The Duckling Drinks Beaujolais-Villages Blanc

Louis Jadot, Château des Jacques
Grand Clos de Loyse
2001 Beaujolais, Villages Blanc
Central Market, $15.69

The first whiff of this stuff was discouraging to say the least. Some tasting notes I found on the internet described it as "pure chard." I describe it as canned green beans.

However, if you can hold your nose long enough to take a sip, the flavors are wonderful. This wine was sweet and creamy with tastes of peach and vanilla with a hint of the brightness of lemon and a little bit of toasted marshmallow. I couldn't stop rolling it around in my mouth tasting all the different aspects.

As long as your nose isn't too sensitive to get over the scent, I'd definitely recommend this one.

Random Photo Friday - Wilderness Edition

Today's Random Photo was taken by The Husband as we drove down Mt. Scott at the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge in October 2005.



We spent about four days tromping around in the wilderness, eating s'mores, and looking at hairy animals. I know the photo above doesn't hold much visual interest for anyone who wasn't there, so let's spice up this post with the hairy animals.

Prairie dog: small and cute

Buffalo (Bison?): big and kind of intimidating

Anyway, we spent one day hiking and got terribly lost. The trail map provided by the refuge was a joke, but even if we had bought a topographical map, I'm not sure either one of us would have had much luck reading it, especially since we forgot to bring a compass. We still had fun climbing around on the rocks and eating our lunch while overlooking a majestic Oklahoma vista.

Once we'd had enough fun and lunch and majestic vistas, we gave up trying to relocate the trail and started heading back. We weren't 100% confident where "back" was, but we had a vague notion that we were walking in the right general direction. As we were starting to get frustrated, knowing we were close to the path to our car but still not able to find it, we both suddenly stopped and looked at each other. The Husband and I had both recognized the same weed in an entire grassland and were able to use it as a landmark to navigate back to the parking lot.

I guess we developed some sort of botanical marital mind-meld when put to the test. It was a good thing, too, because I was really starting to worry that we'd have to spend the night with the buffalo/bison.


Majestic, huh?

Pain in the Neck

Last Saturday, I gave myself whiplash while towel drying my hair. Previously, I have injured my neck during such strenuous activities as sleeping, walking, and driving a car. The pain always goes away by itself, although most days I have at least a minor crick in my neck. I've tried a new pillow and stretching exercises, but nothing has made any difference.

My neck still hurt pretty badly on Monday, and I didn't have anything interesting to do that day, so I decided to go to the urgent care clinic and have them take a look. I figured at the very least, I might get some good drugs out of them. My Vicodin stash from last year's ER visit was running low, so it was time to stock up. I'm not a drug abuser, but for some reason I am a habitual drug hoarder. Also, Vicodin is the very best hang-over cure ever.

After quite a wait, I finally got to see a doctor with a very handsome accent. I felt like a fraud complaining about neck pain and was sure I would quickly be identified as a pain-killer addict and kicked out on the street. But, the doctor took one look at my neck muscles and started making impressed noises about how swollen they were.

He said to me, "Tell me if this hurts," and suddenly everything went black and stars starting bursting out of my eye sockets. Evidently he was able to determine the most jab-worthy spot on sight. "Yeah, that hurt," I told him.

To be on the safe side, he sent me down the hall for X-rays. Two rather bumbling techs fiddled with gadgets and argued about the best angle from which to shoot me with radiation for what seemed like forever. Finally, they concluded that my neck was not broken, although my spine was rather bendier than it should have been. Overly-bendy as in, I have scoliosis.

They put me back in the exam room, and the doctor came in with prescriptions for Vicodin and muscle relaxers (score!). "Do you have any questions?" he asked. So I brought up the whole, Surprise! You have scoliosis! thing. The exasperated look on his face made it abundantly clear that bumbling X-ray techs are not qualified to diagnose me with scoliosis and they really shouldn't have brought it up.

The radiologist was supposed to have reviewed my films and called me by now. I also left a message at the clinic this morning, which no one has returned. I'm not sure if that's a good sign or no sign at all. I actually hope I do have some spinal issue that's causing my achy neck. At least then I would have a specific problem to work on fixing. In the meantime, I guess I'll just have to follow doctor's orders and pop a bunch of pills. Oh, well.

Random Photo Friday: One Day Late Edition

Why am I posting the Friday photo on Saturday? Just because I can! Bwa ha ha! Anyway...

Here is my lovely mother-in-law at our wedding.



I am blessed with a pretty awesome family, including the one I married into, and my mother-in-law is no exception. Despite the fact that she's been through some real crap since I've known her, she always seems to be smiling and looking for her next big adventure.

She has always made me feel welcome among her family and circle of very cool friends. One New Year's Eve she and my sister-in-law taught me how to knit. In less than 6 months, she altered my wedding dress and two of the bridesmaids' dresses and still found time to sew her own outfit.

I know this isn't how mother-in-law stories are supposed to go, so if guess if I had to complain about her I would say that her energy and creativity sometimes make me feel a little lazy and boring in comparison. Of course, I'm totally lazy and boring so the fact that she only makes me feel a little bit that way still speaks to how awesome she is.