Suburban sundown - Stop messing about! - # 09/12

What are you doing?!

Well, it's raining hard outside.

I know that!! Now answer the question!

Well it's something for Jilly, http://menton-daily-photo.blogspot.com/2009/01/ride-on-big-wheel-matchstick-men.html Richard, http://zurich.dailyphoto.forthmedia.com/index.cfm
Peter, http://peter-pho2.blogspot.com/2009/01/rue-du-faubourg-saint-antoine.html
a chap called Blognote in Arona http://aronaeveryday.blogspot.com/2009/01/another-sunrise.html
and a lady in Birmingham http://birminghamalabamadailyphoto.blogspot.com/

Birmingham, for heaven's sake?? !!!!!!

Yes, in Alabama.

Birmingham, Alabama! That's even worse than our own Birmingham!

Yes, but..................well, not only those. Also some other blogger friends.

Hmmmm. But, answer the question! And......what's all that beeping?

It's the camera.

Why? What are you doing, exactly?

The rest you can imagine...................the above is a photo of an excellent Stilton Cheese from an artisan workshop "Cropwell Bishop". The cheese is unique and, in the right context, delicious.

Camera: Olympus E3. Lens set at 400mm equiv., telephoto. Minimum focus range about 1.2 meters. Settings all Manual at F8. Available light. Tripod.

In Suburbia, when it's wet, things get really nerdy.

Suburban sundown - Sun's up in my kitchen!- # 09/11

Taking a rest due to foul weather the hunt is on for a special kind of "red". It has to be light, with a nice balance of very light fruit and acidity. I'm looking towards the rarer "northern" reds grown under gentler heavens - perhaps Teutonic rather than Gallic.

So why show a Languedoc pinot noir? Only because I drunk the others before I could get the camera ready.

My wine merchant revealed a merlot from the Veneto (Italy) grown on the cooler gentle pre-alpine slopes at the very north of the region. I was suspicious that as a merlot it would be much too soft, but he correctly assured me that the cooler conditions had left it fresh enough for my palate and stated criteria.

Then came a gamay, from the Tourainne. Normally a Loire area wine is white, so this red fitted my search criteria.

I was highly suspicious of the above featured Languedoc pinot noir. Far too sunny. It will be too well delveloped and a bit too "tough", I complained. "Trust me" he said. He was right - but only just. It is a light and nicely balanced wine, that can be appreciated. One senses the South, but it's not too overbearing.

Now the search is really on for the very rare but serious German reds, followed by Austrian and even Swiss reds. This is what I am really keen to ferret out and sample.

What's provoked this sudden excursion? As I said; the weather, and Zurich. ( I suspect he's flying a kite with a hidden agenda). http://blog.forthmedia.com/index.cfm/2009/1/23/Valpolicella