Events
Le
Bal du Moulin Rouge
4.7.01
 This
month the PEERS event was in Alameda and the theme was turn of the century
Paris. Ah, Paris. Tango, Waltzing, the CanCan.
Well, we didn't so much CanCan
as others CanCaned while we watched. There were several floor shows between
dance sets. They flipped and yipped and cart wheeled about and were generally
impressive.
The general dancing was also
quite nice. The band, Baguette Quartette played music as it would
have been played in French music halls over a century ago. It is interesting.
I had never realized how dissimilar waltz music can be. Austrian Waltz
is martial and march like. This was, well French. Accordions. Violin. Very,
very French. And quite good. We got one of their albums.
I still had a bit of a problem
with the venue, which will while pretty, has terrible acoustics, but whatever.
I got to tango twice.
April
in Carneros
4.23.01
 Spring
is in the air and a young woman's fancy lightly turns to wine, cheese,
olive oil/vinegar tasting in the Carneros region of Napa/Sonoma. Whew,
that was quite a sentence wasn't it.
Every spring, the wineries
in Carneros, the area between Southern Napa and Sonoma, have a wine festival
aptly named April in Carneros. Wineries host bands and local restaurants
and well, do wine tastings.
It works fairly simply. You
buy a glass for $10, and then you can go taste at all of the participating
wineries. Since, some wineries can cost $2 to $5 to taste, this is a pretty
good deal. Quite a few of the wineries aren't normally open to the public.
Also, many of the wineries have special price deals for the weekend.
Thankfully the weather, which
was dreadful during the week, cleared up for our Sunday drive in the country.
I would have to call the day uber-bucolic. We drove down tiny little country
lanes. Parked in dirt fields with views of rolling green hills, grazing
sheep, and vineyards. The sun was warm. The air clean because the recent
rain. Obviously, Enya and Lorrena McKennitt was the music of the day.
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