FIN

            I finished up my final salon des vins in the ancient city of Chartres, just south of Paris and home to supposedly the largest cathedral in all of France, although the one in Metz appears larger to me. The city was utterly enjoyable unlike Metz where I pictured people hanging themselves behind drawn shades. No, Chartres was a place I felt I could hang my hat for a spell or two. The salon though was less than stellar as the weather (we were outside) was often cold, usually rainy, and always windswept. Needless to say the promenade of spectators looked upon us much like many do at the zoo, with curious questioning eyes that asked, “what are you people thinking?” I spent most of my time poking fun at the locals and Apolline and dancing and juggling and in general being an ass. I literally drank more wine than I sold and when I was bored, which was often, I strolled around centre ville. Every four steps was a real estate sales or rental place so I made a hobby of inspecting all of the listings to keep my mind occupied.

            We stayed at Paolo’s parents (Friend of the Family) home in Dreux, just south of Chartres, who fed us excessively and when we said we were finished they would pry open our mouths and toss more in for good measure. They were painfully sweet people and after the second night of two to three hour dinners I realized that I finally could comprehend French. Not all of it mind you but finally enough now that I could piece the information together without my mind twisting it into meaningless chatter. This of course I figured to be just a moment of clarity that would surely disappear once I returned to Alsace. As it turned out this was not true as I had dinner with Apolline’s family on Monday and sure enough, I understood. Now of course I am leaving France and am sure that unless I am very strict with myself I will forget it all.

            So I have mentioned the end and at the end is where I am. I am moving to Budapest for a stint and am not sure if I’ll blog on it or not since I am keen on doing a travel book on the city and it’s surroundings. So most likely this will be my final blessing to the blog and I bid it all goodbye with a sense of sadness. I have had my ups and downs with this whole adventure and sometimes I was ready to head fast into the crazy lane but it was all good, every last experience was just that, an experience.

An old love recently asked me if I had found what I was looking for and for that I have no answer.  Some of us search to find and the rest I feel search because searching is all we know. At least now I feel I can search without abandon.  

Maybe I have found what I was looking for.

MY FATHER IS WAYNE GROVER

            Sorry for the lack of posts and whatnots and usual witticisms but the only thing slower around here than me is the vineyard. Finally all of the intense things have been taken care of just as the weather has slipped into perfection. Ah, how I will miss standing out in the driving cold rain and being slapped mercilessly by the twig vipers. I am down to my final two weeks here and am still contemplating whether or not to come back for the vendange (harvest) in the fall before/after I go to Ireland with my sister. My usual phrase of “time will only tell” is what I’ll have to fall back on in regards to my future. I have one last salon des vins in Chartres and then that is that, smack my hands finished.

            I had hoped to stay in Europe for the whole year and in my research never came across an item called the Schengan Visa. That was until my buddy, Taylor, was told about it as he entered his new Nordic landscape. Apparently if I stay longer in any of these countries that have no “borders” for more than ninety days out of one hundred and eighty I can be fined, arrested, and summarily slapped by a man in a funny cap and then banned for five years. Luckily England is not part of all of that so I will scurry on back there just before the deadline. But the killer was I was just starting to line up house sits, where I care for someone’s home as they play far away and I toss a ball for their dog without the worry for me of rent or for them boarding fees. Since I will have to leave the countries with this agreement it pretty much kills me being in Europe for the rest of the year…or does it.

            So I woke up early on Saturday before last after a hard night of all things the night can bring and I decided, Budapest. So I pulled up Buda on the web and lo and behold they are not part of the agreement. So without thought I put an ad on Craigslist for a room/share/apartment/abandoned car and within a day I had several responders ultimately deciding to go with a grad student right in centre ville. So, once again, time will only tell in regards to my future.

            Enough of the future, let's talk about the past. On the very last day of intense “we have to get this all done” type of work I finally figured out the last mystery for me at the vineyard. What in the hell does Benoit’s cousin mean when he says, in English, but in heavily accented Alsacien, “my father is Wayne Grover.” I always thought maybe it was from a TV show or personality or maybe an inside joke. Finally though I put it all together and it wasn’t Wayne Grover at all, it was Wine Grower. He was saying his father was a wine grower. Yes, yes he is, but I knew that from day one. Thank you for confusing me.

INEVITABLE - PART DEUX

            I don’t know how it happened or when but I finally hurt myself. I know the timeline might sound weird but I have a very delayed reaction to pain. I was literally standing there as we all took a break from “clouet” and I began to notice a sensation in my left bicep. I was like, “hey, what is…oh my GOD!” Yeah, the pain kind of sauntered in and then made a mad dash and then quickly disappeared. Apparently I had ripped my bicep. Oh well, it’s not the end of the world and the pain is come and go. This has happened before to me and it will just take some time for it to do what it needs to do but it won’t interfere with me slinging that forty-pound nail into all those sunken trunks since I’ll just use my right arm.

LE WEEKEND - SUNDAY

            Strasbourg is 100km north of where I usually lay my head and Apolline and I are making good time on getting there, mostly because she drives like a Roman. The day is already about as gorgeous as you’d want it to be. We get to Strasbourg and if Apo hadn’t kept telling me she was lost I’d have never known. I just thought she was driving around so I could see the city. I guess the city has changed a lot since she lived here a decade ago. Everything changes I guess, well, except my home town. As we get more into the city center the town really starts to pop. The river, the buildings, the cafés, and of course what every French city has, a gargantuan cathedral. We circle about looking for a parking spot for what feels like forever since I am absolutely starving and we finally decide to use a garage, which apparently no one uses as they prefer to park on the sidewalks.

            We immediately find a café and I order a “moyenne” biere, which means average size, and it’s huge. I might just be too used to the little nursing bottles they normally come in. We have sirloin with French fries and really really good bread and when I see the check I realize that the beer was 8 Euros. Apolline thinks it’s funny that the same beer in America might be $4 (3 Euros). Yep, you can either get twice as drunk or just as drunk for half the price in America. We at least still have that going for us!

            We walk across the square after lunch and pay nearly 10 Euros to climb to the top of the cathedral. 10 Euros should get us carried up but the hike was good if not entirely dizzying since the stairs are totally wound as tight as, well you get the idea. The view is amazing though and you can actually see the time lines of the city from up there.

            Sunday really is not a day to visit anywhere in France. Almost all of the stores and shops are closed which means nothing to me since I’m not really into trinket or clothes shopping. We head over to Parliament and the UE and walk about and crack jokes and I have an overwhelming urge to do something stupid since there is a closed circuit camera ever four inches but I don’t and I’m proud of myself that for the second time in two days, I didn’t make an ass out of myself. When we get back to her car she turns the key and…nothing. She had left the lights on and drained the battery. I ask her if she’s ever popped a clutch before and that it won’t be a big deal. She says no and wants to call someone. I put her back in the car, push the car back, and then give her some instructions. I am sure she has it as I begin to push her on the long, flat, parking lot. Man, I would have killed for a hill. I gave her the signal to pop the clutch as I let go and all she does is coast and coast and coast. I realize she never popped the clutch but was really trying to turn the key. OK, there is a language barrier of sorts. She wants to push because she’s really nervous but there is no way she’ll be able to do it so I do my best cheerleader go team speech and just when I get ready to push a mom and her son jump off their bikes and help as well. Well thank you very much, strangers. We get her up to speed and I just have that feeling that she’s going to coast again so I start to bark, “Pop it! Pop it!” I see her shoulders squeeze in and touch her chin and low and behold she pops it. A thick cloud of black smoke brings me a smile as she takes off.

            I think she is really surprised that I know how to do anything but write. I have no idea how this stereotype has manifested itself into fact with most people.  “Oh, you write?” Then they give you that look like you’ve never changed a tire, ripped out a toilet, or stood in a foot of muck while you cut down half a vineyard. Yes folks, before I decided to try and write for a living I had your typical boy/man’s life of repairing my own car (when you could before all this computer shit), gutting my duplex, digging, fighting, and a whole lot of bleeding. Sorry for the gripe but for the last four years I’ve just gotten a shit ton of that crap.

            She is so jazzed by the whole popping of the clutch that she drives as if in the French Connection all the way back from Strasbourg utilizing the winding wine route through tons of quaint villages and towns and mountain peaks. It was so much fun I had to hang my video camera out the window. We end up in Colmar, a medium sized town just 15km away from home for some dinner and another cocktail. I ate two pizzas. One was an Alsacien special with a soft cheese, onions, and bacon on a feathery wafer style crust. Then of course I had a pizza pizza with whatever I could fit on the little thing. After dinner we walked about the darkened streets that either teamed with life or were deserted. I really like this town and am sure I’ll return before I finally head out on the next adventure.

LE WEEKEND - SATURDAY

            I’m going to consider this my “lost weekend” where I learned no French, ate pizza, and drank beer and scotch and nary a drop of wine. The family upstairs had a visitor in from London, a girl named Angeline who knows their daughters, and was visiting just for the weekend. I met her on Friday at the dinner the family was hosting. OK, yes, I had wine at the dinner but that was Friday and I’m thinking Saturday and Sunday.  I hadn’t understood that the day before that the father had said she spoke English or that she was living in London since he railed it off rat-a-tat style while hurrying down a hill. So you can only imagine my relief when I explained to her that I had only been learning French since December and she replied simply, “we’ll use English then.” I could have proposed marriage on the spot. She was definitely the highlight of Friday outside of being called a “bad boy,” by the Moldovan. I’m not saying anything but what I will say is this, it was a total accident that lead to the whole “bad boy” comment.

            I wake up on Saturday and have no plans except to steal the company car, fix the bike, and ride said bike. I start to head into town when I see Angeline down by the Cave so I stop and she’s waiting for a friend. She asks me what I’m doing that night and I fought all my normal retorts of seeing how many hookers I can get into the trunk or the like and simply state that I have no plans. She proposes we get a drink and I’m all for it. I don’t know if I lived in Los Angeles too long or just know too many flakey people because I half expected her to not show but there she was knocking on my door at seven.

            We head out and we’re already laughing which is good. I can be remotely charming in English but with French I’m still a bit, more than a bit, of a Neanderthal.

            “You pretty. Eyes. Smell of…” as I point to Jasmin just before pulling out my date club.

            She tells me of a small town up the way called Eguisheim that she had seen earlier and it’s either that or we go to the really tacky Safari Bar in Issenheim. We are there in a matter of minutes and the town is, of course, charming as all get out. I think this is the whole town as we stroll along the main street until she turns down a small alleyway and into another world. My god it’s beautiful. The old homes and shudders and lamps and aged glass all tilted over a cobbled road no wider than your average car. Homes ride alongside small restaurants and bars and some bars and restaurants look like homes. We finally decide on Auberge du Rempart and she takes me through the smallish bar area that leads out into a fountained terrace.  We talk over my beer and her tomato juice and I tell you, if there wasn’t such an age and intellectual issue I’d pursue this woman with everything I had, me, of course being the one older and obviously less intelligent. We eventually make our way back to the car and so far I haven’t had to speak a word of French and I know I should feel bad for writing this but I felt relieved.

            She had asked the lady at Rempart where she thought we should go next and the lady told her a village name that sounds just like this village but with an I instead of an E. We blaze around looking for said town but never find it but we do find the same exit a few times and a couple of turnabouts recognize us as we confusingly circled them.   I really didn’t care. She was fun and I enjoyed myself and I’m sure I’ll see her again. The night closes the door and I have to get ready for the next day of Strasbourg with Apolline. Apolline and Angeline, this is something I’d normally screw up.

GUESS WHO'S GETTING MARRIED

            Well it certainly isn’t me. I just wanted to congratulate my buddy John on his nuptials and I wish I could have been there when he toasted them. Actually that sounds kind of painful. Congrats John & Courtney.

INEVITABLE

The shattering of my drivetrain happened just far enough away for it to be really annoying. Oh well, it was a nice walk home and it kept me from bombing down the back of the mountain which would have meant a terrible, half day walk back home. Yeah, the bright side of life.

FEELIN' FINE

            I was walking back home after a day of learning a new aspect of the vineyard yesterday. The “archers” are catching up to the “fixers” and no one is catching up to the vines. So I moved from arching to fixing which is grueling but really fun since I pretty much carried a forty pound four foot long nail around for nine hours spearing dead wood and dragging them out of the ground. I have no idea why I love getting dirty and performing manual labor. For some reason it makes the day seem as if something happened I guess. I can feel all the muscles in my back, arms, legs, and even my neck telling me I did something really hard all day. I miss that fatigue and working middle management does not give me this sense at all. Sure I feel fatigued, from boredom or clients clanging about how horrible their lives are and how we’ve just made it that much worse. Ok, that is more mentally numb than fatigued. Really, now that I think about it, I have enjoyed jobs but I haven’t loved a job since I left the bike shop I used to work at in Big Rapids. Every day there was a new challenge like, “How can I affix this pedal to a stripped out crank with a zip tie?” By the way I figured it out and after we gave him a stern warning to not wait very long before getting it fixed I saw him two weeks later on campus, still riding on that damn pedal.

            But I digress, so I’m nearly home and outside of a nagging feeling of loss, I won’t go into that here, I was truly happy, calm even. I feel as if I live here now. I think the feeling has been coming on for days now but today was the day I realized it. I was driving around on Sunday in the vineyards delivery truck just milling about the small towns that encircle the mountain and taking in what the scenes around me would offer. For the first time I wasn’t nervous at the turnabouts or whether the gendarmie would pull me over and whip me with cheese. Nope, this is where I live.

            The strange has become commonplace. I’m not nervous now when someone says, “Eric (or American)?” and then rails off a spit of French.  I have skipped all decorum at lunch and dinner in regards to me always waiting to be asked if I wanted something since I didn’t want to appear rude. I mean you should have seen the crowd when I got up to go to the other room to get cheese. I sat down with a wheel the size of my head and dug in. I thought they were going to cheer they were so happy as one lady railed off in Alsacien, “He just might be Alsacien after all!” I believe they have put me through many tests here on this little island of wine but luckily I’m such a medium sized dumb animal I have missed them all and in the process won them over.

            I mean you know you’re making a difference when for example, the second day of “fixing” we run into a stump that just won’t come out and I say, “Well guys, what do we say about this?” I looked up to find three French men look up from the dead sunken trunk to me and say, “that bitch is in there.” Their accents accentuating the cussing. That was what I said every time the day before when we came upon something that fought way too hard. Who knows, I’d like to believe, that maybe one of these threes final words will be as he lays there ready to take his last breath and has his adoring family all around him.

            “That bitch is in there.” Amen.

MUST LOVE...BEES!

            And spiders and ants and lizards but the bees are the most in your face here. I’ve noticed though that if you are working away they leave you alone but if you stop and suck on some water or just walk about aimlessly like I like to do they confront you as if to say, “Get back to work human. We’re not going to do this all by ourselves.”

            So I was getting ready to rub it in that it has been absolutely magical here as of late weather wise. Everything is blooming, hence all the bees, and the temp has been in the 70’s (20-24 Celsius) and the wind hasn’t even been that strong to destroy my bike rides.  So I take the morning off because I am just spent and decide to study some French since I actually think I’ve fallen off track with it all. The day before I had worked on my farmer’s tan and gotten my arms burned up a bit so I made sure I applied liberal amounts of sunscreen before I left. It was cloudy and cool when I got ready to leave but the weather around here always reminds me of every hiking/climbing story that goes horribly awry.

            “So tell us what happened,” asks the barely there reporter.

            “I don’t know, the weather was nice when we left and then a storm blew in and after eight days camped in a snow bank we ate Ted.”

            I make my trek down the mountain to the vines and I notice that there are no bees. None. I look myself over and tell myself that what I’m wearing will be OK for whatever blows in. I figure the bees know something I don’t and it makes me uneasy but for two hours it’s perfect weather to work in. No sun, slightly cool, and just enough breeze to keep it all moving. Then just as fast as all the military aircraft in the sky (there is a shit ton here flying back and forth from Germany) a storm rolls in, drops the temp to the low 40’s with rain and wind. Ah, merde. I knew I should have listened to the bees I thought to myself as I made a mad dash back home to grab my gear.  Next time I’ll listen to the bees, or maybe, just maybe, watch the freakin’ weather report.

Note: Today I did check the weather since I wanted to ride to Colmar which would be a 40-50 km round trip and they said all was well weather wise. I finished up with somethings around the abode and got ready to go but once again, no bees. I gave it some time and ate lunch and I decided to finally listen to the bees and stay home. Fast forward an hour and you guessed it, another storm rolled in, dropped the temp, and wreaked havoc for four hours. I was going to thank the bees but then I realized they are French bees and won't understand my sentiments and probably just sting the living bejesus out of me. Any way bees, if you're reading this, you're the best. 

STUFF ORDER RANDOM IN

            I finally made it all the way up the mountain without having to stop and walk the bike.

            I’ve learned to tell the time by the placement of the sun. I have no watch or cell phone and the only clock I have is the alarm in my desk that I only set at night and turn off in the morning. Once I figured I had it down I started to play with the other folks by guessing the time. So far, I’m four for four and by the end of the week I hope to be ten for ten. Also the serving of lunch and dinner is announced by the ringing of a really loud bell so who needs a watch. It’s perfect.

            I finally had a craving for a burger. A real burger but what I mostly have been craving is a certain someone’s chili. Man it was good. I miss that chili.

            They are crazy about Dr. House here and most days after it airs that’s all they talk about. I forgot they were a season behind and started talking about how I couldn’t believe that the Kumar character committed suicide to take a job with Obama. You should have seen their faces. They all looked at me as if I had told them they were adopted. Granted in hindsight me not really knowing the word for suicide and having to act it out was probably pretty funny. I can be a bit animated at times. BTW, it’s the same in both languages and my dance to demonstrate such a suicide was largely unneeded.

            Coke, I’ve been drinking Coke. God only knows why.

            I’m pretty sure I’ve eaten every part of the duck now, save for it’s ass, but I’m sure it’s coming.

            In Metz, whenever I would help people to their car I’d always thank them for buying American if they had, obviously, an American car. Funny how many people love Ford. Actually I think they were all Fords. I think Chevy is Opel over here. I did see one Chrysler Sebring Convertible that looked like someone had taken a bat to and when that wasn’t enough hit it with acid.

            They’re on to me with the telling time bit. It was raining and they asked me what time it was and I looked at the sky to no avail. I looked back to them and all of them were looking up, realizing I had simply been targeting the sun. It appears I’ll have to find a new game to go ten for ten.

TEX-METZ / SAGA CONTINUES

            As I sit behind our make shift table I watch two cowboys pass by. One is about six foot four and gay and the other is five foot nothing and Asian. “Interesting,” I think to myself as I figure out what wine to drink. It is 1010 AM and I’m already bored. I pull out a piece of paper and begin to document the number of times thing happen. Like the sausage maker, how many times he disappears from his booth for ten minutes or longer (8 Saturday, 6 Sunday, 4 on Monday but at one point is gone nearly two hours). Pregnant women trying wine (6 over three days). Kids trying wine with their parents (Under 10yrs old, 4. 11 and over, 9). Of course the age was a guess since I really have no idea when it comes to kids but it was my game so I played it as I saw fit.  I did have one precocious six-year-old demand for me to give her some rosé. I told her no and after she just wouldn’t stop I told her to hit the road. She went and got her parents and they came back wearing a strange look as if to say, “why won’t you give her any wine?”

            The day goes pretty much like that and we only sell half as much as we did on Friday and that trend would continue all the way up until we packed up and left on Monday.  Benôit and I passed the time by wadding up paper and trying to make baskets utilizing the far away recycling bin. I find that I’m amazingly accurate and Benôit writes it off as all Americans can play basketball. I regress into juggling, which I literally do for two to three hours a day for the next three days. I’m a huge hit with the kids, sober and drunk alike, but it still sells us no wine.

            For the next two nights I am on my own as Benôit and his future femme head up north to see her Godmother. I don’t mind. I like my alone time and he gives me cash and I decide to put my, “there is no bad Mexican food,” theory to the test by walking down to the strip center that houses, El Rancho. As I walk up to it I see a small sign that reads Tex-Mex and I instantly thought they should have called it Tex-Metz and I revel in my genius and decide to tell them but then I realize they won’t care or the most likely case, not be able to understand what I am trying to tell them. I go straight for the margarita, which comes with Cointreau but only comes frozen, and blue. I have to admit, it was pretty good and for it being frozen it was really good. Then the chips came and I realized they were Doritos but with a lighter spice and a thimble of salsa. This too was not as bad as I thought or probably have made it sound. I scan the menu and it’s the first menu I have been able to read front to back and know what in the hell it said. I also like that they have two drinks called the Bimbo & Mosquito. I wonder what the translation is on that. I get the Fiesta plate and it really isn’t bad but if I were in Texas I’d be pissed especially once I found out that I had paid 25 Euros ($30) for it. Oh, and my last bites of the enchilada were green beans. I guess they figured any beans would do. Luckily the vineyard gave me money to pay for my dinner so I looked at as, “hell yeah I got a free blue rita!”

            Marie is apparently going to help us on the last day and I am happy about that since now there will be two people who know the language. After about twenty minutes she changes her mind and Benôit has to take her to the train station leaving me behind, all on my own. Wait a minute, all on my own?! When they leave I am standing off to the side and I have to admit I had a “fuck this” moment in my head as I realized I could just stand here and let people think the booth was abandoned or he was in the john or getting more wine but the crowd started to pile up and wasn’t going anywhere so I jumped in, head first it felt like and you know what, I did pretty good. Sold a few bottles, made a few laugh with my Stagiaire and American bit. At the end of it I could only wonder what these French folk were thinking as they bought/tried French wine in France from an American who didn’t speak French. They were really amused I was living in Alsace, which is basically like the old country to most of them. If I was in Bordeaux or Champagne I wouldn’t even have been noticed probably but the old country, please, I’m a riot. I tell you though the weekend was either a high or and absolute low with my French. Some accents I just can’t understand. I’m either a home run or a strike out. Oh well, what can I do, I’m only five weeks into this whole shenanigan.

            As soon as Benoit returns it all dies and at 530 I pack up the camionnette and we are on the road at 620 and make good time back. We have a kebab in some town outside of Colmar that is impossibly long and even harder to spell especially when you fly by the sign like we did. It really was the loneliest wine faire of the three I’ve been to.

            Above all my favorite thing about the salon des vins in Metz and even Paris was how many times I was complimented on my English. Of course I always replied, “Thanks, I’ve worked really hard on it.” God I’m a schmuck.  

Can you tell how busy I am as I juggle the day away. 

NEXT STOP, LUXEMBOURG

            “My god it’s early,” I think as we careen through the Vosges Mountains in a camionnette (cargo van) that would be better served as machine gun target.  Benîot and I are headed to Metz, which is essentially the last stop before Luxembourg for a salon des vins. He is not happy about the turn of events with this camionnette and I think he is trying to kill the damn thing. I do the whole fall asleep for half a second until he slams into a curve redlining the engine, which causes me to snap my neck back up in that special “I’m awake” way we all do when passing out in a car and we repeat this procession for roughly an hour. I just have not recovered at all from the day before when I hand loaded 8500 bottles to be labeled over a nine-hour period and then pushed thousand pound loads of booze from one corner to the next. I followed that up with packing, cleaning, eating, and other whatnots before finally falling asleep sometime after midnight. You ever have finger fatigue? It’s a really weird sensation to have your fingers say, “time for bed.”

            The day hasn’t started out well. The father had come by the night before to say he’d leave me the GPS on my doorstep and when I left the next morning there was no such GPS so I checked his door, and then his car. Nope, Nada, et Rien. I was stalked by the peacock and then had to wait for what seemed like forever, as Benôit was late. He shows up with the keys to the camionnette and I toss my bag in the truck and we are off and as we are flying down the highway I notice a wire or a cord or something stretching it’s way across the window.

            “What…the…hell…is that?”

            “GP…S,” he responds without a whisper of worry. He rolls the window down and snags the computer part but the wire is wrapped hard so he just rolls it up into the window. I have no idea why it was placed there especially since we picked up the truck in absolute darkness. It’s not like it was after sunrise where we’d see it and go, “Oh, that’s why it wasn't on my doorstep.”

            Fast forward three hours and we arrive in Metz and I grab the GPS and look for the address for the event.

            “Where’s the address, Benôit?”

            “Don’t know.”

            I look and look through all the paperwork and low and behold we don’t have the address to where we are supposed to be. We drive around Metz as if in a Benny Hill sketch with errors galore and finally find a huge building set in the middle of what appears to me as nowhere. I walk inside and see that almost everyone is set up and we find out booth and it is completely bare. I mean abso-freakin-lutely nothing is there. I had figured it to be like Paris where a table, glasses, and a fridge would be provided but none of that was here. Luckily Benôit knew more than I did and brought glasses and by chance had a table and cloth to cover it so we rigged an area. Later we liberated a table but that’s neither here nor there and this is no place for confessions.

            We sell two cases of wine right off the bat and all looks well until we realize that would be the only person who would even taste wine let alone buy some for the next four hours. I took this time to combat my boredom with what I do best and that is test wine. By two I realize I’m a bit cooked and at three as I begin to sober up and my achy body and tired mind take over. I literally feel like death warmed over. I pay my 4 Euros ($5.25) for a shot of espresso and the price was well worth it as it snapped me out of my funk and back into the game that wasn’t even being played. It was so slow. I don’t know, maybe Easter weekend isn’t the best time to hold a wine faire. I know that the girls in Calais, Apolline and Co at another salon de vins, were rocking so I can only think that this appears to be more of a gastronomic faire than a wine faire so we are a bit in the secondary.

            I did have my moments though especially when three groups arrived at the same time and my interpreter was gone. I was hemmed in, pinned down, under the gun so to speak so I just let it rip. Finally one lady asked where I was from and I explained I was an American studying wine and for some reason they all loved it. I told them that if they talk a bit slower we’d all be fine and guess what, they did, and we were. By the time Benôit showed back up I had them all drinking and speaking French and laughing and he just had this look on his face where he couldn’t decide whether to laugh or be impressed. I must note though the next group of people I couldn’t understand a word they were saying and I looked like a total dim wit.

            Later as we drove to the hotel I noticed that this city reminded me of something that I didn’t like, oh god what is it, what is it, oh yeah, Dallas. I mean all I see are huge buildings, not tall but just f’n huge, chain eateries, and a bizillion car dealerships. This is France? I am ready to write the town off until but we head to centre ville and before I know it I realize why people come here with its excellent shopping and cafes and narrow streets and a HUGE cathedral. Rivers converge in this city and we walk along one of them as we try to find a place to eat and we do and it rests between the river and the cathedral and I people watch and drink and enjoy the cigarette smoke from another table. I of course forgot my camera once again. I had thought we were just going to head out the door and get a bite from one of the local chains and had no idea we were headed into the old part of the city. I have to remind myself to strap that bad boy to me at all times. For a former boy scout, I’m horribly prepared it seems for most things coming my way as of late. 

I AM MARLIN PERKINS

            Come on, I know your mind is working a bit overtime with the stress of life or kids or prison but you have to remember Marlon Perkins. I mean that is if you are my age or older or really loved old wildlife TV shows. He was that sweet old white haired man from Mutual of Omaha who showed us the ways of nature and later, when he had a young Brit to set outside the cage so to speak, the dangers of being in the wild. That poor Brit had to have been chased up a tree by more animals than any one else, and then of course there was the anaconda incident that just riveted the holy heck out of me.

            Any way, I am not Marlin Perkins or anywhere near him but I do seem to be entertaining some weird moments with the local fauna. For instance, last Friday I made the long trek in the dark to the Cave to catch a ride at 445 AM to Metz, France. Metz, pronounced, “mess” and it was a mess, is the last stop before Luxembourg and I was set to do another salon des vins up there. That is why I have done no posts for the better part of a week, no Internet and no time. So I round the bend and the moon is full so I feel I can easily see anything or anyone that might be out and about. Now I grew up in the country. I feel that I have a pretty good sense of when something is around and I had a feeling I was not alone. I thought about what kind of animals I knew in the area and the only thing I could think of that could cause me harm was the wild white boars that frequent the area. I just didn’t think they’d be out at this hour but I can’t shake the feeling I am being watched.

            I finally convince myself that it’s one of the stray dogs that inhabit the area which settled me a bit but not knowing what the F is always the hardest part. So I find the Cave and wait and wait and wait and slowly I get the feeling that what ever was out there is now here and as I turn slowly in the black the form of something rather low and long appears before me and then wham!

            “Er! Errrrrrrrr!”

            It’s the damn peacock and if it had given me just another second to figure it out I wouldn’t have left my shoes. This is the third time this damn bird has snuck up on me and let one go. I mean, if you’ve never heard a peacock let loose then you have no idea what I mean, but if you have then you know that it’s nothing like a rooster. I really wish it had been a dog. Speaking of dog…

            Before Paris I was getting ready and was lost in my thoughts and duties for the day and don’t forget the ever-present French words that stream constantly in my mind. Apparently I was so focused that I didn’t hear Prince, the devil dog of death, push the front door open. He’s a stealthy bastard he is. So there I am, getting ready when I turn around to find his huge black frame standing directly behind me. I think my internal scream went supersonic since his ass immediately hit the ground as if the hand of God had smacked it.

            The reason I bring this up is because you would think, especially after I told myself to check and recheck the door when I come and go, that it wouldn’t happen again. But there I was, that night of coming back from Paris, exhausted, sorting out my backpack and such when I turn to find him again. With a quick trip I caught the side of the bed and found the floor. It wouldn’t have been so bad if Prince hadn’t savored the moment so much by coming over and putting one paw on my chest with his nose pressed to mine. All that was missing was the cage and a rabble of carnies. 

            Then to top it off this morning, the morning after returning from Metz I find the answer I had wondered about the night before. When I walked in the door I noticed that Josette had propped my window open, which is nice since it’s been gorgeous here, but there was twigs and weeds on the floor, which didn’t make sense. I told myself that the cat had broken in again, it did it once before and woke me up by kneading my chest at 3 AM, and had tracked in the foliage. No big deal I reckon so I close the window and sweep up the left over. 

            The next morning I grab my box of cereal which rests high on the cabinet and guess what I see? A freakin’ bird’s nest. I just stared at it as if my mind couldn’t comprehend the whole thing. Once I got past that though I realized, uh oh, eggs or worse, chicks. So I push my head into the cabinet because I don’t want to disturb anything yet. Nope, no chicks or eggs but a wonderfully built nest that is fabric lined which I’m pretty sure I’ll be pissed about once I find out where that fabric came from but I leave it and head on down the hill for some work that needs to be done.

            I consider just leaving he window open and to let the bird do what the bird had intended but I realized that it is just a bad idea, especially since I’ll have to close the window sometime, which would cut mom off and that would just be horrible. I take the nest and Josette shows me where they usually nest and set it there and I can only hope, after all of their work, that they find it. Now if I was Marlin Perkins I’d set up the camera and leave the damn window open but I’m just a silly American in Alsace.

Wikipedia - Because Walt Disney had fabricated footage of a mass suicide of lemmings in its film White Wilderness,[6] CBC (at that time) journalist Bob McKeown asked Marlin Perkins if he had done the same. Perkins, then in his eighties, "firmly asked for the camera to be turned off, then punched a shocked McKeown in the face.

He’s a hero to us all.

  

YOU DON'T HAVE TO TELL ME, I'M AMERICAN

            I made it down today into the Cave to get some questions answered. I have been doing translations on the “descriptive” of their various wines. I am to go to Metz this weekend for another salon des vins and am not going to be a waste of space like I was last time in Paris. This time I’m going to be prepared. I will know everything. That is until someone actually asks me something that is totally out of whack or just simply in French.

            I run my questions by Apolline who still retains much of her English even though she left London some eight years ago. Honestly, I think she sits in her home and watches Hollywood movies all night long wearing a bunny suit but that’s just me. I bring up the bunny because she was sure I was messing with her when I mentioned the Easter Bunny. Apparently she was sure only the Euros use a rabbit for its Easter festivities. Later she would come to me and say that she looked it up on the Internet and we have the bunny in Texas because of all of the German who settled there. You should have seen her face when I told her no, America, not Texas, the huge country not just the big one. Remember, Texas, bigger than France.

            So she gets through my questions and for some reason she has now found comfort with me so she begins to tell me about her time visiting my friend, her cousin. She proceeds to tell me a tale of her hairdresser saying with an impossible accent, “France, do ya’ll have electricity?” She regaled me with other such stories of ignorance and said until she met me she had thought all Americans were stupid. The comment was like being slapped because you’re just too pretty. Thanks, but it kind of hurt. I do an anti-Eric thing and play it nice because I’m working abroad and don’t want to upset the balance because she really is a sweet girl who’s not a girl but a woman of my age. I hope to catch her now before she settles into her forties and into a permanent thought on anything.

            I tell her about how things appear here, on the vineyard. How I could view them as bass-ackwards and how many times people have asked me if I carried a gun in Texas and if cowboys roam the streets. Sorry to say folks, no, and no, and the last of the cowboys are in the last states just before Canada. The only thing left in Texas, (man I’m gonna get beat up for this) are the belt buckles, the pressed jeans, and the felt/straw hats.  Texas does have its fair share of cowgirls though and I miss you all. Man you can wear jeans!

            But as I two-step my way back to my point on ignorance she finally hits me with the last straw. “America just doesn’t know the world because of the media.” I sat there bobbing my head and simply said, “Yep. But we are the news.” She started on her slant that their media has a blend of Euro and America and African and Martian and I could only sit there with my translations slowly bobbing my head. Finally I looked up and gave her what I had. I will paraphrase because my memory is nowhere near fail safe. By the way I was a featured extra in Fail Safe with George Clooney but that’s neither here nor there, oh wait, it was Los Angeles.

            “Apolline, first off I watch the news here every night. Three quarters of your so-called balanced news is all on America. Obama, violence, floods, or what star is doing what star. All the entertainment news whether it is music or movies is American. America is huge. Houston, Texas is bigger than the Rhone wine region. Houston is a city, not a state. Do we need more international news? Yes, of course. But what happens over here that truly affects what happens in America? Is the average American’s ignorance on Europe abhorrent, of course? But I give you this, we, you and I, only know what we know and all we can try to be are good to one another. But please don’t take a few small moments in Texas and write off a country that the whole world looks to without ever asking to be looked back at.”

            That’s when she turned to me, turning off her blu-tooth earpiece and said, “what?” 

Just kidding, wouldn’t that have been a bitch?

BTW, ignorance, the word, means unaware of the facts, not stupid. Spread the word all of you anglophiles that have been pissing me off since I was seven. 

JOANIE LOVES CHACHI

            I woke up today with the strangest of cravings. It wasn’t Mexican food, a burger, or even a missed lover. It was for some reason the craving to watch really bad 80’s movies like Fast Times, Summer School, and Zapped. Zapped for some reason topped them all and I haven’t even seen that flick since it came out in ’82 at the local drive in.  I mean really, when was the last time you even thought of Scott Baio?

            So I thought, I wonder if I can explain this movie to my counterparts here on the vineyard. Has my French improved that much to where I can tell them that the main character in this movie literally “zaps” women’s clothes off? Luckily, in hindsight, we were set too far apart in the field for my first attempt and the closest person was a twenty two year old girl who speaks Russian and Beautiful fluently but I was pretty sure she’d have no interest in my experiment so I decided to wait for lunch. I mean who doesn’t want to hear about an aging American comedy involving nudity, photography, and implausible set ups? Pass the wine I got a story!

            But a snag happened and that was once again the language had changed. No one was speaking French today. Some spoke German, others mostly Alsacien, and some not at all. So I thought, I’ll do it at dinner since the afternoon crew was going to be all women and I really didn’t want to creep them out with my stuttering French constantly invoking the word for “naked.”

            Fast forward to dinner and for the love of God it’s Alsacien again. Yes, Alsacien is a language just as French, German, and English are for all that matters.  It starts out with a whisper of French but ends with a decided, albeit weaker, finish of German. Needless to say I am nowhere near getting any of that and honestly haven’t even tried. This is when I realized that I if I want to really learn French I might have to move out of this province that has a decided history of going their own way. Later I leave dinner and all I could think was, how would I ever explain Chachi? Do any of you know he did an episode of Love Boat and Fantasy Island? How come Fantasy Island was never done as a movie? So I had my cravings of cinema today and I know I could hop online and harvest the movie from some website but I have a strict anti-piracy policy for myself so I’ll just have to wait for America.

            On another note altogether, after spending all day out amongst the vines I came home with only my thumbs sunburned. I’m not even remotely kidding. How in the hell does that happen? They even poked fun at me during dinner because my thumbs were brilliantly red. It’s as if I walked around all day giving the thumbs up.  I know right now I could make a Chachi and Fonz connection but I’ll leave it alone even though I really don’t want to. 

DUCK. DUCK. HUH?

When I was in Los Angeles I asked my Nicaraguan friend Manuel how he learned English. He instantly replied with the biggest smile, "cartoons." He would watch the cartoons everyday with his kids who were of that age and that's how he picked it up. So this last Saturday morning I flipped on the tele and low and behold, it's Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. "Cool," I think as I settle back down under the covers for my first learning experience of the day.

WARNING; listening to Donald Duck is absolutely the worst way ever to learn French! 

I suddenly remember I can't even understand him in English and this was just so bad in so many ways. Not to mention the voice they gave Mickey made you want to chew up some coffee beans and load the shotgun.

IT'S WHAT?

In my zeal to eat anything and everything I have to expect now and then to find something that just isn't my thing. The other night the dinner table was set with various plates and meats and sauces and it was all so good but off to the side was a silver tray lined with something I just didn't recognize. So for me that means, let's eat it. So I took a few bites and I realized that the chef was watching me closely, nearly studying my reaction. I was caught in a moment of eating it all out of kindness or risk appearing rude because whatever it was it was not for me. As I moved on to the other edibles on my plate he told me what I had just been eating and it took a few moments for the translation to sink in, duck brains. Yep, I ate duck brains and I can honestly say I did not like it before I knew what it was so I can officially say that I am off brains.

BACK TO WORK - SORT OF, KIND OF, THEN YEP

            I spent the last two days inventing things to do like labeling liquor bottles and then translating all of their wine descriptions into English (Currently I have 14 of 31 done), which would have helped immensely before going to Paris. Apparently it’s like everything else I’ve encountered here, much harder than originally anticipated. As I finished up the labels I heard a rumor that the vineyards mini car/cargo thingamajig (that’s a shout out to you, Becky) was going to be available for like an hour. “I can do some damage in an hour,” I tell myself. I get the keys, l’assurance, some other official document, and a note from the vineyard saying, “please don’t arrest the American.”  Armed with enough paper to stock Kinko’s for a day I depart to the store where I commence to buy every liquid I can find. Liquid is heavy folks and picking up a twelve pack and riding up a mountain on a bike is not my idea of fun.  I did have a moment though at the store when I realized that Stella Artois is outrageously inexpensive here as I bought a twelve pack for 6 Euros. I nearly bought the rack but believe it or not, I even have a stop button.

            Honestly I was in hiding mode since I just wasn’t ready to go back to the field because descende du bois was done and arché was already under way. Let me explain something, due to my countless wrecks on half-pipes I have numerous injuries mostly to my head and hands and arché involves taking the twig vipers I love to hate so much and arching them down to the bottom wire and affixing them with either wire or string. Essentially we make the baguette look like the M from the golden arches without all the guilt and gas. I was more than worried that my hands, that have the dexterity of link sausage, just wouldn’t hold up. Well, today came and there was no turning back as I was due in the field and of course it’s raining, hard, cold rain. My hands already hurt as I step outside.

            Sorry but I have to interrupt this because as I type this the news is on and I watch a hippo open the front door of a house, after stepping on the dog, and walking inside. The camera follows it into a kitchen where a woman is talking about her pet, the hippo, and tossing chunks of whatever into the hippo’s face. Even though it’s being dubbed in French I know it’s got to be an Aussie family. No one else on earth would do that and finally there is a break in the French and I hear clearly…an Australian accent. God bless you silly bastards. I’m sure you’d laugh right now at my spider problem though. BTW, the dog that was stepped on is fine.

            Benôit and I head to the field and for some reason he’s enjoying practicing his English, which is killing my French, and tells me I need pockets. Check, I have pockets but have no idea why I need them. Finally he stuffs a roll of coiled string with a metal core into my pocket. “Ok,” I think, first question answered. Then he hands me another tool that is reminiscent of mon sécateur but has a twisty feature that makes me feel better since I realize I won’t have to be tying the knots myself and that my hands might not be as much of a factor as I thought. Confident, I strut into the rows of twig vipers whispering at most of them that they will soon be mine and this time I’m bringing the pain not vice versa.

            I don’t know how I have any confidence left. Either I truly am an idiot or I really just don’t care enough about making an ass out of myself. The string is properly placed in my pocket so I can pull it out without any resistance and I have my tool and I pull the vine and twist it down as they all ramble at me in various versions of the best way and of course I understand little if any since they are now down to the science and I am still at the stage of ordering coffee in a café sort of French. Ok, I’m not that bad but seriously people talk slower! I finally get it all and pull back with my new tool and all seems well until I spin the tool into the vine essentially locking it to the twig viper. Merde!

            Fast forward an hour and I barely have a hang of it as I either break the wire or attach the tool to the vine or at one point attaching my glove to the vine along with the tool.  I know Benôit was trying to pep me up when he came over and said, “Soon, you realize it is an easy job” but it did nothing for my frustration level. Luckily my glove was stuck to the vine or else I would have slapped him with it. Any way, fast forward seven hours and I have it down and on most rows I’m not the last to finish and in a moment of karma Benôit loses a vine and it swings up and slaps him square across the face. Of course if it had been me, the vine would have carried along with it the tool and my glove just to punctuate my defeat. 

WHY NOT?

If you all out there in blogger land want to send me some ideas of places to go or see and have any questions feel free to contact me at homewild@gmail.com

Come on, you know you want to. Everyone's doing it. Thanks for reading.

AMERICAN GIRLS

            Low and behold there were two American girls here in Alsace who came to visit the vineyard. I was working out front when they walked by and I thought they might be American but, really, honestly, we are out in the middle of nowhere and hardly any Americans even know who we are let alone where. I run some items into the Cave and when I pass them Apolline mouths at me, “American,” so I of course have to say, “Oh…my…God, Americans.” I then continued on with my details since I was more than hungry and ready to be done with the day and the day is not done until the day is done if you know what I’m scratchin’ at.

            Later we all begin to talk and I have to admit it was really nice to finally get to speak and hear some American. Up to that point I might have heard a hundred English words and several of those were from a sweet old lady who tends the vines and who would ask me questions like, “what is this?” and point to something or when she asked me what “mooter fucker” was? Apparently that was my favorite phrase that day when I was avec mon sécateur. I just couldn’t tell her.

            I have to admit that I was very happy that they were good representatives of the good ol’ US of A. One knew French, the other not but more than willing to play along. Both liked wine and travel and didn’t come across at all as ugly Americans. Not to mention they were not ugly at all, attractive actually.  So we tell them about the salon des vins in Paris since the one lives there currently and we give them the info and such and I’m sure that’s the last I’ll see of them.

            Friday, the first real day of the Paris salon des vins and I look up to find them strolling along looking up at all the signs of the individual vineyards and once again I have to go, “Oh my God, Americans.” The funny thing is that back in Bollenberg I was on, happy to be talking and rolling with the dialogue but after the day and a half of being utterly confused in Paris and with the grueling time schedule I was, well, a bit out of it. Not to mention me suddenly speaking English sounded really weird. I felt like the loudest cat in the room and I found myself dialing down any tone I had, which in hindsight probably made me sound more like a mouse than anything.  So I of course screw up, giving them a glass of wine in the wrong order and there is an order and you cannot betray that order and Mr. Gaugin tells them to go away and come back in an hour if they want to try the wine. I am a schmuck. I mean really, yesterday was my first day with the actual wines. The previous three weeks, as you all know by now, have been hard and fast labor. The whole thing was so frustrating at times I’m surprised I wasn’t doing shots of our Brandy.

            So they return in an hour to try the wine and find me tilting back a glass. I just needed a little gusto. They tried the wine and all was well and just when I was struck with the idea of seeing what they were doing later an old, crazy, and I mean crazy lady sidled right up next to me and was not letting me get away. She had decided here and now she was going to practice her English. Me, I was totally hoping to have a night of English and fun and to get away from the night I was supposed to have. You see Benôit’s fiancée was coming into town and he made her sound very unhappy about, well, everything. Let’s see, hang out and be a third wheel involving a language I don’t speak, or, do the town with people who know Paris and speak English? Welcome to the no brainer part. I mean I don’t even know if they would have been up for it but it was at least worth a shot. But no, I got a full discourse on some obscure philosopher and why I should drop everything and learn why he was who he was and all that jazz.  So after several beats of them watching this gnarly looking woman they say “best of luck” and are gone. It would be the last English I would here for two days outside of Benôit.

            BTW, if you are those American girls reading this, Canaille means “roguish scoundrel.”  For you other people, you’ll just have to buy the book.

THOUGHTS & WHATNOTS FROM PARIS

1)            I am not tall in Paris, merely average. I guess I am only tall in the countryside, which makes sense if I had any.

2)            I still don’t physically fit into many things though, like most cars. I also have extreme difficulties with restrooms. When I sat in one at the hotel in Paris my forehead rested squarely against the wall. I ended up sliding the towel over a bit so I’d have a pillow. Also the showers are more than a bit undersized. Every time I would turn or reach or scrub I would hit the lever for the water effectively killing it. A five minute shower became thirty. I wish I were kidding. I feel very clumsy here, as I seem to be running into and over almost everything including one poor soul at the wine faire. She never stood a chance. I should probably start a scholarship in her name.

3)            If you’re wearing a lab coat no one questions you.

4)            Everyone and I mean everyone has killer frames here when it comes to glasses. I saw a ninety-year-old man with his grand son who had the most exceptional red frames. If they had had an engine it would have been a Ferrari.

5)            Knee high boots and black stretch pants/hose seem to be the uniform of Parisian women.  Somewhere there is a country out there with no black hose or knee high boots to taunt their men with because Parisian women have bought them all.

6)            Women janitors in France do not wait for you to exit before they start cleaning the restroom. If you act like you’re going to wait for them to leave they will just point at the urinal and go about their duties. You could always tell a Brit or an American just by watching them enter and literally shudder when they would realize how it was all going to go down.

7)            Pregnant women sampling wine and no one thinking this to be strange was what I found to be strange.

8)            18-year-old kids sampling wine and looking 14 makes you feel criminal in some regards.

9)            2HOT4U. A KFC promo I always saw in the Parisian Metro. I wonder who thought this to be a good idea or if any thinking was involved at all. Sure, most of them speak a bit of English but think about this, they will read it as deux-o-quatre-oo! The numbers are obvious but they also don’t pronounce the H, ever, plus rarely the last letter, and U will never be thought of as YOU. Great marketing.

10)         The Parisians are so thoughtful they dress their roadside stanchions for the cold.

           

11)            Moments you wish you hadn’t missed. Like the naming of the restaurant above. I sincerely hope it was either induced by booze, ignorance, or possibly the nickname of a former/current wife.  Either way I feel saddened that I missed his revelation.

12)            And lastly, just because you speak French that does not make you hot. It will however give you an extra point on top of what you would be if you simply spoke English. Let’s say you’re reasonably attractive, a 7.5, and now you suddenly speak French you can just bump that up to an 8.5. If you’re ugly you’re ugly but you’re the first to be taken at two in the morning when the lights come on.

SORRY, MORE POSTS TO COME

I was thinking that I'd have more time in Paris with the wine faire to get out and see Paris once again but I ended up working 60 hours in 6 days and that didn't even include setting up each day and then the ultimate take down mad rush of 586 other vineyards scrambling to get out. It was kind of crazy and I'll fill you all in soon.

WHAT DOES YOUR BACKPACK HOLD?

            I finished fixing up the bike I found in the shed and decided to get some essentials. It felt great to race down the mountain thinking the whole time that if I crash without a helmet my sister will kill me but that didn’t stop me. I was going so fast that it pulled the tears in my eyes all the way back to my ears.  I know I’ll regret the whole thing since it’s easy to go down the mountain, but it’s going to be a bitch to get back home. But as I rocket off the mountain road onto the bike lane that jockeys the highway I didn’t care. I was free and able to go and do what I wanted without anyone having to take me and wait on me.

            I used this time to do some much needed shopping in Issenheim. It’s a little town that rests at the base of the mountain but across vineyards and farms so it’s not like I can coast from my front door there. Luckily I remembered how the mother got there a week ago although I did say a few times to myself, “this doesn’t look familiar.” Shopping at a French market takes just a second to get used to especially once you realize where their priorities lie. For instance, they have a whole side of an aisle dedicated to chocolate. On the other side of that it is cereal, which takes up about as much space as four offensive linemen. Not a whole lot when you think about our stores and how they have a super long aisles filled with every cereal including much of what you would never eat in the first place.

            I only get the essentials since I am riding back up a mountain and don’t need crap slapping back and forth against my handlebars or whatnots. Start the drum roll and…my little backpack easily holds four bars of soap, spaghetti, a bike tube, box of cereal, loaf of bread, cheese, and nine rolls of toilet paper. Put that in you smoke and pipe it!

I'M TALL IN FRANCE

            I was strolling down the mountain and realized I hadn’t checked out the hotel yet so I thought I’d give it a gander. As I made my way to the front door a little old tourist lady stepped out and looked me up from head to toe with her mouth so wide I thought of uncapping the beer bottle I had stuffed in my jacket.

            The following day I went with the father to pick up a refrigerator truck in Colmar and when we entered the renter guy, God only knows what he is in French, looked me up and down and then back again. OK, what is going on? I tried to ask the father what the problem was but he was more concerned about whether I really could legally drive his car back to the estate. “Hell yeah I can!” I replied and we were off. (See previous post)

            I forgot about all of the above until I was having drinks with Apolline that night and I told her what had happened. By the way, I was totally mistaken, she knows way more English than I do French and since she lived in London for a time her English comes with that accent. It’s cute; I’ll admit it, especially since I find the English accent about as attractive as a uni-brow.  She immediately knew what was up and told me that I am really really tall! I had to laugh at all of that since, yes, I’m taller than everyone here but I’m not Shaq, or even his pants for that matter, but here they don’t expect anyone over 5’8” and I’m just a bit over 6. It made me think of earlier in day when a girl was trying to jump and put a wooden box back on top of a locker. I stopped her, took the box, and slid it up on top of the other boxes and went about my way. I heard her mutter sweetly in French “who needs a ladder” in which I simply replied.

            “Je suis la échelle.” (I am the ladder)

            She turned red since she didn’t know I could understand her. It was all making sense, the words mostly; the French girls are still a bit of a mystery but that’s a whole other blog or book or Oprah. Does Oprah still have a show?

GIVE ME THE KEYS! I GOT A TOURIST VISA!

            I drove for the first time from Colmar back to Rouffach. I’ve never driven in a foreign country before and Mexico and Canada don’t count, not in my book anyway.  So not only was it my first time driving in France it was also the first time I drove a stick in six years. Sure I’ve moved cars with a stick but driving is driving and it felt great. I totally want to get rid of my auto when I get back to the states. I forgot how much fun sticks are but I do have to remind myself that in L.A. I wanted to kill myself every other day due to the traffic. My thighs would actually cramp at holding the clutch and such. Any way, I approached my first roundabout, you know, one of those circle type intersections with the roads that tentacle off? I entered and skipped out the other side without any flair and I thought, “Huh, that wasn’t so bad.” It kind of makes sense to never have to stop. I came to the second of about thirty roundabouts and low and behold as soon as I got into the intersection a late 80’s Dodge Caravan careened out of nowhere and nearly side swiped me. First off, who cares about the near accident? What I’m concerned about is the fact that a late 80’s Caravan is still on the road! I don’t even think there are any late 80’s Dodge Caravans left anywhere in the States and here is one in Eastern France driving all willy nilly. I thought they had all either rusted away or just plain blown up. Wouldn’t it be ironic though if it were a Detroit family funster that killed me while driving in France. I think so.

TOUR DE FRANCE

Finding a bike in a shed – Zero dollars

Finding a bike shop – Zero dollars

Items bought to fix said bike – 70 euros

Ability to leave the vineyard on my own and tool around the French country side – Priceless

RIGHT THE WRONGS - TWO WEEKS IN

            Things that have changed.

1)            Prince, the dog, now loves me. We rubbed it out and now the devil’s toss off will do my bidding. Granted I won’t be keeping bacon in my pockets.

2)            Apolline knows way more English than I do French. Imagine.

3)            When they speak, I hear words, not just sounds. It’s a start.

4)            I have internet

5)            I have a new nemesis in the form of a giant peacock.

6)            I have weaned myself from French game shows.

            Things that haven’t changed.

1)            The English are still on my shit list.

2)            I still have no phone.

3)            I don’t have internet…sometimes.

4)            Wine is divine.

5)            Belgium beer is wicked good.

6)            Although I don’t watch the game shows, I miss them.

MY NAME'S LABOR. MANUAL LABOR.

            Like I mentioned before this week the whole vineyard was abuzz with it’s first salon du vin (wine faire) of the season. It’s a hive of activity and I am the only one who stops and that is to pull out my bite sized French dictionary to look up every third.  The good part is that slowly but surely what they say is becoming actual words and not just sounds smushed together in a impossible hodgepodege of oo’s and uh’s and poo’s and puh’s. OK, who giggled when they read poo?

            So I got ready to pitch in and do whatever necessary since my nose is broken, figuratively, I’m sick, which kills the whole drinking and learning wine aspect of this experience. Little did I know they would take my offer and run with it in a way I hadn’t expected because once again I was in the distillers area amongst huge kettles all the while wondering, “what in the hell am I back here for?” Well folks, it was suddenly now my task to strip, polish, and refurbish not only the copper but all the painted surfaces as well. Ah hell, how bad can it be, right? I mean polishing has to be way worse than the painting just like descende du bois has to be harder than bottling. I know I’ve referred to myself as an idiot before and I’ll do it again right here, and probably for the rest of my life for that matter.

            In between paint strokes I was pushing around thousand pound stacks of booze destined for the wine faire. I’m getting a good work out and I’m still sick but I think all the work is helping me. I know I could sit down and watch my French game shows I miss already but what’s the point. I go to Paris next week and by looking at the truck we are taking it can’t be that bad and I doubt they salon du vin from early morn to night so I should be able to get to check out the city I miss so much.

            It takes me three days to finish the alambics (liquor stills) and a fourth for touch ups, which is perfect timing since tonight is the start of the big to-do. I wish I had taken a picture before because the place looks amazing now. I just had no idea how much work I would be doing. It all sounded so simple in the beginning. I guess most things do, eh?

WHAT'S YOUR DEFINITION OF ILLEGAL?

            The reason I ask is because I woke up with the sudden reality that the authorities think I’m in Switzerland, right? I mean that is where I got stamped and that is the door I walked out of and the nice gentleman at the French customs literally took my word, actually he didn’t even take the time to do that, and just waved me through. I wonder if this will cause a dilemma later or will it work in my favor since technically it is illegal for me to stay inside France for longer than ninety days. I wonder what other countries I can sneak into?

SO I FINALLY HAD A BAD DAY

            By the end of Monday my throat has seized up in that “oh my god it hurts to swallow” sort of way. I never get sick. I also never get sick from food but I proved that wrong last week. By the time I left the field, yep, I was back in the field for the day, I was totally exhausted and my throat was not having the cool air anymore. No worries, I’ll drink some OJ, eat a little soup at dinner, have a good meal and go to sleep early for a change. Guess what? I did all the above, including the sleep, and I woke up really well and ready for the day but then as I made the trek down the hill I began to feel it. That achy feeling that is not the “I hit the gym to hard yesterday” achy but that “shit” achy. I try my best to suppress it but by lunch I’m totally beat and since we are getting ready for a big wine fair at the estate we are cleaning anything and everything and we are using cleaning agents and the vapors slice my throat into tender ribbons before I move on to polishing the copper stills. The copper dust is the last straw but I continue mostly because I don’t know how to say, “calling it a day, I’m shit out of it so that means you are too.”

            At the end of the day the mother drops by and gives me three small stalks of what looks like “A Peanut’s Christmas” tree and tells me to make a tea out of it, add a lemon, and a spoonful of honey. I have no idea what it is but I’m sick enough I don’t care and I immediately set the tea into motion. What I found surprising is just how this tiny kitchen already had everything I needed. Something to boil water, check, large glass coffee pot to seep said Christmas tree, check, a large strainer that easily accomadated a coffee filter to catch all the debris, check, one sick ass American ready for relief, double check. It actually tastes quite nice and is rather soothing. I just hope the tiny Christmas trees aren’t a psycho trope and end up in the yard wearing my winter jacket as a diaper screaming in Spanish…since that’s the language I most frequently revert to in times of stress.

BLACK DEVIL

            I had a few moments before lunch was served and my jacket was just too much for the day so I made the trek up to the apartment to drop it off. As I approach I notice the gate is once again closed so I key myself in through the door next to the gate. I get two steps in and I stop as I look at Prince’s cage. If you don’t recall Prince is the 130lb giant Schnauzer that wants to see me dead.  These are the moments that I thank my lucky stars for having the parents I had and for also living in New York. Always be aware of your surroundings and if you have a bad feeling then there is a reason for that said feeling.

            Although I can’t see him in his cage that doesn’t mean he’s not there since he actually lives in an old wine cask. Appropriate don't you think? I stand there, two paces from the door, eyeing and listening for anything and everything until finally, thirty feet away hiding behind a tree is Prince. I can barely make him out but once he realizes that I realize he’s out it's on! I rush back through the gate and although it was a mere two paces he still nearly got me! Jesus mother of holy God! Prince lunges up on the fence with barely a try and his teeth reach the height of my forehead. Tricky little devil I think but this is where the next problem arises. The key, that I have to use to lock the gate that really doesn’t stay shut on it’s own is just inside the gate…still in the lock. It’s an ancient metal key with the old style head and I have to turn it a full rotation but Prince isn’t going anywhere and I’m not sticking my hand in there to turn it.

            So I stand there for about three minutes holding the gate closed and finally something catches Prince’s attention long enough for me to reach through the hole and turn the key. SNAP! The gate is locked and I am now safe and Prince’s blood lust will have to wait another day. Of course as soon as I finally get the lock affixed the father comes racing up in the car apologizing profusely. He had forgotten to tell me that the black heathen of death was out today. No worries, seven days down, eighty-three more of me cheating death.

JENNY CRAIG AIN'T GOT S*!T ON ME

            Before I left Michigan I was laying on the couch watching TV when my sister noticed something she’d never seen before, me, with a belly. I had begun to notice it about two months before but did absolutely nothing about it except tempt it with booze and Mexican food. I was also experiencing another thing I had never experienced before and that was when I would jog up a set of steps or the like I could feel the fat on my front slide up and down. Now I will guarantee you that if you are the typical American and you saw me you’d say I was skinny. I prefer thin since I do have muscle, skinny is when you can see bones, but here I was…heavy. I weighed myself and I was ten pounds heavier than I ever have been and I was heavy into racing and weights not so long ago and muscle is way heavier than fat. (I know that a pound of fat weighs the same as a pound of muscle but you know what I mean)

            You want to lose weight? I mean really lose some weight?! Go to England, get poisoned, then head to France and work like a madly inspired devil dog, taming vines and hand slinging nearly five thousand bottles and then pushing around thousand pound carts of booze. Fast-forward to Thursday night after I get out of the shower and low and behold my five pack is back. I could never get the six-pack but five is just fine. I knew I had lost some weight since I had to wear a belt on Tuesday to keep my jeans up out in the field but this was just plain crazy especially with how much food I have been eating. Now all I need is a long haired dictionary to show it off to.