“I told myself it was beneath my dignity to arrest a man for pilfering firewood. But nothing ordered by the party is beneath the dignity of any man, and the party was right: One man desperate for a bit of fuel is pathetic. Five million people desperate for fuel will destroy a city.”

Sunday has become our day of rest, kind of like the simpler times when I was growing up.  There is no place to go, no one to visit.  The party has made sure of it.  We can still buy groceries, cigarettes and alcohol and even an abortion, because the state has deemed it essential.  My Bride calls one of her girlfriends and they are connected by cellphones and they both watch the same Mass on their own computers, because the churches are closed.  Her girlfriend is even such a good friend that she encourages my Bride to sing louder.  Once a month, my Bride would even go to a Senior complex and give Communion, because she is a Eucharistic Minister for the Roman Catholic Church and she hasn’t been able to do that either.  We make sure that we get our daily walk, we have a Brunch and then an early dinner, because then we have about a three hour Zoom session and sometimes the monitor looks like we are watching Hollywood Squares. 

We started off the day with some coffee and then it was up hill from there.  We had a breakfast of Lox, Bagels, Cream Cheese, Onions and Capers along with Poached Eggs.   Perhaps not breakfast at Brennan’s, but certainly not at the Big Boy.  I am spoiled and I am the first to admit it, my Mother always had an egg poacher at the house and we have one as well, because I am not a fan of fried eggs; the less egg white I see, the better and yes I do know that the white is the healthier part of the egg.   Her dinner menu was a new version of one of her favorite dishes.  We had Salmon. But this time we had it with Pesto Butter.   We had a medley of Roasted Baby Potatoes (Idaho, Redskin and Purple Majesty) and Steamed Asparagus (which is in season and hence one can never have enough).  She also made Chocolate Pudding with Whipped Cream for dessert.  She has had great success with her Weight Watchers program that she started before we went into lockdown mode and she has lost twenty-five pounds, while I have been having the same menu as she, just not measured out have gained one pound during the same period of time. 

It is almost a sin, if we don’t stop at Mawby Sparkling while we are up in the Traverse City area of Michigan.   You can find Mawby out near Suttons Bay and whether you know it as L. Mawby Vineyards or M. Lawrence, one thing is for sure you will have a fun time visiting the winery and tasting/drinking the wines.  I have probably written about Mawby the most of all the wineries in Michigan and part of that is because my Bride has fallen in love with their products.   In 1973 Larry Mawby founded Mawby Vineyards with a small parcel of land.  He had a passion to make wine and that passion led him to now only making sparkling wines from the Nineties on to date.  In 2009, he began a partnership with the Laing Family; but I have often heard with respect from the other wineries that Larry Mawby is considered the “Godfather” or the “Dean” on winemaking in the region.  In conversations over the years with winemakers they all hint at, but never describe the heart and largesse the man has, as well as his love for the local wine industry.  I opened up a bottle of Mawby Us NV was a classic blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, aged in Stainless Steel, then later blended with some reserve wine, aged and with an added dosage to maintain a certain finish and bottled.  I would recommend this wine to anyone that likes a nice traditional tasting sparkler with some fruit in the finish, but dry and crisp.  Actually, it may have been over-kill for Mimosas, but it was excellent and because I had forgot to put in some Mimosa grade bubbles in the refrigerator.  It was really delicious and quite heady, because we only add a tincture of Orange Juice for color, especially because we wanted to enjoy this wine.  As for the Salmon, I went down to the cellar to look for something different and that probably needed to see the light of day.  I found a bottle of Indigo Hills Pinot Noir Mendocino County 1996.  Indigo Hills was located in the North Coast (Sonoma, Mendocino, Napa, Lake and Marin Counties, but it appears that they either closed or were bought out without the name, as it seems that I could find any mention of them since 2003.  There was still a retail tag on the bottle for $19.00 and that was probably a decent price back then.  The wine was opened about an hour and it was delightful.  A soft nose promising some fruit, the tannins had softened, the finish was on the short side, but for its age, it held up, quite well and my Bride will be upset, that we cannot get more wine from this winery.