Here we are again this morning at the double barrel drive through--Mickey D's as The Spudboater calls it.
WOW, can you believe it? THREE comments on the bowling blog post last night. That's a strike for sure. Great comments. Maggie was the city champion, eh? Amazing. Congrats, Maggie, glad to know you went out on top of your game.
Not much going on today--going to church with Mom pretty early (it would be 5:30 am Arizona Time). Then we will do some morre cleaning at her place. And then? Not real sure. Read about a new winery called the Wildcat Creek Winery. They aren't growing grapes--just importing juice and bottling it. Apparently, that's an OK thing to do and they've won a bunch of medals for doing it. I don't quite get how that works--Goatherder would know. Enlighten us, GH.
My Mom spent some key years of her life on the Wildcat Creek. We went out past her old home there yesterday. Her Dad was a fireman on the Monon Railroad. Firemen were those guys who shoveled coal into the boiler of the locomotive. Anyway, he had heart trouble and had to leave the railroad in his 30's. He eventually died the year I was born when he was a mere 47 years old. Well, in 1936, he moved the family out onto to the river right bank of the Wildcat two or three miles above its conflluence with the storied Wabash River. He made a big chunk of the family's annual income digging mussels from the muck of the creek. Mussels are a kind of fresh water clam or oyster, take your pick. My Mom thrived in her formative years out there on the Wildcat. During the winter, she claims she even broke the ice to go swimming. That's where she met my Dad one day before WWII. I remember going out there to her old house as a kid when her Mom was still lucid. Her Mom didn't like me at all and the only thing I can remember her telling me was: "You don't know s*** from shinola." Looking back, she was probably spot on with that assessment but at least it helped me learn the definition of shinola. I am still working on learning the meaning of the other word.
Anyway, the Wildcat Creek has become a local icon. You can click here to learn more about it. Back in 1978, I did a hairball spring trip on that creek. My Dad took me to the teeny, tiny smallest possible rivelute way up by Kokomo. It was in some farmers barnyard with cows and sheep milling around. When we put the canoe in the water there was only a few inches to spare on either side of the long boat. I paddled several days down to the Wabash and then through an evening thunderstorm to the Purdue crew boat house for the take out. Looking back, I can see it was my first real multi-day solo river trip. Anyway, it will be fun to go to the winery out there a couple of miles upstream from my Mom's old house.
Well, the sun's up and I gotta grab some grub and boogie back to Mom's Place to get ready for church. I will post up a bunch of photos during this evening session here at a McDonald's with a double barrel drive through.
Have a great Sunday & Cheers.
PS--Susun and Family had a wonderful 3rd birthday party for Gage yesterday. Thirty people attended and the boy was showered with toys. That's Mom Sarah showing off all the b-day "loot," as she calls it. They didn't run out of food but they ran out of beer. Sounds like a pretty good party.
3 comments:
California is literally awash in good wine, bulk grapes, and also juice and juice concentrate. It's good to know this IA winery is actually buying juice and making wine from it. They could easily pick out bottled, unlabeled varietal wines from CA, put a foo foo label on them and call them their own and then go out and win local competitions with them. It's being done here in the Verde as we speak. Even He Who Must Not Be Named does it, buying CA grapes to supplement his local production. Caveat Emptor.
Actual midwestern wines produced from actual midwestern grapes tend to come from other than popular varietals, like Catawba. CA and the great european varietals don't do so well in the midwest. At least that's the common wisdom.
GH may not know this but historically, the Missouri River Valley outside St. Louis was the largest wine producing region in the US up through the 1950's. During the Depression when the Temperance morons had alcohol made illegal, most grape vines were torn out. But enough stock survived to come back strong. It wasn't until the 1970's that California came on strong with varietals that we see mostly today. Much of the wine varietals in Missouri are relatives of Germanic varieties by and large.
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