Weather and Projects

After some very warm spring weather over the past couple months, May is turning out to be cool and wet. Which helps with project number one - reseeding a section of the lawn. For the most part I'm anti-lawn. But with a kid and a dog, it's good to have a good utility surface for play.

Not all that

We just finished a long weekend here in Canada known as Victoria Day. Just about everyone takes the time to not think about Queen Victoria for whom it is named. Out here in the West, it generally rains on campers despite the previous weekends and weeks being terrific weather. We did not camp, preferring to do some house projects and such to make the real good weather weekends coming soon more enjoyable. We also volunteered at an aid station at the half way point of the Peach City Marathon - water, e-load, hammer gel, bananas, sponges.
It was great having three days off and no where to go.

Recent efforts

Just finished blending the Stag's Hollow 2002 Merlot Estate. It's a good vintage and should be well received. There's plenty of varietal expression and I think a fairly good representation of the barrel work. About 60% American oak (year old or newer).
I'll probably continue along these lines for the 2004 harvest. I think the 2002 was picked a tad late; some of the fruit tastes a little tired or cooked. There's a bit of raisin to this and slightly more so in the Renaissance version.