Hi ALL

Its been a little while, I know...I really am not being very good about posting, am I ?!?!

I think mostly its because this time of year it is pretty quiet around here (...boring..?) and there's not much to pass along.

The winter, since the holidays, has been fairly cold and wet...we got about 12 inches of snow here and about 20 inches in Chateauneuf in early January....A RECORD for around here.

My friend Jean Marie tells me that his father-in-law, who has lived herre all his life, had not seen snow like that since 1956! (Jean Marie had never seen so much here at one time). Needless to say, the community was snowbound for about a week. I had to use the tractor to make a path for me to get the car out of the driveway (and had to shovel a bunch to make clearance for the gate to swing open and shut). When the 'plow' came down the road, of course it left me with a nice pile of snow across the entrance to the drive - so I used the tractor to break it all up and smash it down. Helped out the neighbors with their driveway as well.

Since then, it has been off and on rain and clear...but generally cool (30's and 40's). So that has made it a little difficult to finish the work in the vineyard (pulling up dead vines to make way for replanting). Its hard on the vineyard to run the heavy tractor between the rows when it is really wet - they compact the soil. I DID get all the trimmings 'raked' up and burned, so any left-over mildew on the trimmed branches will not infect the vineyard.

And then - today - we got another round of snow!!! For crying out loud its MARCH...its PROVENCE !!..its THE SOUTH of France.!!!!

The forecast calls for cold weather for the next couple of days, so I'm sure the snow won't go away 'till the end of the week. Oh well...at least its real pretty !! And I have lots of books and DVD's to keep me occupied in the house (thank you Amazon.com.UK).

For those of you on my e-mail list, you will know that the second shipment of the 2008 red reached Seattle in late January. I got a report this week that the wine is still selling nicely - they have sold about 1/2 the shipment (which was twice the size of the first one) in the first 5 weeks!!! So you are all doing the job I asked you to do!! KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK !!!!
Remember: ALL I ASK IS A BOTTLE A WEEK!!!!

Also, it looks like we will be bringing the 2009 ROSE into Seattle in the Spring - I am hoping to receive a Purchase Order from Noble in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully the wine will arrive in time for the BREAST CANCER CLIMB DINNER at BRASA! Watch for more news on that soon.

On a personal note, I am continuing to work on getting a French drivers license (Permit de Conduire). It is REALLY TOUGH!! The written portion is very difficult - you must answer 36 out of 40 questions corfrectly, and the questions may have multiple correct answers. Taken together with the fact that it is all in French, and my language skills are good but not perfect.....I have been struggling to get over the 30 correct hurdle....quelle dommage.....SO I go to the 'Auto Ecole' every evening for about 1 hour and study. Of course there are NO English speakers around to help..so it is a bit frustrating.....oh well...c'est la vie en france. I'll just keep sluggin away at it.

Other than that, things are good. Looking forward to Spring and Summer - warm weather, sun, exploring, vineyard work, clients for the wine........and VISITORS!?!?!?!

Be well out there.

Ciao