The Wrath of the Grape

It is very cold here in the winter. We have to escape the deep freeze. We choose to not get warm using the method of Sam Mcgee, so instead, we head to South Miami Beach for 3 weeks each year. We have to go when it is President's Day, for the sales - particularly at Macey's. My wife is very fond of Macey's on President's Day! We also try to hit an event. We used to go on tours, but over the past 12 years we have done most, if not all, of the interesting ones. Two years ago, we went the Wine and Food Festival, but at $150 a pop, it was a flop. We vowed never to go again. Last year we had tickets to the Comedy Festival, but I felt too parky so we passed it by. Mostly we just enjoy summer in February and March, but this year we got intrigued once again by the Wine and Food Festival, particularly a seminar about "Ice Cream and Champagne Sharing". Now I am an aficionado of both ice cream and the bubbly. We purchased 2 tickets. I will let you know the outcome later, if I survive.

But this is not about my love of good champagne, it is about fear. If you have been a reader from the start, you might recall I have had a couple of falls caused by PD. I also had an odd PD gait one early morning. I didn't fall, I just couldn't control my feet and I felt that if I stopped, I wouldn't get going again. I ended up ankle deep in a puddle, with 3 people looking at me with just a hint of disgust - a drunk, so early in the morning! My fear is that I will have a few glasses of wine, encounter fenistation and weave my way toward home ending up flat on my face with an audience. My ordinary PD stride lacks control at the best of times, but with added champagne encouragement, I am afraid I might make a spectacle of myself.

Too bad, I am going to enjoy the seminar to the maximum.

I just thought of the opening lines of that Scottish poem The Ballad of Sir Patrick Spens

The king sits in Dumfermline town.
Drinking the blude-red wine

That will be me, king for a day, with my trusty wife to hold me up.

I would like to thank everyone who has contacted me, by email, with their comments and also thank you for your condolences on the passing of my mother.

“I feel a very unusual sensation – if it is not indigestion, I think it must be gratitude.”
Benjamin Disraeli