Wines and Beers

Applied for a job today at a local wine and beer shipper. They want an order clerk. Dunno if they're still hiring, as they posted on Craigslist and maybe I'm being anxious. I used to do the job they advertised right out of college, with my fresh and useless Geology degree in hand and no jobs to speak of. So I became a wine shipping order clerk in Healdsburg. Did that for a year and change prior to moving to the Sierra foothills.

Nice town, Healdsburg. Very touristy despite actually having serious wine-business to do. You wouldn't think wine was serious business unless you grew up around it like I did. It was everywhere and earned a billion a year for the county I lived in. A billion. Pause and imagine that from a semi-rural county on the fringe of the Bay Area previously limited to ranching, dairy, and vegetable crops. Some winery in Napa valley wins the international contest for Chardonnay in France and suddenly we're planting vineyards everywhere. Those odd little goat farms are making gourmet cheese. The alpaca wool sweaters are selling for $350 apiece. The local restaurants have wine lists of multiple pages and $4/bottle corkage fees if you bring your own for dinner. It became the place to go for a weekend away from The City (San Francisco).

Of course, the twisty roads would kill you if you drove drunk, and even sober drivers had a tough time of it, but I was inured to it all, having grown up to the sounds of whining engines, squealing tires, and sirens as a common thing heard multiple nights a week. I suppose I was traumatized by this, because it was so common as to be normal. Apparently, that level of death is a bad thing? I dunno why. Darwin Awards hadn't been named yet, but these were winners.

The days were sometimes hot, but the fog came in every evening at 5-6 PM and temps would sink from 85'F to the mid 50's. Bring your sweater or a light jacket or you'll catch cold coming out of the movies or watching a local soccer game. Good times. The Pacific was only about 18 miles as a crow flies. We still bbq'ed and smoked various meats, ate the best local cheeses, and enjoyed the sparkling waters, even as kids. Back then you could get really good sourdough bread. Now? Not so much. The bakeries went under and part of California culture DIED when that happened. It used to be at 5 PM you'd settle down with wine or a local IPA, a loaf of fresh warm sourdough, and cheese or butter to put on it and enjoy a pre-dinner repast. It still allowed a full day of work, you just had a pre-dinner snack to warm up your appetite. Somehow you get fat from that today. Not sure why it didn't do the same then. Youth perhaps.

Now that the season has turned, mornings are chilly and the days warm enough for shirt sleeves by late morning, but close your windows at night or the evening chill will give you a cold before you know it. Rain threatens, though mostly its theoretical. The storms are passing to my North, so far. Wait a week. I can see value in waxing my car for the winter. The light is golden all day, thanks to the lowering angle. Skies are so blue, and there's no pollution to see at this elevation so visibility from the mountainside crosses the entire Sacramento Valley over to the Coast Ranges. Sunsets are red and orange. I find myself wanting to plan meals soon. I think a soup with Italian sausage, maybe. Something with a bit of red chard in it, maybe some red potatoes. Skip the beans. Maybe use some yellow squash and chunks of carrot and onion. That would do. Its good soup and bread season.