The last few months have been trying at best. After writing the last post, it seems Sarah's (and thus mine) worlds got quite a bit more topsy-turvy. Her father, Colin, became ill and was sent to the hospital. The doctors found he had a collapsed valve in his heart and was arranged to fly down to Vancouver for further testing and possible operation depending on if they think he is able to withstand the surgery. Having decided he was able to withstand open heart surgery, they proceeded only to have him -unknowingly to them - suffer a stroke during surgery that prevented his recovery. He was left on life support and brought back to Penticton. Once Paul had come down from FSJ, they decided to take him off life support and let the chips fall where they may. Colin Brown died just over 12 hours later at about 5:25am on Dec. 8th.
I miss him and so do Sarah and Judy. Every once in a while they get pictures of him sent by well meaning relatives without forewarning. It comes as a shock to see him in those pictures looking so alive and smiling; it strikes me as poor judgement to send pics without warning but there it is.
Anyway, his vigil took place on the weekend just before my last final one which i did not do as well as i had hoped. I could have gotten a postponement until Jan. but I chose to get it over and done with so that I did not have to study over the holidays.
My parents arrived a couple weeks later and stayed with us making the holidays much more bearable and enjoyable.
Since that time I completed my last semester at UBCO and got my degree in Biochemistry with wine option. Professor Saucier arrived from France and is a very nice man and introduced me to Monsieur Madevon, winemaker and chief viticulturalist of Osoyoos Larose, a joint venture between Vincor and Taillan Group of France. I have been working in their vineyards for almost 2 months now and have started on the watering crew due to my experience with irrigation in the past. So far they have had me attend forklift training, repairing wires and posts, working with the regular crew for all stages (suckering, shoot thinning, tucking, raising wires). They are also sending me to an oenology conference on the 22nd of this month in Penticton which should be enjoyable as well. The crew as a whole are all good people with many french canadians over for the summer. The watering crew are Punjabi and very nice people. Sometimes their accent is difficult to understand but their english is largely excellent (far better than my punjabi, which I only know to say "Thank you"). I have been getting the low down on where to get the best indian food and I hear the indian market in Oliver is very good.
In April, my wife and I found out we have a baby on the way and went for the first ultrasound this last Th. My wife thought the pictures showed "his" (only through the benefit of calling the baby he from the get go) junk but I pointed out he would become a porn star if that was the case and is more likely his umbilical cord. Needless to say we did not ask about the sex and won't until "Spud the wonder monkey" (my wife calls him spud because if it is a boy then we will name him Tait; I expanded on that just a bit) is born.
Anyway, that is up to date. It has been almost a year since the last post and hopefully I can keep up with the times. Next time, for sure the Riesling that rocks my world and hopefully a few more wine notes. Enjoy.
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