Bah. Day 4? 5?

It's all just blending together. Not sure what day it is, but I know that I'm in the state of California.
But I do have my notebook, which I've been writing in, so I will reference that for today's blog.

Wednesday night Jay, Toy, me, and the shark-man himself (Kyle) went out for sushi. We ate a million rolls and drank a ton of japanese beer and sake. Kyle, aside from being unfazed by the infamous great white sharks, is a winemaker {"vintner"}, and he has a dog, DOG [dee-o-ghee]. His hands are stained a deep purple, almost black, from working with the grapes.

Yesterday, Thursday, I went to work with Toy @ Bridlewood Winery to learn all there is to know about wine. It's beautiful here; the grapes, the hills, the horses. I hung out in the office for a bit while Toy got some work done. She gave me the "bible" with all of the information about wine. Here are some things that I learned:
-Top 3 US States in terms of wine consumption: CA, NY, FL
-Why swirl? Because when you swirl your wine you invite oxygen into the glass, which allows the aromas to escape (if you taste or smell vanilla, the wine was most likely aged in oak casks)
-One bottle of wine has 2.4 pounds of grapes.
-Bacchus: the Greek and Roman God of Wine
-The horses @ Bridlewood are named Oprah (cause she's a big, black powerful woman), Charlie, Dr.Pepper, Cannon & Utah. There were a few more, but I didn't like them as much as I liked these horses.
-Fermentation: the process that occurs when yeast changes the sugar in grapes into alcohol and carbon dioxide.
-Tannin: a bitter compound found in the seeds, stems & skin of grapes, and is extracted from wooden barrels. It is quite astringent and causes a puckering sensation in the front of the mouth.
-Tannic: word used to describe wine in which tannins overpower the fruit and other elements. A tannic wine is not well-balanced.

In the afternoon, Juan took me on a tour. First, you crush the grapes. Not with your feet people, they use a machine. Then the wine ferments with yeast in steel containers for 2-3 weeks. After this they are moved into barrels where they will sit for anywhere from a year to 3 years. At Bridlewood they use 75% French Oak and 25% American Oak barrels. I drank unfiltered, still fermenting white wine - it was cloudy, still very fruity, and tasted almost like a white-wine spritzer or a mamosa. Similar to sparkling wine. Juan's job is to taste and test wine. Difficult, I know. He said sometimes you "just dont want to drink anymore wine" hahaha. He also told me that the best way to learn about wine is to drink drink drink. SO I took his advice, starting right then and there, and proceeded to drink for the rest of the day, and into the evening. Around 4 pm Jbird picked me up and we headed to the Red Barn , a local and famous spot. Jay and I sipped cocktails for a couple hours until Toy met up with us. After that we headed to some other bar, where we drank some more drinks! Debauchery should be today's word.

This morning I'm feeling a tad-bit hungover, which serves me right. I'm going to sip some tea and prepare for what the rest of the day has in store for me. Jay is getting done work early, so we will get to go for a surf. Definitely need to rest up for that...

California : (Day 2) & Day 3

Yesterday was lovely. It began with getting a perfectly brewed Americano (well, not as great as Julia makes them, but pretty damn good) at a small cafe down the street. Toy, Clancy (toy's son) and I headed out for some breakfast then came home. Toy was feeling "sick" so she couldn't make it to work that day...

I took myself for a long walk around Lompoc, enjoying the sunshine and bopping in & out of a few antique stores and thrift shops. Got some cute little goodies, which is great because all I have with me is my not-so-warm-weather-friendly clothes that I had packed for Seattle. Jbird let me borrow some flip flops too, so now I almost have a california wardrobe.

When I got back from my walk, I sat outside with the dogs and started a new book, compliments of Julia, Tom Robbins "Skinny Legs and All". Ruby, the cattle dog, was dead set on helping me read, so she sat on my lap. Around 3pm, Toy came outside declaring that it was cocktail hour!! Now just a bit of FYI about Toy - she runs Bridlewood Winery. She's the real deal. So not only did we drink some fabulous wine - but I got a bit of an education about the process and art of winemaking and drinking. Also during our back-porch afternoon happy hour Toy and I talked about everything. Turns out that she lived in Japan for 5 months teaching businessmen english. Singing Karaoke, dancing at random japanese techno-bars, and eatting crazy foods. We talked about life, traveling (the importance of!), animals, love, and of course - WINE!

Jay got home about an hour before sunset, so we quickly hopped in the truck, loaded in the dogs, and headed to Surf Beach. I said that it looked like fun out there -- and then Jay ruined it for me. His buddy has been stalked by a great white three different times at this spot. This guy, KNOWING that there was a great white hanging out in the line-up, continued to surf here!! I know -- it doesn't make sense to me either. SO anyways, the third time that this guy was out there, he saw the shark again. And again, he just stayed in the water. Well a few minutes later the great white shark took a HUGE chunk out of this guys surfboard. I'm talking all three fins - gone. This guy is lucky to have his legs!! ANd you know what -- he was out there surfing just the other day. If I move out here to California, I CERTAINLY will NOT be surfing Surf Beach. I love my limbs, and I plan to keep them. When I was walking off the beach all I could hear were those two notes....

Today (wed) is day 3. Toy just left for work, and I'm about to cruise down to that Cafe and grab some caffeine. I am definitely planning on working on some of my new tunes, and for those of you who haven't checked out my youtube yet then shame on you!! www.youtube.com/cailincallahan Tonight we have plans to go out for SUSHI mmm with Jay and Toys' friend Kyle. I'll be sure to report about it all tomorrow!! Gotta go now, the little attack-kitten is using my pants as a play toy.