Bottle of wine, Fruit of the Vine...

At our recent Labour Weekend, we headed off to Blenheim to visit family and friends...and of course the fabulous vineyards on offer up that way. You would go a long way to beat a Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc!

We started off at hte local Farmers Market...a heady mix of local cheese, fruits, pickles...and this rather unusual treat??

The it was off to the vineyards. I liked these two - first off Wither Hills. Very pretty setting and I am told the wines were great. Yep - how unfair but I drew the straw for sober driver, someone e;ses's turn to be the Duty Drunk then!!



You could climb 3 flights of stairs and get wonderful views from the top of that wooden building you can see - all in the time it took my passengers to try the Pinot Noir! 

About 10 minutes down the road, Villa Maria Wines. Now I have tried their offerings before and have never been disappointed. Again, pretty setting

and under the picnic table out front a couple of ducks had settled down for a sleep in the shade!

 

After spedning quite some time chatting to the Australian working the counter, the sample of the day was declared to be this one...



and we headed off to Picton to have lunch with family.

Sundays Song

Because today is today...I guess history has taught us we have learned bugger all from history!

Sundays Song

A bit of Kiwiana from ages ago...

What ever happened to Saturday night?

It seems light years ago that Saturday night was THE NIGHT. You know, we'd get all gussied up and head off into 'town' and giggle at boys and then progressed to being with the boys...eventually settling into some kind of pattern with that.
When I was younger we lived in a small town, not much to do any day of the week really let alone Saturday. The local movie theatre was pretty much where I headed to at weekends. I recall one night coming out to find my car had been 'egged' - all over the windscreen was yellow goo (I'm not yolking!) and as it was winter and an icy night it was damn near impossible to clean off until I got home. At least someone had found something different to do!

We also used to go to the local takeaway shop (or burger bar if you want to call it that) - I found that my order took as long to arrive as it did to hear this song - to this day, whenever I hear it I think of the Saturday night pineapple burger with extra pickles!!

Sundays Song

Update of drama

I don't know how we did it, but the Scowly Teen has confessed to liking The Strokes. I told her they were an old band and she nodded earnestly and said she knew that, but all the really good bands ARE old. Some are even dead. Who knew!!

So - we are in the process of taking our insurance company to court in an endeavour to get our policy entitlements. I can't say I am happy about it but I would be even less happy getting a good stiffing in this manner (ok, get the school boy giggles over with....)

In the interim, to take my mind of it all presumably, my moggie boy Ernie is apparently a diabetic cat.  He has been responding quite well so far to treatment and I am ever hopeful he will continue and go on to become one of those 'self healed' mogs. Initially I thought the vet had stumbled upon a surefire retirement plan, but - what can you do? I will give Ernie a go tho' and see how he gets on, to be honest I feel our family has lost enough lately and can't bear the thought of having to put him down.



On a brighter note, I have discovered a nice sparkling wine from the Lindauer brand - Sparkling Pinot Gris. So hold out your buckets chps and chappettes while I pour you some frivolity! Yes sorry still have to use buckets as we have still been shaking down here.

Normal transmission will resume soon...in the meantime....