Update for May 12 2010I'm still on the damn wagon and even with Gabby Hayes driving and Andy Devine riding shotgun I haven't fallen off. I have a little help from a tablet called Naltrexone, which tells my brain it couldn't care less if I have a ginger ale with my pasta. I really don't miss the stuff but challenges are sure to come. Meanwhile I have lost between 20 to 25 lbs. depending on which scale I'm using. If there is one thing I miss it's the mystique of red wines. I guess there's no sense in my taking that trip to Italy now.
Update for April 2, 2010, much to my chagrin, I have pulled up the wagon and climbed aboard so there won't be much more written here for a while about wine. Seeings how booze is guilty for about 3/4 of my daily calorie count it's gotta go while I enter the diet of my lifetime. Either the two sacks of cement I'm toting around on the front of me go or I'll be going, if you catch my drift. Meanwhile, be sure to drink one for me when you do.
/////I couldn't wait until February for this update to the cheap wine assemblage since my package goods store rolled out a caseload of a rare new vintage (2008) of an old favorite on mine (2007) Estampa Estate Malbec / Petite Sirah blend with it being 60% the former and 45% , give or take a little, the latter - which is a shame because Petite Syrah is amy absolutest bestest favorite grape - wine.
Well this one is a real winner at $11.oo people. It's from the Colchagua Valley in Chile which has a very small growing area to begin with considering the length of the mostly costal Central American Country with nutty neighbors.
Estampa Winery apparently makes many other wines, fine wines according to their web site :
http://estampawine.trustpass.alibaba.com/ (alibaba???) and this very nice blend may be at the bottom of their efforts.
I find it has a beautiful red color, good nose of burnt cherries and a taste of ... well... grapes...yes thats it...nice ripe grapes that have been squoze, fermented, aged and bottled. Hard to beat that!
OoooOoooThey have a Cabernet Reserve called "Ticket to Chile Reserve" that's 14.5% alcohol, this I have to find!
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Friday, January 15, 2010
Affordable, Sustainable Housing
[Edited with new pix 3-10-10] Hey, everybody has to do something in their spare time. Me, it is largely wagering on slow horses but when I'm not I doing thatI try to lose myself in making various types of birdhouses out of "scrap" lumber. I started using left-over siding from our house, which is cedar and made awfully nice houses but eventually I ran out. Before I started pulling boards off the back of the garage two friends, Judy Smith and Don West, fortunately came along and offered some scrap they had left over from home improvement jobs and some old fencing. It'll be a while before I have to start scavenging off neighbors houses at night thanks to them.
I know all the faults of each house I make but not a bird has complained to me as yet. I'm no carpenter and my inspiration comes to me from my partner at work, Harvey - the Pookah. He's not much with a hammmer or saw but he does have a good imagination. Unfortunately he drinks more than me and is pretty well snookered by 3 PM most days so I have to have him sketch his ideas out before then. He's terribly fond of Ruby Port, he is, and I don't argue with him about it because he does put up with all my fussing and fuming about matters local and what not.
So here's a few pictures of what Harvey and me have cooked up for the neighborhood birds. I really do hope to see a Pileated Woodpecker take advantage of one of those with the 3" holes someday.
I know all the faults of each house I make but not a bird has complained to me as yet. I'm no carpenter and my inspiration comes to me from my partner at work, Harvey - the Pookah. He's not much with a hammmer or saw but he does have a good imagination. Unfortunately he drinks more than me and is pretty well snookered by 3 PM most days so I have to have him sketch his ideas out before then. He's terribly fond of Ruby Port, he is, and I don't argue with him about it because he does put up with all my fussing and fuming about matters local and what not.
So here's a few pictures of what Harvey and me have cooked up for the neighborhood birds. I really do hope to see a Pileated Woodpecker take advantage of one of those with the 3" holes someday.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Wine talk
There are few wines that haven't passed through my lips over the years. In my hot-shot 30's and 40's I made the effort to become a conniseur and collector of fine wines as I had the money at the time. I collected all of the French first growths; storage became something of a problem and after a while I became convinced that a lot of othe wine game was bogus. California wines were bringing ridiculous prices. Australian wines which tasted as good as wines from Virginia were bringing $40 a bottle. Yet than, as today, wines from Spain and South America which would blow you away were selling for $10 a bottle.
Yes, I can still appreciate that some Cabernets are worth $100 a bottle for a special occasion and I have developed a weakness for Petite Syrah at any price but I have come to realize that wine need to be drunk every day and that for most of us that means a bottle of $40 Zin is out of the picture and crappy Zin in a box won't cut it. So from time to time I'm going to discuss great CHEAP wine here, starting with the stuff they serve at Olive Garden for $30 a bottle which you can find at your local liquor store for $8.50 a bottle at the 1.5 Litre size Principato Rouge. It's great Pizza, spaghetti and burger wine! Hell it goes with anything and for those who love rose, they tell me people are fanatical about the blush version. There is a Pinot Grigio which I find is acceptable but there are better on the market at the same price. Phooey on Chardonney, Pinot Grigot served ice cold IS the best substitute for ice water in the summer you know.
For more information on the Principato line of wines, visit this web site of the importer, they have to moving tanker loads of the stuff just for Olive Garden. http://www.palmbayimports.com/uploads/brands/AboutWinery/principato_bp.pdf
Yes, I can still appreciate that some Cabernets are worth $100 a bottle for a special occasion and I have developed a weakness for Petite Syrah at any price but I have come to realize that wine need to be drunk every day and that for most of us that means a bottle of $40 Zin is out of the picture and crappy Zin in a box won't cut it. So from time to time I'm going to discuss great CHEAP wine here, starting with the stuff they serve at Olive Garden for $30 a bottle which you can find at your local liquor store for $8.50 a bottle at the 1.5 Litre size Principato Rouge. It's great Pizza, spaghetti and burger wine! Hell it goes with anything and for those who love rose, they tell me people are fanatical about the blush version. There is a Pinot Grigio which I find is acceptable but there are better on the market at the same price. Phooey on Chardonney, Pinot Grigot served ice cold IS the best substitute for ice water in the summer you know.
For more information on the Principato line of wines, visit this web site of the importer, they have to moving tanker loads of the stuff just for Olive Garden. http://www.palmbayimports.com/uploads/brands/AboutWinery/principato_bp.pdf
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Beautiful Ladies
I have a passion for investing in slow race horses. It's taken me years to develop this interest and refine it...I believe it originates from my grandfather, Corneluius Kehoe, a man who loved horses and never bet so much as a dime on them. Smart man!
Well I have come to appreciate a good horse's conformation and when the really good ones come along I put my wallet away and just marvel attheir ability. I doubt I will ever forget the amazing Barbaro who broke my heart and so many others in the Preakness when he broke down and then fought so valiantly to recover, thanks to his marvelous owners the Chapmans who gave him the chance.
2009 was an extraordinary year for the racing ladies. There was the 3 year old filly Rachel Alexandra who we'll see again next year. She even beat the boys at 3 but her last race was a close call. She's something special.
And then there is the unbeaten, now retired (???) mare Zenyatta. She beat the boys too but she really whomped them. It has been so exciting to see this mare prick her ears in last place at the top of the stretch when her fine jockey Mike Smith chirps to her and then see her 17 hand high body stretch out to leap down the stretch as if she had afterburners - you can see how much she enjoys the thrill of the race herself. They talk of the great Ruffian, who I did not get to see run, but I cannot imagine being any more fortunate than to see these two great ladys run in my lifetime. I haven't witnessed a Secretariat but who know what's ahead - I believe Barbaro had the makings of that caliber a horse.
So here's to Rachel and Zenyatta. May they live long and well and give us many champions in the future as broodmares.
Well I have come to appreciate a good horse's conformation and when the really good ones come along I put my wallet away and just marvel attheir ability. I doubt I will ever forget the amazing Barbaro who broke my heart and so many others in the Preakness when he broke down and then fought so valiantly to recover, thanks to his marvelous owners the Chapmans who gave him the chance.
2009 was an extraordinary year for the racing ladies. There was the 3 year old filly Rachel Alexandra who we'll see again next year. She even beat the boys at 3 but her last race was a close call. She's something special.
And then there is the unbeaten, now retired (???) mare Zenyatta. She beat the boys too but she really whomped them. It has been so exciting to see this mare prick her ears in last place at the top of the stretch when her fine jockey Mike Smith chirps to her and then see her 17 hand high body stretch out to leap down the stretch as if she had afterburners - you can see how much she enjoys the thrill of the race herself. They talk of the great Ruffian, who I did not get to see run, but I cannot imagine being any more fortunate than to see these two great ladys run in my lifetime. I haven't witnessed a Secretariat but who know what's ahead - I believe Barbaro had the makings of that caliber a horse.
So here's to Rachel and Zenyatta. May they live long and well and give us many champions in the future as broodmares.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Welcome to Carroll County
This is what you get when you have uninspired politicians who only bemoan the miserable
state of economic development in Carroll County and don't get it when quality - minded
businesses don't move here.
This is the first business you encounter when arriving via Baltimore County via Rt. 26.
It's the Eldersburg Drink and Drive! get your six pack of Bud and a used car too.
Of course the landlord, a well know fellow about Carroll County, certainly hasn't
imposed any restrictions on his tenant has he?
Think this is ugly? Try the MD Rt. 140 approach through Finksburg. It grows worse by the month. About the only way to fix it now is to call our friends at NSA and tell them we saw Osama bin Laden entering the pawn shop and hope they call in a massive drone attack that takes out a 2 mile stretch of the road section.
The politicians haven't the nerve to deal with it and the business owners are too busy making their grubby little profit to care what their community looks like so it looks like a lost cause without an act of nature or a visit fro bin Laden.
state of economic development in Carroll County and don't get it when quality - minded
businesses don't move here.
This is the first business you encounter when arriving via Baltimore County via Rt. 26.
It's the Eldersburg Drink and Drive! get your six pack of Bud and a used car too.
Of course the landlord, a well know fellow about Carroll County, certainly hasn't
imposed any restrictions on his tenant has he?
Think this is ugly? Try the MD Rt. 140 approach through Finksburg. It grows worse by the month. About the only way to fix it now is to call our friends at NSA and tell them we saw Osama bin Laden entering the pawn shop and hope they call in a massive drone attack that takes out a 2 mile stretch of the road section.
The politicians haven't the nerve to deal with it and the business owners are too busy making their grubby little profit to care what their community looks like so it looks like a lost cause without an act of nature or a visit fro bin Laden.
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