Deliverance

Today's delivery of Chardonnay to a winery a couple of hours north was mercifully uneventful. Man, the truck was really nice, though. Even carrying an estimated 3.34 tons of fruit, it handled like my Accord?. It had a powered lift gate which made the loading and delivery a snap. And the diesel for the whole trip (about 160 miles) was less than $30.

Still, deliveries eat up time. As it turned out no rain fell today. Once home I had to rinse out dirty lugs to prepare for tomorrow's pick. I was really counting on the rain to soften up the grape debris - skins, leaves, twigs - that get stuck, neigh cemented, inside a lug thanks to the grape juice. Ideally one would rinse lugs immediately after they are emptied, but I'm often a one man operation which is far from ideal (though usually preferred). Anyway, rain softens up the juice "glue" and then you can just thump the lug upside down on the tailgate bed to release the detritus (crap) as you load them in the truck to take to the pickers. So even when it doesn't rain, Mother Nature lets me down. My mother-in-law told my wife: "Never marry a farmer." Is it because we're never happy or just that she dislikes me?

Tomorrow we will be trying to pick up to nine tons of Chardonnay for yet another winery. They will be picking up from me so that will save time. Still, that's a lot of fruit and there is bound to be some crisis to relate. Wish me luck and stay tuned.