It was the 14th of July ( France's " Bastille Day " ) 2008 at our local pool and it was a swim meet and I was meeting two of my son's old teachers for the first time. Actually they were neither teachers of his but had become friends and they had come to the pool to watch some of their old students swim. Throughout the period that we were there talking to them and watching the swim meet lots of young swimmers/ students kept coming to say " hello ". It was fun to observe all of this and later at some point my wife asked me if I knew who they were and when I sad " no " she introduced me.
At some point I asked them to come to our house after the swim meet and to help us celebrate the 14th of July. I had no idea whether they would accept or not but I did know that if they did we would make it a special occasion. My son had spoken so much about them and I knew that he really liked them and it seemed that the feeling was mutual with sincere appreciation on each end. And accept they did and pretty soon after the meet I was down at our cul-de-sac welcoming them to our home for the first time. I took pictures of our marvelous celebration that night and have already included some of them in a much earlier blog that I wrote in July 2008.
It's Monday, Labor Day 2008 at 3:43 PM and my wife and I will soon be going over to our local pool to join our son and have a swim. It will be one of our last for this season. It's a beautiful day here and a great day for a swim. I am reminded of the contrast now between our beautiful weather and that in the Gulf now as Hurricane Gustof approaches our southern shores and I am almost ashamed to be feeling so good about our excellent weather on this holiday of ours. My thoughts go out to all those that have fled their homes and are worried about their homes and their loved ones. It's a difficult/tenuous time and we are all I believe as a nation worried and concerned. The Republican National Convention is on hold as we wait and see what happens now.
" Are you about ready? " asks my wife a few seconds ago. It's time for us to go swimming so this will be picked-up by me a bit later. Let it suffice for now to say that we thoroughly enjoyed this bottle that was signed and given to me and my wife by Laurent Givry ( owner of Elite Imports ) and owners/ winemakers Francois et Marie-Pierre Mikulski of Francois Mikulski vineyards, Meursault, burgundy France. I finally got to meet them last year at Laurent's big yearly warehouse tasting where he invites all his winemakers to come pour their wines for us in the wine trade that are lucky enough to show up. It was on a really hot Monday ( my day-off ) here in Lorton, Virginia where his warehouse is located. I showed up around 1 PM and stayed for about four hours enjoying meeting all these French owners/ winemakers and getting a chance to speak with them in French for awhile as they poured and explained their wines.
I really had a wonderful time at this tasting. I had lunch there with both Francois Mikulski and Jo Pithon of the Loire valley ( he makes only great whites in all styles of dryness and sweetness from the Chenin Blanc grape ). And though I enjoyed everybody's company on this particular time and day I felt that I most-bonded with the Mikulski's. On the bottle they gave me they said : " Avec toute mon amitie " signed Marie-Pierre Mikulski. Francois wrote : " Lynne, Please forgive Anthony for today ! " signed Francois. He knew that I could have been spending some of this time with my wife instead of with them tasting wines on my day-off.
I will write more about this 2004 Meursault " Poruzots " and include some pictures from this past 14th of July, Bastille Day 2008. This sure was a great wine to enjoy on this special holiday as well as the great 2005 Chateauneuf-du-Pape which I will also mention soon.
Cheers, TONY Happy Labor Day to one and all.
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