Bits & Pieces
A mixed week - Tyson does good, we go to a wine wedding and the EU makes an important change in the law. By Kate.
How I wish we were heading for the dog days. Apparently, we are to abandon all thought of a summery August and this week it rained and rained and generally sulked. Today hints of better prospects but I have lost my faith and my tan, both of which were looking promising in early June. I am longing for it to be so hot that I don’t need clothes and I can’t sleep and the summer nights are heavy with the scent of a hot city. None of these conditions are necessarily attractive or pleasant when they are here but they have been absent so long that the passage of time has rendered them highly desirable.
I cannot even console myself with wine as I am detoxing in a bid to regain some energy. Nineteen turbulent, non-stop months have assailed me since my last holiday and I feel it. So since I cannot drink I conjure fond memories instead, fantasizing about wines like the incredible Rose made by our friends at Caot Mailloles - Canta Manana .
So, to other bits of news this week, and all of it good.
Email from Tyson to say that he had laid on a wine dinner for a group of the higher brass at Spier, where he is now working, and it was very well received. On the strength of that he has been asked to do another and he will shortly be meeting with someone very important in marketing to discuss how he can help in selling wine to the emerging black market.
This cheered me up considerably. Getting our next person over here from South Africa
Another highlight of the week was an incredibly rare Friday social event that saw Jude and I all dressed up and attending a very glamorous party to celebrate the marriage of Tim Atkin and a lovely South African lady called Sue. We didn’t even begin to do it justice though. We arrived late, having finished work late in East Dulwich and then battled traffic home to Queens Park
I was feeling almost too tired to go out, but that wine is magical stuff. Two glasses (served not too cold, in a wine glass for maximum aroma) completely sorted me out and with my lipstick on I was ready for anything. Arriving at the party I was giddy with excitement just to be among lots of fabulously dressy people, and I do so love weddings; they tend to completely banish my cynicism and stress. It was a very good mix of wine-y, not at all wine-y, and South African people and the music was good.
Jude was not having fun though. I was somewhat impressed when we walked in and he was immediately pounced on by an elegantly dressed lady who seemed to know an awful lot about him. I gossiped with my friend Ursula, who finally leant forward and whispered that the elegant one thought Jude was Jay Rayner - a confusing situation for both her and Jude as I can’t say that his bemused answers to her many questions were quite what she was expecting. This did not put him in a good mood. Especially not when Ursula pointed out Jay Rayner later and, while certainly not an unattractive man, he definitely has at least a decade on Jude. 
Jude Liddle
Jay Rayner
Then he said that being there made him want to smoke which is of course the number one most forbidden activity since The Stroke. To top it all the rigours of the previous very long days began to tell on us and we lasted about an hour and a half before packing it in. There was not even a semblance of dancing but still, it was a great mini party.
Finally, news came this week that the EU has at last decided to allow producers to put grape varieties on wine labels, in a desperate attempt to stop the loss of market share to the New World . I do think that this is on the whole a good thing. Those who make great wines which taste unmistakeably of the place they are from (who thus have a greater reason for putting a place name instead of a variety on the label) now have the choice to give consumers a bit more information. On the other hand, in the hurly burly world of bad commercial wine I don’t really care what any of them do. On balance, though, anything that makes wine less confusing is to be applauded, so hurrah for that!
Jude Liddle
Jay Rayner
Then he said that being there made him want to smoke which is of course the number one most forbidden activity since The Stroke. To top it all the rigours of the previous very long days began to tell on us and we lasted about an hour and a half before packing it in. There was not even a semblance of dancing but still, it was a great mini party.
