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We won’t talk about saturday other than to say it was a less than positive day.
Sunday however, made up for it very nicely. After a relatively quiet morning actually making progress on a few projects at home (schoolwork and geeky stuff), I finally made it over to the Williamsburg Winery. Given my penchant for good wine and the fact that I have lived in Williamsburg for many years, it is strange that I had never been, but that has since been corrected. Tiffany had two friends from her undergraduate days, Anne and Jason, who were coming to visit for the day. She organized a small outing to do the winery tour and more importantly tasting. Along with Q, the five of us headed over there a bit after lunch.
The tour itself was certainly interesting although I would have liked to have seen a bit more of the actual wine production itself. It may just have been the wrong time of the year for that kind of show and tell however (note cheap excuse to go back again). The tasting comprised of 6 wines some of which I had experienced before, but several new ones. If I remember correctly, we tasted the Governor’s White, the John Adlum Chardonnay, the Acte 12 Chardonnay, the Virginia Trianon Reserve, the Barrel Aged Claret, and finally the Blackberry Merlot desert wine. The Claret, and the Acte 12 were both especially good in my opinion (not counting the Governor’s White which is always good). The desert wine was amazing.
After exiting the tour, we did exactly what the winery hopes you will do; we bought wine. Between Tiffany, Q, and I, we put together a full case to get the 10% discount. Given that I had recently stocked up on everyday drinking wines, I decided to go for quality over quantity. I picked up a bottle of the Gabriel Archer Reserve and the blackberry desert wine I had tasted earlier.
A meal without wine is like a day without sunshine
The quote above was shown during the tour and since the sun had come out, how could we not indulge in a meal? We had a very pleasant lunch sitting on the patio of the tavern next door to the winery complete with a bottle of the Claret. Sadly, after the meal Anne and Jason needed to hit the road. But I think a good time was had by all.
I can’t imagine a better cap to a weekend; good friends (old and new), good food, good wine, and great conversation.
Hey everyone! Here I am again. I have been really busy lately (good busy) and I though I’d relate a little of what I’ve been doing. Tuesday has become bowling night :) Jim, Tiffany, and Robert are part of a local bowling league and I have been going most weeks to cheer them on and watch their games. I have always enjoyed bowling, but it is never something I did very often, nor did I really appreciate the whole “culture” of the event. I know that may sound silly to many of you, but as a social event it is unique in the experiences I have had.
The bowling league brings together a whole different cross-section of people that I would never run into socially in either my school or work life. Especially working in a technical field, I have found that one gets surrounded by a very small group of people who share the same interests as you. Computers have taken such a prominent role in society over the last 20 years that those of us who work with them are looked upon almost like practitioners of magic. Don’t misunderstand me, I am not implying that we are somehow better or special, if anything we are looked upon as odd and a bit scary. Which is what makes this bowling thing so cool; it pulls together people from all walks of life into a common interest that is amazingly supportive.
The game lends itself to one of support. You are in effect competing far more against yourself than you are against any of the other players. As such, everyone is rooting for you all the time. It is just cool.
This past Tuesday however, I got to be a participant. Robert was sick, so the team needed a pinch-bowler. Now I haven’t bowled in many many years so I was a bit nervous. Watching Tiffany and Jim is intimidating; they have finesse and style and use bowling words I don’t understand. When they bowl, the ball does all this funky curvy stuff to hit the pins that I knew was far beyond my skill. So I went for what I thought I could do; the direct application of as much energy I could to the pins. E = 1/2 mv^2!, baby! (That would be the equation for kinetic energy for you non-physics geeks.) And I will say that it worked pretty well. I did not embarrass myself overly much and I’d like to think I contributed.
So I had a great time. I look forward to the next opportunity I get to play.
That’s all I got for now. Have a great day!