got just over a ton) at some recondite house almost smack dab in the middle of the line between Morgan Hill and Scotts Valley, after which we had a big party to celebrate.  I'll be picking more grapes for them on Sunday.  In addition to that, we pressed our pinot noir, which yielded nine gallons.

Still no job, although i'm feeling quite hopeful that i'll be employed by the end of the month.  I've gotten some valuable (and some not-so-valuable) feedback from places that have turned me down.

I got up at 05:10 on Saturday to go to Los Altos Hills and pick grapes for Hallcrest, along with eight high schoolers who were raising money for their soccer academy.  We harvested about 2 tons of chardonnay and a half-ton of pinot noir.  After a midday break, i headed to the winery to experience the first crush of the season.  The chardonnay fruit was dumped straight into the press, and while that was being processed, the pinot noir fruit was crushed and destemmed, then packed away with a CO₂ blanket.  I was exhausted by the end of the day, and a full night's sleep wasn't enough to restore me.

On Sunday, after going to the garden and picking about a bajillion tomatoes, 2wanda, her mom, and i headed to Hollister to buy our pinot noir for this year's wine.  We bought it from the same folks from whom we bought it last year.  After that, we headed down the road to taste at DeRose, whose wine is notably higher in alcohol than average, but you wouldn't know it from its flavor.  I've been a fan of their négrette, but their late harvest viognier was a revelation; it was subtle and far from the sweetness you'd expect in a dessert wine.

I spent the day today at Hallcrest again, helping them bottle a couple of cabernet sauvignons and a pinot noir.  The bottler is a little fussy and we had a few hiccups, but we got through them and didn't break a single bottle.  Also, i am helping translate for one of the employees, whose English is poor.  My experience is growing in leaps and bounds!

It's been a rough few weeks, interviewing for jobs, getting turned down by some, waiting for contact from others, and dealing with family shit.  Once we finished moving butterflygenius to her new digs yesterday, 2wanda and i finally got to unwind and went to Hallcrest Vineyards for a barrel tasting which toropeza kindly paid for.  While there, i spoke to the winemaker, and knowing that it's getting pretty close to harvest time, asked him if there was anything i could do for him, so that i could get practical experience in commercial wine production to go with my fancy book larnin'.  He told me that, in fact, he'd be giving some training today on using the equipment involved in the crush, such as the crusher/destemmer and the bladder press, as well as other equipment and steps.  I jumped at the opportunity and not only did i learn a lot this morning, he fed us all some very tasty baby back ribs for lunch.  I need to look at my schedule so i can send it to him so he can let me know when he can use me next; they'll be bottling tomorrow, but i have an interview, so i'll be sadly missing that.  Nonetheless, today was very encouraging and educational.

There's been a ton of shit i've been meaning to mention.  Let's see if i can remember most of it...

Just over a year ago, i got a T-shirt addressed to 'rone'.  Then about a year after that, i received an envelope addressed to Ron 'Tron Guy' Echeverri, with a PO Box in San Luis Obispo as its return address, containing a ten-dollar bill.  The "Tron Guy" is an amusing touch given my antipathy towards jmaynard.  I don't mind getting random stuff, although i suppose i would prefer getting stuff off my Amazon wishlist.

Speaking of Maynard, lammah mentioned that Maynard James Keenan and his winemaker, Eric Glomski, would be signing bottles of their wine at the Whole Foods in Cupertino.  Kim and i showed up about 75 minutes early and there were already about 100 people in front of us (Kim heard someone inside mention that some clowns got in line at 06:00, eight hours early).  Keenan isn't very comfortable as a celebrity, which showed as he barely looked at us when we came up, but Glomski was engaging and while they signed our bottles, i got to talk to him about the pinot noir that Kim, Kim's mom, and i are making.  If you feel like you missed out, he'll be at Fresno's Whole Foods on February 17, Petaluma the 18th, and Sacramento the 19th, all starting at 16:30.

Speaking of wine, i passed Viticulture for Winemakers, which was the final class towards my Certificate in Winemaking from UC Davis Extension.  So as soon as i cough up the certificate fee, i should be receiving my first academic certificate since my high school diploma in a week or two.  I'm a bit excited about it, but i'm only getting started with figuring out if i can make this wine thing go.

peglegpete moved from Dallas to Seattle, and stopped by our humble home for room and board.

I got to go back to playing soccer last month.  This Thursday marked the first time i won a game while on the field since... i dunno, last summer.  A last minute squeaker, too, thanks to my teammates losing their minds in the final minutes of the game and leaving me defenseless.  It felt good to win, and i feel like i've finally gotten back into playing shape.

I picked out a bottle of shochu at our local sushi joint, but it turned out to be not shochu, but awamori.  It smelled like tequila a bit, and was quite tasty.

"Browning may occur in the absence of pinking."

I completed my winemaking class this week.  I'm somewhat unhappy with my effort, but some of it was out of my hands.  Now i find myself with lots of time on my hands and nothing hanging over my head.

On Monday night, Crossfire lost to 4Fit 11-2.  The team, frankly, played lousily.  We jumped out to another quick lead and just crumbled once they tied.  One of the other team's girls kept shooting unopposed from half-distance, and after she finally got one in, i berated my defense, "How many times is she going to shoot before you stop her?"  The ref told me late in the game to stop yelling because it can be considered an effort to distract the opponent, even though i was clearly yelling (often and loudly) at my teammates to cover, to move, to form a wall on free kicks... anyway, i think part of it was that it was a 23:25 game and there was nobody there, so my yelling seemed louder in the empty arena.

Centavo lost again, this time to Sub Zero, 10-8, in a late collapse similar to yesterday's game (and eerily reminding me of more than a few March Madness games).  Other than getting caught once outside the box and allowing a goal, and stupidly causing a penalty (but saving it) by clobbering the attacker well before the ball arrived, i had quite a good game, but it's scant consolation.  Since Monday's game will in all probability also be a loss, that'll make 3 in a row.  I'm in crunch mode for my winemaking class (final exam, research paper, one and a half lab reports, all due by Wednesday night), so i could've really used a morale boost.

This winemaking class is kicking my ass.  I've rediscovered my intense distaste for writing papers which, combined with my mildly improved but still chronic procrastination habit, has left me in a hole, depressed and ashamed.  I'm not even certain that what i'm being asked to do has enough relevance with what i'm learning; i understand the fundamentals and the process of making wine, but the papers and midterms have been centered around extreme situations that are, in my view, advanced topics.  These are all things i could have brought up to the teacher and TA if i had gotten an earlier start on things.  Despite the fact that the first two weeks of the class were a total loss for me due to things at work hitting full-bore, i didn't try hard enough to acquaint myself with the difficulty level of the class.  Now i'm trying to tread water.

It's not a lost cause yet, and i believe i can earn a passing grade.  But i wasn't ready for this, and at this point i'm regretting taking the class.

(and don't i look oh-so-smarmy in my new icon?)

On Thursday, after a short interview at EDD to make sure my unemployement benefits were all kosher, my mother-in-law and i went to weed our grapevines at her property in San Martin.  They were fraught with unwanted vegetation, but we eradicated a significant portion and reduced the rest after a few hours of work.  Photographic evidence: a young grape cluster; a maturing grapevine; a young charbono grapevine amidst a forest of weeds

On Friday, eqe and i met for the first time over Amici's.  We talked about mutual acquaintances, the Net and its culture (he wore an RTFM T-shirt, i wore my OSI 9-layer model T-shirt), and our professional milieux.  And he paid for lunch!  What a guy.  Thanks, man.

On Saturday, Kim and i dropped by her mom's and we bottled our grape wine.  I don't intend to open our limited supply until at least Hmas, but we tasted it at bottling and, well, it's quite good.

Today, we went to Thai Pepper in Campbell for their Mother's Day buffet brunch.  I ate a lot of shrimp.  We had a bottle of Weingut Köfererhof `04 Kerner which allannah gifted us, which she had during her dinner at the French Laundry.  It was really good on its own, with a complexity that's rare in a white wine, and it accompanied the Thai food well.  I shall repay her gift by getting a hold of some Txomin Etxaniz `04 Txakoli.