Getting old is a bitch!

The subject title may seem odd for a blog about our New Zealand trip but bear with me. As Ernie & Joelle started to read my entries, they both started to remind me of all the other stuff we've done and I didn't mention. When I try to garner a little sympathy for an old mind, they basically say suck it up and get with the program. Maybe not in those actual words but definitely with the looks. Thank God for family!

So here are some of the things they reminded me of and I can't believe they didn't get mentioned in this journal.

We went to Huia Winery the other day to have lunch with Joelle (she works in the vineyard there). We picked up several meat pies (similar to the pot pies that one makes in the states except the stores serve them already coked and ready to go). She arrived at the winery tasting room about the same time we did except she came in on the tractor. What fun! Ok, so maybe only a city girl would think riding a tractor would be fun. Just call me silly. After lunch, we got a personal tour through the winery and got to taste some wine right out of the tank. Ernie and I thought that was so cool and we were so lucky to get a chance to do that.

We then went on to Forrest Winery to visit Trevor (our son-in-law who works in the front office of his winery) and tour his winery. Trevor introduced us to the winemaker Chris and we then got to try several white wines directly from the tanks and a few reds from the barrel. Twice in one day. Just call me ecstatic!!!! So Joelle just pointed out that we got better treatment from our son-in-law than we did from our daughter. Thank you Trevor!

Joelle is putting Ernie and I to work - and here we thought we were retired. We're going to do some labeling at Huia next week. Seems they have a shipment that needs to go out and the wine needs to be relabeled so they need extra hands. The bad news is that we don't have a NZ tax number so they can't pay us, the good news is that since they can't pay us with money, they're going to pay us out with wine. Oh gee, does life get much better than that?

Oh, oh, oh......we are also going to be working at a pooh-fling. They actually call it a 500 prep. I guess pooh-flinging conjures up other images and raises some questions as to what goes on in an bio-dynamic vineyard. They actually make a 'tea' from the cow manure and then dilute it in water. The tea is then put in barrels on a trailer and the trailer is pulled through the vineyard while workers fling the tea on the grapevines using long handled brushes.

As I said earlier, we are heading into winter but we've just had a 'warm snap' to the weather and now the cherry tree in their yard is blooming. Hopefully the out-of-season bloom won't cause a problem.

Again, thank you family for reminded me things I forgot to list! Hope y'all have a great day!