The Day Off

And how is it that on my days "off" I never get started doing anything productive untill after 2:00 pm? Really? That is just silly on my part. I need to learn to get off my fanny and not dawdle. Although I did go to the gym this morning and tried to clean my room (failed) and made some food. Everything is alright except for the fact that I need to be on the ball from here until spring break. I have the first act of my play due next week, lots of reading, three days of work, and mom wants to come visit in the middle of it all. I wish I would have asked for next Sunday off of work so I could just chill, but I really need the extra few bucks for vacation and the summer.

Speaking of summer, I need to start applying for summer programs/interships/workshops because I dont' want to be stuck here ALL summer. I'm thinking about going to an extreme and going to Argentina for a while. Maybe just by myself to travel or something, who knows? I really need something to inspire me, because lately I feel very housewife-ish and just want to go to class, do homework (or not), work, go to the gym, and cook. It's weird, I know, and I know that if I'd stop having classes I'd miss them and I'd need some outlet for something, and I really do not want a nine-to-five yet. (Cue music.) I need some choices of things to do this summer and it has begun to drive me batty. I need to send things out before March, and I need to get on it!

Okay, just found an amazing website. Rose Avengers and Producers, advocates for dry rose wines. I love them, and others should, too. The website is hilarious to me. OK. Time to get off my ass. Or maybe just sit on at and do work. Ciao.

Really, Thursday

And I had a long arduous day, and I'd rather forget it. I'm speaking metaphorically here, I guess, because I'm not going to drink myself into a stupor or anything. I was, althought, hoping to at least have a glass of wine, when I found both the Shiraz/Viognier and the Carmenere to be a little two vinegary to bear. Last Saturday both wines were so lovely, that I was sad to see them go. Anyway. Today I felt brain-clogged and was dreading everything. I'm sure it had something to do with the three cups of coffee I downed last night which kept me up and wired all freaking evening. It probably also had to do with yesterday's somewhat unproductive day at the statehouse and it's effect on delaying my homework. I was doing homework all evening--aside from getting my head shorn.

I'm Bad, I Know It

And I am procrastinating hardcore. I don't know what can convince me to do anything else. I am promising myself that when I get home tonight I will buckle down and at least finish half of my paper that is due on Friday. I have 1/6th of it done--1 page of text and an outline. Woo-frickin'-hoo. Not much has conspired since I blogged last only some class, some work, and some sweet sweet nothing.

On Friday I went to work at the Winery and, much to my enjoyment, the Maximum Port 2004 had been released. This petit syrah port's raspberry carmel nuttiness I loved in the 2002 is back, and will continute to improve as it sits compartmentalized in its new glass cage. Work is highly entertaining, even if sometimes you want to hypnotize customers the ability to enjoy the same wines that I do. I walked back into the warehouse to help Andrea take the hand trucks back into the warehouse when I took a gander at what was loitering back there--Cabernet Sauvignon. Times two. Both the regular 2004 Cabernet and the 2004 Creekbend Cabernet were sitting ceiling high, taunting me. I love Cabernet, and I miss having something that I can share with my fellow lovers of full bodied wines. Oh, and the Merlot will be out soon, I think. I do not care for Merlot.

Speaking of wine, I went to the lovely little wine & tapas bar, Tutto Bene, with the Oliver entourage to celebrate our friend Manie's birthday, and had a more-than-lovely time. I spent entirely too much money and had a great time. I had three wines, one of which was from Lebanon and nothing to write home about, but the other two were delicious enough to take up some of your time. I was in the mood for a white wine, yes, a nice cold, full bodied white with a little oak to bring it home. I got what I wanted in one of the most expensive wines on the by-the-taste/glass/bottle list. It also had the best name of any of the wines: Conundrum. And it held true to it's name. I found out later that it is a proprietary blend of Sauvignon Blanc, Viognier, Chardonnay, Semillion, and Muscat Canelli. The website claims that it was fermented and aged about three-fourths in oak, some new some not, to give it it's complexity, and complexity and body were almost overwheling, but not quite. Now the website also cites the suggested retail price at $24--a bargain. This wine had a heyday in my mouth, it tumbled and tossed and jumped, and rolllllllllled along. It was simultaneously crisp, floral, exotic, refreshing, enticing, acidic, vanilla, and honey. I love it. I must buy some, I don't care abou the price. Live a little--or a lot. I also had a lovely lovely California Zinfandel, reminiscent of the Graziano Zinfandel I had in New Orleans with Jason, but a little less fruity and a little more spice, but still super-lusciously fruity. Yum

Speaking of wine, but with a slightly bad taste in my mouth, I am headed up to Indianapolis on Wednesday to be a lobbyist, I guess, for Indiana's fledgeling wine industry. There is a nasty nasty bill, House Bill 1190, that just got passed in the House of Representatives that says, basically, that Indiana's Farm Wineries are not allowed to ship directly to consumers, retail stores, or restaurants. Why, you ask? Because distributors, those greedy bastards, want to control and profit off of the wine industry and allowing Indiana Wineries to ship to customers in Indiana (We're not asking for interstate commerce here; heaven knows that would be the end of the world.). The baddies are proclaiming that the Wineries want the "deregulation of alcohol" and cite studies that wine will get into the hands of our fair state's youngsters. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. We, the small wineries, are required to use a service with UPS or FEDEX which requires the recipeint to be present when the package is delivered with two forms of identification proving they are over twenty-one and they also must sign for it. No leaving booze on your doorstep, Senator, sorry. I hate the distributors, they hate small businesses. I want to be able to order wine from California, too, so they need to...well...suffer. I won't say die because we need them to sell cheap wine to Sam's club, so that we don't have to. I'll see you in the Senate Transportation & Commerce committee hearing!

Jason was lovely enough to send me an invitation to this thing called Newsvine and urged me to join. It was a month, seriously, until the website allowed me to access it, and it is sort of like a blog, and sort of like a news source. I could (haven't yet) write a blog and also seed news stories for other people to read and enjoy. I'm not sure how much I like it yet--for instance, there is no Food section, but there is a section on Bird-Flu. So I'm worried about quality here. It also seems like a simple forum for Bush-bashing and the like. (Let's just say I know Bush is a dumbass, and criticism getting to be like a bad movie pointing out the obvious, so I really just don't want to pay much attention anymore.) If the site fleshes out a little more and becomes, not balanced (like mainstream media claims to or wants to claim to be), but more apolitical, then I might pay more attention. My politics are in my apolitics, dear, and don't confuse that with antipolitics or indifference. Psh. Oh, so if you want to read my Newsvine, go to Martini.

Finally, I need to decide on summer plans, which is quickly becoming more urgent than tomorrow's homework. I have thought about a theatre internship, but it's hard to find something short enough (I need to work.) that is still unique enough and quality (No Brown County Playhouse clones.). I thought about something in the wine industry--still thinking about it. And finally Zach put me in the mood for some Argentine sun. I'm talking a monthlong shindig in the Paris of the South--Buenos Aires! Ay! I hear that it's hot hot hot down there with a 100% chance of passion! I found a neat, but pricey, program through NYU that does about a month in Buenos Aires studying the politics, art, and culture all in a lovely interdisciplinary manner--and you know how much I love interdisciplinarians! Hot! Anyway, those are my options as of now. Or I could just move to New Orleans, work at Sip and Whole Foods, and become a Pilates instructor to work off the pounds of crawfish I'd eat. Who knows?

I'd Rather Not Read

And this definetly counts as dawdling. While I should be headed to the gym and/or doing the insane amounts of homework that are ahead of me, instead, I am sitting here blathering away. I can use the excuse that I'm letting my homemade cherry-vanilla Irish oatmeal settle and finishing of my last coffee. Which I am, but that's entirely beside the point.

I have been slaving away at my full-length play for a week and a half or so now, and all I have come up with is a sorry fifteen pages of passable dialogue. I fell like the characters are coming through, but I need to be more specific with things, and less, blah blah blah. I need to figure out this tragectory for things, and I think I'm on my way, but the question is--how to get it Act One to 40 pages. I have a sketch of several scenes that I need, but I don't know where they fit in and what sort of dialogue to fill some of them with. Bah! Anyway, I need to finish up that and turn it in so that I can have a productive story conference with my professor and TA. Oy.

Yesterday morning I almost died in the shower. I was the first one up, aside from Stephanie--but she was gone already--and I got in the shower. Mind you, the shower has been utterly clogged with girl-hair for a few weeks, so when you take the shower you are standing in a pile of nasty water, and then when the water finally drains, it leaves a film of slippery ooey scum on the bottom of the tub. So yesterday, when I got in the tub I almost fell on my ass and busted my skull on the nasty blue ceramic tub. Instead of falling, though, I grabbed the wall (as much as one can grab a wall) and the shower door, making a huge racket and pulling a muscle in my leg. Good morning, Marty! Wahoo! Someone must Drain-o that bitch before I die a death under this shower's murky waters.

I just worked three freaking days in a row. While that's not a lot for the general public, it's about 24 hours of work this week, and, compared to the amount of time I should be spending on homework and classes, that is bad for my health. I like it because I'll make some sweet cash, but wow, what a workout. I stood for at least 7 hours each day, and Saturday was utter insanity. Luckily it was Chocolate Lovers' Weekend on the Uplands Wine Trail, so we gave out free samples of amazing local chocolate confections. We got to taste them before work, which was fun, but giving customers chocolate and running out at the end of the day was very annoying. Very. And yesterday for a while I had about half of the tasting bar to take care of and it was a little much, and I was going batty, because we didn't have a Barback (the person whose job it is to take care of washing glasses, refilling things, etc.) scheduled, so we all had to "keep an eye on things", which, when we were busy, meant that no one did the dishes and I panicked. But I had fun customers, and life is good when you give people free wine and chocolate all day.

I Had To Do It: The Results Were Too Good

Martin Henry Sorge's Aliases

Your movie star name: Grapefruit Bob

Your fashion designer name is Martin Barcelona

Your socialite name is Gizmo New Orleans

Your fly girl / guy name is M Sor

Your detective name is Kangaroo Northrop

Your barfly name is Horseradish Cheese Wine

Your soap opera name is Henry Lassiter

Your rock star name is Dark Chocolate Bird

Your star wars name is Marzoe Sorjas

Your punk rock band name is The Spicy Chapstick

The Amazing Meganame Generator

Sorry I Forgot The Title On The Last One

And I had a little wine tonight, for me, and held a lot today, but not for me. When I got home from what turned out to be an unexpectedly long day at work, I had a quite pleasant night, alone at home, which reminded me. Of a lot. First of all, good tv on DVD is a great thing. I like TV better than movies--there! I said it! Amen. Just like last night when Amy and I watched old episodes of Nigella Bites on VHS. So tonight, yes I admit it and I was a tired boy watching Sex and the City all alone. On a Saturday! And it was luscious. Great. Just what I needed. I had been thinking too much, analyzing too much. And what is the world about anyway? Am I learning more at my weekend job than I am in class? (Look how SatC makes us quesiton things!) I don't know. Would I be happy being a sommelier for a good restaurant someday or working for a great university? The answer is--it all depends on the specifics. Life comes down to those. Fuck generalities, speculations, it depends on who, excatly, you get to cuddle up to at night and what, exactly, you did all day. With this sort of philosophy things are always changing, consistancy isn't guaranteed, but since you learn what exaclty is good in an exact moment, you can try to recreate it. Sounds all well and good, but who knows if it can be done? But lets not generalize about that, shall we? Also: let be bitch. Sometimes I am tired. I hate that. I also hate when I eat to much and I wake up and fee fat. The end!

Ah-So

And I have a deep eternal conflict. It's a struggle that I try to avoid. I try to end my existential crisis, by just deciding. Should I open a bottle of wine, or not? Why is this such a big deal for me? I don't know. It's not that I might not like it, I, I, I dont' know what it is, I just get crazy. Crazy. I teeter-totter back and forth between whether I should open a bottle or not. It may go bad before I can drink it all. I don't want to drink to be drunk, I have homework to do. But maybe it'll be so yummy that it will go down in the oenophilia history books! Woe! Travesty! Calamity! I can never decide. Wait. Tomorrow...I will do it! What will it be? I don't know. Zinfandel? Maybe. Barolo? Who knows? That's all I really have right now, it might be time to stock up soon. I thinking a Pinot Noir, another Zin, Carmenere, maybe a something daring. A Viognier or something white? Eep! Maybe a Gruner Veltiner (however that's spelled)? Ahh!

Also, we're having a wine & tapas party with people from work, which should be more than fun. We're all bringing a dish and a wine. I was thinking Carmenere, so that I could share my love of it with all. Then I was thinking Viognier, because I'm intrigued by it. Finally, I think I may be set on something radical, and, well, flamboyant--Champagne. I mean the real French thing. What do we think about that? I think it's great! I'm going to look for a good one less than $30, and see how we go. Now what goes well with that? It'd have to be something that goes with Chardonnay, but even lighter, unless I can find a cheap Blanc de Noir, and then I'm totally lost. Oh food!

Speaking of food, today I bought some Bok Choy at Krog, and this older woman, we'll call her Fran, was standing next to me. "What's that?" Fran asked, much to my surprise. I turned around, not sure if she was talking to me, "Huh?" "What's that?" she repeated. "Oh, this? It's Bok Choy." I told her, and then headed toward the organic food section. But before I could get one step, she retorted, "What's is it?" I had to gather from her inflection that she had no freaking clue what this wonderful Asian veggie amounted to. "It's like a Chinese cabbage." I explained, followed by an awkward pause, which caused me to question whether her hearing aid's battery hadn't died. "Cabbage is round and purple." I was informed. "No, this is like cabbage, but not." I said, just wanting to go. "No, cabbage isn't green, that must be lettuce. Do you cook it?" "Yeah." I told her. Then I think she said more stuff, but I didn't care and I left. I couldn't bear to hear her complain about how young people eat weird food. I should tell her that the Whole Foods website has health information about veggies, and the Bok is very, very healthy. So there, Fran.