39 and holding

Today is my birthday! Officially my age, waist and I.Q. are now the same number; a confluence of astrological unity that has an ebb and flow of time and space and many beers and an occasional cigar in my future....

The celebration began yesterday. The Home Vacation Team's intent was to travel to the shore again, but when the weather report reads 100% chance of rain, there's no reason to make an attempt. Instead, we saw a matinee of Michael Mann's new film, Public Enemies; a beautiful movie, if predictable story. We exited the theater into a soft summer rain that became steadily fiercer as we drove along the flooded streets. I avoided the highway for we had some time to kill. We were going to the Hopewell Valley Winery's Friday happy hour which began at 5 p.m. The winery is along Yard Road just outside of Pennington. We had been there before to purchase a bottle and had enjoyed their award winning Chambourcin at the NJWGA event we had attended last spring. We had signed up for email announcements and finally we decided to go to their Friday happy hour.

There was a jazz quartet playing in a cavernous back room of the wine store. Individual pizzas were available for $6.00 and wine was for sale either by the bottle or glass. We arrived just before the event offically began at 5, but there were a few people already seated and drinking. Evidently the "hours" were very loose. We settled in at a table with a bottle of Chamourcin, $15.95, ordered a pie and watched the place steadily fill up. Other people arrived with their own food and some splayed out on their table an array of snacks. It was very nice and a light jovial athmosphere was pervasive. We could have stayed through the evening, even after we had drained our bottle, but our moveable feast had us heading over to the Triumph Brewery again to play trivia!

After a quick sandwich at the house and a change of clothes; it had gotten noticeably cooler after the rain had stopped; we drove down into town and walked across the bridge into New Hope. We ordered beers, $5.00. Janet and I first had an Irish Red, which had a subtle smoky flavor and signed in as BIM to play trivia. We were neck and neck with a bunch of kids across the bar from us signed in as ROY. They smoked us with all the rap questions, but eventually we won the overall game! After a couple of more beers we weaved back across the bridge to NJ pausing to marvel at the beautiful endless Delaware and the rolling hills shilouetted by a half moon and life just seemed to be in the right place.

For a vacation from home you could do a lot worse....

Today for my birthday we are heading into Philadelphia for a Mexican dinner.

How old am I you may ask? 39 and holding........................................................