Oh, this was a lovely wine. There were a lot of cedar and dark fruit notes in the nose, with just a hint of sweet smoke--like candied bacon. It's a dark, full-bodied wine (typical of Paso Cabernets) without the aggressive tannins Paso Robles Zins are known for. It's a complex wine, it was quite jammy (in the best way) and yet I tasted a lot of tart cherry notes along with violets, blackberries and baking spices. I found the finish very peppery, almost like a Syrah.
I paired this with a hearty, Sicilian pasta with eggplant.
Okay, so...I'm writing a wedding story. So everything is about weddings right now. In fact, there are times when I forget that the people whose wedding I'm planning are not real. And also: no, I will not be able to attend said wedding.
Anyway, I think this video is of the very first flash mob wedding proposal ever. Or, at least, ONE OF the first. I may have watched it many, many times when it first came out.
The couple is still together, AFAIK. The woman in the red dress choreographed the whole thing. The gay couple are shown wearing (cheap, fake, plastic) leis because, at the time, Hawaii was one of the few (possibly the only) state where gay marriage was legal. I'm still not sure how I feel about the lyric "dancing juice" having been misinterpreted/re-imagined as "dancing jews". I believe the family is jewish, and it gives them a chance to get in on the act, but it's a grammar thing. If I could convince myself that Bruno Mars was singing "these" instead of "this" I'd be a lot happier.
But, even all these years later, it's still just the cutest thing!
So...this book has a bit of an interesting background. Ever since I'd introduced Kristi DiLuca in the second Games We Play book, Never Have I Ever, I'd known that someday I'd want to write her brothers' stories. But other than the fact that they're family ran the best bakery in Atlas Beach, I knew next to nothing about them. Then author Tiffany Carby put out a call for books involving sandwiches.
Coming from New Jersey--a state with its own, iconic sandwich--I knew I had to get involved. And, wouldn't you know it? I just happened to have a New Jersey based series already in the works. The title practically wrote itself. Because I wanted it to be game related and the Taylor Ham vs Taylor Pork Roll name dispute has raged up and down and across the state for a hundred and twenty years.
Because if there's one thing Jerseyites can't help but fight over, it's food.
The Name Game
He knows what to do to save her business. She knows what he needs to fix his life!
Atlas Beach is experiencing a retail-renaissance—and Carly Meyer is determined to be part of it. But her sandwich shop-slash-food-truck, The Lunch Box, is struggling to stay afloat.
Luckily, help is on the way thanks to the Chamber of Commerce’s innovative mentoring program—partnering successful Atlas Beach business owners with some of the newer start-ups. Too bad the mentor assigned to her is the delectable—and highly annoying—Tino DiLuca.
Tino knows exactly what’s hurting Carly’s business and—exactly how to fix it. But his number one solution, changing the name of her signature sandwich, is the one thing she’s not prepared to do.
I'd never seen this version before, but I kind of love it. I mean...vocally, it's rough and a little fast (?) but the energy and the HAIR are fire! The multiplicity of cuts to Yoko was an interesting editing choice.
So Decoy is put out by Duckhorn and I talked about Duckhorn's 2021 Cab recently. Decoy is a little more affordable, but also quite good.
This has a lighter feel than the Duckhorn. There's a lot of black fruit--cherry, black raspberry, etc.--on the nose, along with hints of toasted oak and California chapparal. It's an easy drinking wine with mild, silky tannins and a creamy mouth feel. I enjoyed this with pizza
So, I know I said that Clay and his mom would be dancing to Wind Beneath my Wings, but I might have to change that, because this would be pretty sweet as well. Currently, I'm trying to convince one of the other POUR DECISIONS authors to choose it for their groom.
Guess you'll have to wait a couple of months to see how that played out. lol!
