123: Cubely Noted

This Racer 5 tells me to pick up Plath’s entries.  Deconstruct, evaluate.  Appreciate.  I would, but they’re downstairs.  Not an excuse, I know.  And, no excuse for not running 2nite.  Well, I did taste some ’07 Oak Knoll Cab with NWG co-workers.  After, across the street for a beer.  So I’m to be charged with inaction, right?  Had an idea on the way back to Sonoma’s nearness:  What if I went on a solo mission to Mendocino, or Lake County by Self, “wine tasting,” as tourists spew, brought nothing but ink?  No cameras, still nor video.  Someone recently asked me, “So, how’s the wine blogger life?” I retreated in annoyance.  Why?  I’m not a wine blogger.  I’m a writer.  Confined to no one topic, theme, existential constituency.  This sitting, a true consciousness stream, as there’s so much I felt, in that cube 2day.  No virulency, animosity.  Just me, connecting with a contemplative core.  Scribbling on yellow glaciers.  Stanford, still, and 4ever, in my sights.  I want to reconnect with students.  And, I promised mySelf I’d do a little lecture writing tonight.  But, I think I deserve this sipNscribble.  Dad, Mom, have always said, “You have to have fun.” And this is how I unwind.  No outings to filthy nearby neighborhood bars.  I’m here, just Mike with his words.  That’s all he wants.  Needs. 

This night’s Notes, not at all cubed.  Me, remembering flavors from lunch hour’s melodic whisks.  Tina, Lisa, Jamie, mySelf, intermingling lines under reassuring sun sheets.  As I age, I’m more obsessed with trapping others’ words.  Too useful for my book.  BOOKS.  I’m a writer.  This, how I feed.  Listening.  I remember feeling relived at the arrival of Jamie’s husband, Jason.  He offered subtly accurate humor, forcing me into chuckle every other word.  More than lucrative for dialogue lines, for my pages.  He left, isolating me, again with femmes.  I eagerly returned to a cube.  To dial, tight-talk. 

8/31/2011, Wednesday

124

Mike thought about what he posted the previous night, about the wine industry fearing him, his wish.  He stood by it, but he needed it known, he wasn’t in search for clash with “the industry.” He wanted the robotically contradictory facets to understand that he wouldn’t ever be still, muted.  How?  Easy, keep writing as his did.  No compromise.  He was a writer--yes, loving wine--that spoke as osprey hovered about Central Oregon peaks, streams, embankments.  He sat there, with what was left of the 2010 Lancaster SB he opened the other night, in his glass.  Looking at the blank screen.  He just wanted to sip, for once.  Listen.  Be a guest in his Wine Bar.  A customer.  No, consumer.

He didn’t pay for his glass.  Didn’t have to.  Envisioning himSelf back in Paris, he knew he had to be there, ostensibly, after year’s turn.  He wanted to buy the song he hear on the Pandora station, “Where It All Starts,” by Thievery.  But didn’t click that link.  He was appeased by the simplicity, the tasty concurrence of song sequence.  He was in a Wine Bar, delightfully envisioned.  Till bed, he was sovereign.  Autonomous oenoWorld.  His.  This effectuation beckoned a sip.  Three.   

This countdown, for what?  He didn’t know.  Not yet.  This was paginated Cubism.  His, solely.  It couldn’t be duplicated, he thought.  As no one thought his thoughts as he them thought.  He wanted back in the classRoom, realizing in the seat of his immediate Wine Cave.  He didn’t like the word “bar,” either, in moment.  Current track, from a Bombay trip-hop mixtape.  Its likeness beatified his vision’s muralized panorama.  Soon, he thought, inoculation for this industry’s predictability, expectations.

Under sheets, he thought of Paris, again.  All its characters, images, activity.  The metro’s chirps, honks, voices.  He needed them back in his ears.  Not counting today, he had 123 days to produce the manuscript that would take him back to his hotel’s high floor.  Or wherever he wanted.  Spain, Portugal, Africa.  He always told his students, “You can write your way through and out of anything.” And as his father recently said, “All that you impressed upon your students, shared with them about being independent, sovereign, as thinkers, has now fallen into your lap.” Tomorrow morning, he’d have plenty useful thoughts, commuting to NWG.  He was sure.  And, he thought, he’d pull over to write them into the Comp book.  Or on the new yellow pad.  He didn’t care, about them.  He cared about he; the prose, poetry; sovereignty, Autonomy [capital intentional].  He didn’t log any notes, descriptors for the Sauvignon Blanc, he realized, turning on his right side.  He spoke into a green pillowcase: “Yummy.” 

8/30/2011, Tuesday

125: Wake, Work, Run, Write, Wine

Punch-in:  9:07pm.  Truthfully, seven minutes late.  But, I’m the boss at MADAIGAN publishing/vinoLit, so...  The fog this morning, light in Bennett Valley, thickening for thought from upper Kenwood to Glen Ellen.  Busy at NWG.  Surprised, frankly, how well I did, officed, considering I was in no mood to be there upon walking though door, sitting at their keys.  Praise my sexy mistress, the Morning Mocha, for her palate massage.  Now at my monster’s buttons, I relax with the ’08 Syrah from last night.  Going to be decreasing wine consumption.  Both in quantity, frequency.  Why, running.  I’m finding it helps the aids the page in ways I’ve never made.  First race, less than a month in front.  Forgot to activate music for this sitting, one second...  Wait, sip first...

The second issue of Letterz should have a rough, rough, barbarically asperous sketch printed by my clocking-out this evening.  Who knows.  Still haven’t turned on a single track.  This quiet, calmly colorful, lightening spontaneity stillness.  Like today’s run; folded, unfolded in thought.  I remember beginning my run thinking, “Okay, need to have useful thoughts in these intervals, a thought menu.” My rationale’s road was somewhat linear, but mostly Cubist, not-so-coherent.  About a block from this castle, still in sturdy sprint, I thought: “Be scattered, that’s Aesthetic.  Don’t plan, that’s prediction.  Allow writing/wine/fiction/spoken word to land atop your lines.  What you remember is what belongs on a page.” Sure winemakers experience something similar.  Added to “Ask Katie” list. 

125 days left in the year, life of this log/bog, this day tallied.  Toward what am I writing?  Easy.  Books.  Not blogs, some wine social media table.  Books.  Novels.  Collections.  Characters on paper.  That’s what I studied.  That’s what Plath, Poe, Pac did.  I don’t prophesy.  I promise.  And what I’ll have by this year’s end, a book.  One noted.  Respected in Literary levels.  Feared and respected about wine’s world.  That’s how I covet coming clocks.  Syrah swigs this evening blur all gigs in thieving.  Study my Now, you’ll see my scene.  Sip ... Sip ...  8/29/2011, Monday  

Kaz Sunday Notes

Tempered pace, but more than enough to keep my pen moving.  Especially in the presence of my brother Kaz.  Today, first formation tasting session for guests.  Day began with Kazola walking me about the vineyards, imparting certain strategies for how he delivers what he does in bottles.  His erudite analyses of the fruit, its progress, the steps after leaving the vine, all covered.  These frames on wine’s game board are what I’ve been wanting to learn, not from some book available on nearby shelves, from someone I trust, salute, especially since deciding I’ll be producing from my own label within the next couple years.  

And then came the guests, sippers from parts afar, close.  They all loved Kazzy’s ’08 Kahuna Zinfandel out of the tap, that they could bottle themselves.  OR, put in a jug.  I found mySelf drawn to the presence of the ’06 Merlot, boasting “Stomp” as its banner.  This Bordeaux steerer has not only the lingering attribute that I often hunt in wine, but also an acrobatic versatility in its food pairing prominence, and simple sippability.  Many also loved the Alicante, carrying the not-so-covert pseudonym of “Intrepid,” which is interesting considering how not many consumers have tried that many interpretations of the shy-yet-supernatant grape, much less expect what to see, hold in mind some rubric for what a bottle of the rare Rhône should do.

As usual, great guests, exotically domestic wines from Mr. Kazariffic.  Forgot to get a bottle of that on-tap Zin.  Next weekend.  Hoping to someday make some wine with this generous, knowledgable, and emboldening fellow oeno-soldier.  He told me he welcomes the idea.  What a charge, to be a student again.  Not of Literature, but of the grape, its eventual bottle.  And, instructed by this grape sage.  I sit here in my lab, nearly seizuring in eagerness waves, for the bottles I produce under his coaching.   Have to write it out of me.  Stay patient, don’t stray complacent.  Sipping some wine, now.  But not from brother’s winery, ‘cause I’m a scribbling goldfish, attention span barely measurable.  That’s what happens when I’m there, when he’s there with me, pouring.  Wine is about moments, with family, good friends, and you can find yourSelf in beautiful speedy sands of clock ticks when all incredibly congeal, forgetting you want to take home a bottle.  Of ’08 Zin from tap, bottled by Self.  Next time.  Coming entry, I sipNscribble with Kaz in glass.  vinoLit ...  

Kazmatazz with my new friends from DC, Kate and Doug ...

[8/28/2010, Sunday]

Sip, Character Kiss

And so she, my character, Kelly: more rapidly rapturous, capturing my balance like chased casks.  A novel, us away.  Where, not important.  She’s forcing me to write mySelf away to dazes, theatrically imagist hazes.  If she were to read this, she wouldn’t know what she’s reading.  Me, sick author, with ink, a flexing blend.

“I think this is one of the better Shiraz bottles I’ve had.  But it’s been a while,” Kelly said, nosing the contents carefully, as if to be sure in her stance.

“Since you’ve had a Syrah?” Mike said, paralleling her progress, raising bowl to sensitive sense.

“Syrah, or Shiraz?”

“Same thing.  Kind of.”

“That’s what someone at the restaurant told me, but I thought he was just showing off, trying to sound smart.  Do people in the wine industry ever do that?” She sipped, eyes still at his.  He watched her, like there were numbers in each physical shift.  He wanted this equation to stay unsolved, as it was too pleasurably piquing.  She.

“Often, actually.”

“We should go into business together, open a restaurant.  A wine-themed restaurant.  Do you mind if I have a little more?  Or should I leave, I know you have to get up early-”

“Honestly, please, stay.  I’m not interested in my obligations right now.  Let’s both have a glass.  And, yes, I would love to have my own place one day.  But not a restaurant.  A wine bar.  And I need to get started if I’m going to ever do that.  I’m...”

“What?

“Getting old,” Mike said, throwing the surviving half-ounce into his place, before setting more for Kelly’s glass, his.  Kelly laughed, he listened.  Spectator, he felt, as her lips stratospherically swooped.  He’d never tire of that grin.

“You’re funny.  No, you’re crazy,” she said.  “Here,” raising her glass, “Cheers...”

Genre Cuvée

A quick note before sleep.  Speak slow as I breath.

Realizing my words are characters, cast them all

in the play.  More sun rays as the guns play, the 

conundrum stays.  I’m re-arranged in palate ballads.

Repeated phrase; close my blog in its deleted stays.

She rescues me from reasons.  Me, set into an Eden.

And I’m Martin.  London, a dozen.  Crumbling cookie in

the oven.  But I survived like my cousin.  Dumb-bludgeoned,

I wasn’t.

2nite, poetry calling me.  No safe expected wine reflection, even though I can’t remove Lancaster’s 2006 Estate Cabernet from palate recall.  Just want to have another Cabermet moment2me.  That ’06, however, haunting.  Should drive to AV tomorrow, buy a couple more bottles.  But, have to save for my inaugural release.  Still not sure how many pages it should be in final.  And I don’t have to settle such 2nite.  It’s my Friday night, as Dad reminded me only hours ago.  2morrow, in-sleeping.

The ’06 Lancaster Estate Cab, deserving of a family night.  Fantasy Cabernet, dream bottle; capsule of treasure sips.  More than merely content I poured it with Dan & Sue.  Life, more than abbreviated, that’s all the more reason to clasp to occasions, with special wines, special Humans.  The Lancaster portfolio, teaching me not only about bottle content, but wine composition/character axioms.  Reactions reverberating, recalling that Alexander Valley ’06 nonpareil.  Thankful, believe ... 

Suits try to my truths recruit.  I’m of dues to new

clues.  Released from corporate noose.  I’m creased

like horrid blues.  Evasive metaphors and similes.  Unfettered

shores for better seas.  My rimes blend with wine, like my mind’s

sending signs.  I’m aesthetically intwined, night-chimed, like a like-grind.

Not impressed by your title, I’m only stressed by the vital.  Micro-

managerial, I’m psycho and ethereal, calm from the filial.  Mike

Madigan, like Mike Tyson, quite livened.  Writing to moon beams,

inviting the June dreams.

[8/26/2010, Friday]

note, unwined

Just as the most Literary act a writer can invoke is not writing at all, so strides the most Wine blogger-y thing a “wine blogger” could exhibit is no consumption of wine.  This sparkling lemon water, too engaging, calming.  I may dance past 1,000 words tonight, many of which went to a specific project destination.  May do some tasting 2morrow, after NWG shift.  No, can’t.  Need to run.  Quite serious about doing a race in November, but more realistically, rationally, December.  Starting with four run days per week, possible reductions in wine/beer consumption.  In order to live a Literary Life, I have to be healthy, ALIVE.  Mentally and physically speedy.

These instrumentals, sending lemon-enabled ink into imaginative boulevards, being lead to where I have no sense.  What is Life without thought, Creative cognition?  Although I’m not presently mid-sip with wine, I’m thinking about some, a floating flavor vapor of a Bordeaux blend.  Not sure from where, I just want some Cabernet dominance abetting my romantic nerve.  As this sitting slowly boulders on, I can’t help but imagine more street sprints.  In Sunriver, Paris, Maui, Santa Barbara (never visited, not yet), Santa Cruz, Monterey.  Want to run on other streets, just as always hunt for other scribble spots.  I’ll fall asleep thinking of this, a list, I’m positive.  Lemon electricity, sipping till still.   

* * *

Tomorrow may be the day I actually go to the café to type on my lunch break.  This is truly a skirmish with Self.  If I don’t get a morning mocha tomorrow, I may be able to forward with such a success.  Save it for afternoon, for delayed pages.  Not hitting 1000 words tonight.  Have the ’08 blend I was sipping to blame, thank.  More, with amplitude elevated, I delight in stillness, sometimes not writing at all.  Used to be hard for me to do.  Still is, more often than.  

Have to remember to bring this little tasmanian Devil laptop to Napa, early morrow.  Not even partially complete, my project due 8/31/11.  1 week from today.  If I’m taking this job seriously, of turning ideas into career as I entertained on the drive to the other valley today, then I need to mind schedules, deadlines.  No socializing, from 12:30-1:30p.  Only this screen.  Writing.  Progress.  Palpable visions, preferred stages, roles.  Leading, no more following. 

8/25/2011, Thursday.  Another glass of the ’08 Alexander Valley blend in glass.  So many cubeNotes, in today’s bid.  May have to start a new project, another book.  Sip 1: Impressively more coherent, engaging than last night’s helpings.  this morning’s drive, magnetic.  Those angelically brush-touched AM ceilings; blue, silver, beautifully borrowed, for me, my pages.  One portion of this penman’s workweek that never disagreeably ages, the AM sprint to NewWineGig.  And I don’t mind that I’m unable to scribble all sentiments, thoughts, while moving the wheel, pressing pedals.  I have to let thoughts go, but I survey such as an animistic barter.  Those navigated hops eastward on 12, Napa Road, then 12 again, reasonable exchange.  Only wish I had free moments to take pocket a bundle of photos, scribble some sentences.  But, the time isn’t mine, in the morning.  It’s NWG’s.  A problem.  Soon solved.  Pangea ... 

Didn’t 2day write in the café, at lunch, as I promised Self I would.  Part of me thinks Kelly would be disappointed.  Other, knows she would urge me to do what feels freest.  Wonder what she paints, tonight, in this oddly atmosphered Sonoma County evening.  Reflecting within today, I look at my cubeNotes, of the characters in Napa’s downtown.  Becoming one of my preferred primordial nodes.  It’s conveying pages, promising more.

I’m journal jumping.  More than I have in months au courant.  I had this categorized as counterproductive, but since picking a yellow legal pad from this desk’s innards, I’m turned, converted to fully subscribe to Literary secularism, separatism.  This new yellow sheet set will be a book.  On what?  I don’t know; Wine, writing, “the industry,” Literature, Literary Life levels (not sure I have one yet), and whatever the moment musters.  Not sure how “wine blogger”-y that be, but I’m hardly concerned with that arena anymore.  I’m a writer, with no sights on appeasing anyone but Self, my real readers, those actively passing through page marks.  “The industry,” not even in views at 6.  Too far behind.  And, more so, below.  I’m meandering with my manuscripts, for my Equilibrium.  Speaking of which, the more Plath research I do, the more I find her narrative rather than imagist.  An unexpected, non-linear remark for this entry, I know.  But I had to make it known that this writer is still very much with crosshairs set for classRoom return.  Professor4ever ...     

After the run, my bones beg for stillness, scribbles and sips.  Too hot for wine tonight.  The chilled IPA sends my paragraphs away, in speedy strays.  Looking through my mini-Mead, all the cube Notes collecting.  Where do I put them, I pose Self.  Winemakers, as they muse over where to embed fruit from different blocks, vineyards, AVA’s, how do they come to a final ruling?  How does any artist?  I sit here looking at my work, scattered within lines of two enervated journals.  What happened to my Literary blending, my mission to consolidate?  Tomorrow’s run, hopefully, provides some sense.  Today’s, only random rhyme fallings during intervals, one of which I just scribbled into the 9.75x7.5 Comp Book.  Odd dimensions, possessed by my judging dominant journal.

8:51p.  Mike was quite surprised that he was able to clock-in nine minutes early for his night’s sitting.  He looked through his day’s notes.  Plath, his possible pursuit of a doctorate, about her; being back in the classRoom, pupil and director.  He sipped away his bottle’s remaining bubbles.  He picked apart the miniature log’s meek pages.  The more academically proportioned ones, of the larger.  Two journals, suppressing him, splendidly.  He typed.  Found another interesting entry, put to page.  Another, momentarily electric.  Typed.  He leapt from the scribbles into a multi-shaded, prism-like freewrite.  He didn’t know if he’d ever “use” it, inject it into a manuscript.  That wasn’t this shift’s objective.

Why did he log his punch-in’s, out’s?  He didn’t know.  If anything, he never wanted his sessions to feel like “work.” Like The Machine.  He did it in mockery of, he was convinced.  He knew he could get up, at anytime, and have another beer.  Or take a nap.  Switch to Diet Coke.  Have an ice cream sandwich, watch TV.  Clock-out altogether, for days.  He felt empowered, relieved it was only his spree.  As Mike spiked in his light but flighted types, he stopped for a sip, asked self, “Maybe this shouldn’t go to the blog, be freely readable.” He stopped, indefinitely, listened to his Wine Lounge playlist, not knowing what to do.  Fingers, escaping his restraint, slapping keys they needed.  Mike observed, delighted in new paragraphs, their nomadic spurts.  Maybe the calloused vertexes were teaching him an actual style, voice, he thought.  Again, for the first in months, if not nearly a year, he was a reader, learner.  -8/23/2011, Tuesday    

From 1 Lab 2 Another

Home from Kaz.  Sitting in chair, immediate scribble.  My sips, to “The Mystery Bottle.” Could be a little Pinot, maybe something Rhône.  Don’t think there’s Bordeaux blood in this blend.  And yes, I do think this bottle’s tenant is collective, concerted.  More tasting Room traffic than last weekend.  Utility for author, and my winemaker friend.  Energetic guests provide material that can’t be explained in entries like this.  But believe me, it’s fruitful, engaging, marketable.  These character in and out of tasting Rooms I’ve hosted, have provided me books, a career.  I just have to focus on the blending of their pages, scattered note sheets in this home wine writing Lab of mine, in this day’s corked close.

This “Mystery Bottle” singing odd chords to me, the page.  Or maybe it’s how it’s blending with the Wine Lounge tunes I have in THIS Room.  I’ve always addressed and endorsed wine & music ties, but Kaz’s tasting Room/Lab has shown me, lamented such effective collusion.  The group earlier today, only an hour or so after my arrival, dancing to some older dance tracks after a couple sips, enjoying themselves, coalescing positive, entirely Human, notes in the Room.  That’s what wine is to me, and more consumers than I thought previously, evidently.

Looking through pictures, I dream of my eventual office, offsite Lab, my Room.  Winemakers have told me how they envision their wine’s palate presence after bottling, a year or two down the road.  I, the same, with my path as a wine scribe, fiction writer, poet, artist.   Time isn’t ever-present, oeno-wizards’ll tell you.  And writers, we’re faced with even more pressing urgency, I think.  This Mystery Blend (I’m now convinced it’s a blend of at least 4 varietals, none DNA’d Bordeaux), helping me solve some of my creative puzzles, blocks.  Further indebted to my oeno-brother Kaz, appreciative in each of this sitting’s scribbles, sips.    

Was going to simply close this session, but I came across more of the random sessions I mentioned above.  Need to organize my sheets of writing.  All of them.  All the years of rushed pen bounces in the boxes below this desk.  Winemakers don’t waste a thing--no fruit, barrels, chemicals, pieces of equipment, NOTHING.  All I have for revenue generation: words, their housing surfaces.  Tonight, first step in universally organizational melody, with my projects.  Finds like this frustrate me, as I know I can’t afford for them to happen, or surface unexpectedly.  It disrupts my whole Nowness.

Letting my angst go, with assistance of Mystery sips.  More mysteries, question marks before me than I thought, now.  Can’t unsettle Self, not 2nite.  A whole five days of NWG, commencing with morrow’s candor.  About to close this Lab, lower lights, but not before finishing what remains in a stemless bowl to my right.  Today, Kaz’s Lab and wine cannon, also put into my thoughts that I should be more random with my bottle purchases, not be so predictable.  Meaning, don’t each time I go to a wine shop, or winery, to buy wine shuffle to the Cabs, or Bordeaux blends.  What kind of palate does that nurture?  That can’t be good for the writing.  My characters, diverse.  My sipping selections must sequence in suit, as should the scribbles they encourage.

AM, 8/21/11

Sunday.  Thinking about writing, wine, photography, video, all of it this morning.  My own office, lab, outside the house.  Winemakers, what would they counsel?  Yet another question for my sister.  But, as I have always embraced solitude, autonomy, SOVEREIGNTY, I solicit Self for scope.  One idea I had: no new directions, stick with the blog, keep it alive, shove it into lucrative leaps.  This means, more coverage of everything wine, even if it’s covert journalism.  Chefs probably wake feeling like this, like they should persist with what earned them acclaim, landed them a position at a restaurant, or what made them successful to the point of owning their own.

By no means does this entail an abandonment of the Literary.  Just saw the time, 10:24a.  Have to leave for the winery in less than 15.  Carrying these thought’s to Kaz’s lab.  Have always found that Room inspiring, him as well, his wines, the labels.  Defiance, a necessary ingredient for fortunate forward ...

Another Chapter

Mike cracked, gifted Self a 2-shot mocha.  Each sip, a slide into indulgent euphoria.  He sat to write, only to stammer in syllable, sense.  He thought he had something, some scene for page, but he wasn’t sure.  Mike felt like one of those characters in a less-than comforting dwelling, in a novel, or short, written for purposes of following readers to bed, crawling in with them.  Marvelously menacing manuscript; Such would sell, he thought.  But that wasn’t his page’s flavor profile.  His fingers hopped cautiously, as if each key may be the sessions-stopping mine:

The hall felt micro, macro.  She couldn’t tell what of its appearance unsettled her.  “Hello?” she said,  pushing her right hand’s swamp of a palm back, forth against the right thigh’s denim slide.  Only the still responded.  With crippling quiet, chaotically coated stillness, more.  She stepped.  Once, three, stop.  The door, reachable within seconds if she darted feverishly, thoughtfully with each leg struggle.

“Stay here, you’ll stay here...” an old woman whisper muttered, words sinking into her ear, expanding like intentioned fog.

With 57 minutes, yes he timed himself, Mike had another chapter.  Would he finally finish something?  He had to, at this transitional trample, he thought.  1000+ words before 10:30a.  He couldn’t remember if he’d ever done that.

“I like it,” Kelly said, finishing her read, then flipping back through the piece, as if to look for quotes, textual evidence to support her statements, Mike thought.  “When did you write this?  It’s like something I’d have a nightmare about, being alone in a house, ghosts...you know?”

“This morning,” Mike said, sipping the 2010 Chalk Hill AVA Sauvignon Blanc, noticing new notes, he thought.

“What?” She saw his face twitch, attention seemingly shift.

“This Sauv Blanc tastes different than I remember.  Anyway, how was work?  How’s your friend?”

“Pour me a glass, and I’ll tell you.  It’s that kind of story, trust me.  You’ll appreciate this.  Just don’t write about it,” Kelly said, laughing, almost certain that he would. 

Journal jumping this morning.  Know I shouldn’t be.  As I count, my writings are in four different spots.  Why can’t I just sit down, write a book in one spot, one notepad.  One sitting, just kidding.  I’m quite sure winemakers feel a bit scatter in their projects.  Don’t they?  Another question for Katie.

Is this blog a word waste well?  Should I only be writing books?  This’ll be one of the thoughts bustling about my brow today, I’m sure, during my tasting in Alexander Valley.  Time, 8:27a.  Not letting Self have the mocha.  $4.65 amounts to over forty-five printed pages.  That’s almost my whole first release.  No mocha, Mike.  No more “Mocha Mike,” as the characters behind Starbucks bar, just down the block, have long my frequency labeled.

Quote for Plath paper: “If you expect nothing from anybody, you’re never disappointed.” Interestingly sovereign, in these words.  The focus is on Self, rather than one’s investment in others’ performance and continuance.  Not sure what I want to do with these Plath pulses of mine.  A class, one day, on her, like-authors.  But, for now, I’m just enjoying the process, the reading, research, being a student again.

[8/20/2011, Saturday]

Can I Revisit ... ???

What guests always ask.  And I throw such at Self, when near past sessions.  My toe tips, resting against the well of old papered orations.  Didn’t take the laptop to NWG with me today, for the promised lunch Literary leap.  But tomorrow, I finally fulfill.  Kelly on the mind as I dial, swim through sales leads.  In my glass, presently, here at the desk with me, the ’06 SoCo Cab from last night.  The profile approaches with more determination, as if angry I didn’t finish it last night.  Doesn’t it know I have to work, wake up early for an hour’s-worth commute?

Revisiting the fog from this morning.  Most enriching I’ve yet met on a drive to NWG.  It told me to organize with the writings, to hurry, talk more to Kelly, she waits for your questions, interview, deconstruction.  First release’s due date, less than 2 weeks distanced.  I have to make use of the enveloped money.  This could be my last chance to stash cash, for self-publication, or anything.  More focused, Now, than I’ve ever been, ever.  Downtown Napa, during lunch, calmly actioned.  And I just eat lunch.  No ink, sheet.  Tomorrow: caffeine, composition.  Eager to see if I fulfill this promise, I tell the Cabernet glass, at right, by the printer.  That bowl, more armed, heavily, than this skinny poet.  Kelly’s crowd, waiting for her pages ... 

My mini-Mead, useful today, for observations encased, while dialing.  Me, not Winston.  I’m Orwell.  The observer, narrator.  Sipping, scribbling, like my brother Steve saw, sees in me, we.  The office space here in the domicile, more spaced, welcoming to flowing fruition.  Tomorrow, Friday.  Thankful?  Yes.  Mocha planned for 12:30-1:30p; writing, frenzied pen skips, ink drips.  No time wasted, I can’t afford it.  The Cabernet, whistling an odd tune, one minute past ten.  Is it mad?  Hard to tell.  Confusing tannins.  I remember describing, to a customer today, one of the wines as “persistent in character and composition.”  She said, “Huh, whatever that means.” As if I’m such an addlepate, for creative descriptions of wine personalities, for going beyond numbing cataloguing of predictable descriptors.  The opposing argument would read something to the tint of, “That’s what the consumer wants, knows...” I respond, “So?  I love wine, and I react to it as I elect.” -8/18/2010, Thursday 

cubedNOTES, Thieved

Back in chair, sipping an ’06 Sonoma County Cab.  Decided, bringing computer tomorrow, taking the remainder excess from bag, placing somewhere other than back inside my little work carrier.  My mood, uncertain, unsettled.  Need music.  Too late to begin my Plath paper, that I wrote about in my cubed notes today.  Ms. Plath, a varietal blended, but altogether distinct, distinguished.  How does she do such in her metered, syllabic shifts?  She’s a chef, with sentiments, observations, connections to pages’ eye-visitors.  Antagonized to study, to devote time page-surfing, as nothing in “the industry” could ever coat, caress lengthened Literary longing like this.  Except for tasting, that is.  No.  I’ll read Sylvia’s sheets, and sip the ’06 SoCo bull of a Cab.  Two worlds, for this writer, tonight.

Operation vinoDish, how do I start?  Most of my funds, stuffed in an envelope for the releases, my small papered winery.  Interesting way to survey it.  But it’s quite acute, accurate.  Indi winmakers, self-pub’d scribes.  We sing similarly!  I need to steal more dialogue from those around.  Actually, today I did.  In the Roasting Co, while waiting for my mocha, my friend Adrianna’s ice latte-something, a despicably underpriced birthday gift for her, I heard a lady tell her friend, “..and then she just shut the door.” The lady across from her, historical purple sweater with little tear atop should right, said, “...and you did the right thing, she’s out of her mind giving the car to him.” What could they have been talking about, I thought.  Didn’t need to know.  The fiction licenses me with embellishment powers.  Elevating glass to Craft, unknowing walking topics around this ink cannon.

Consciousness stream, carried by Cabernet.  Panoramic, dramatic, like the view from the Sunriver Lodge’s top deck.  See Self there, now, after a book signing in Bend, if there’d ever be such events in Central Oregon.  Sipping a stainless Chardonnay, in summer, watching hawks and osprey overhead, scouting their own dishes.  I’d relish in removal, right now, if I could afford it.  Soon, I’ll be roaded, drowning all scenes in my conscious stream.  vinoLit.  -8/17/2011, Wednesday     

clocking in ...

sipNscribble initiates.  This morning, the same fog from from last week.  Thick, following, rich, encouraging.  So, 2nite I write.  Sipping what remains of last night’s Cab.  Actually, haven’t taken my first.  Now, glass angled ... More ghostly, lingering than last night.  Thank you, Napa.  Looking over the day’s cube notes.  Don’t have many pages with which to play, so I’m forced into pragmatism placement.  Tonight, truly a relaxed freewrite.  NewWineGig, teaching more when I thought its lectures had halted.  Would never be the somewhat-learned writer of wine sitting in this Madigan chair if not for that office in Napa’s downtown.  Raising glass...

I look right, at the generous glass of ’07 Cabernet Sauvignon, realize no instrumental in pairing.  Flaw in scene.  Augmenting, now.  Thievery Corporation slithers into the speakers, spilling into Literary surroundings.  Pleasantly potent gravity, much like this ’07 Napa Cab.  Have to again salute my oeno-ally Rony for the generous bottled courtesy.

Every time I play this Pandora station, I can’t help but think of Kelly, me, in a booth at my Wine Lounge.  How do I write such into an indulging igloo?  These tempo’d arrangements, helpful for page, especially with wine.  Just found an old entry where I reflected upon an open mic I did at a spot near SSU.  Miss days on campus.  There, and in the classRooms at CSUH.  Or Cal State East Bay, now tallied by system, population.  My diploma touts “Hayward.” Preferred.

Landed in Napa today without briefcase.  Felt lovely in lightness, free.  I was armed, mind you, reader.  Notepad in back pocket.  More cube notes than I expected to shovel.  Would rather be recording pen2paper right now, with these beats, this wine.  Speaking of writing, wine, I need to cruise through the France footage.  When can I find time to do that?  “Kiss me and you will see how important I am,” Plath said.  What I would have written, for her.  Kelly, still ambulating about my imagination, fantasy like restlessly persistent mists, following all my plans.  Her lips, stuck to my lenses, shell surface.  Trapped, in a café by the Tower, with her.  But it’s fantastically false, or unrealistically real.  She, my character, yawns before espresso sip.  I wake up, furious with science.  And my alarm clock.  -8/16/2011, Tuesday 

Draconian, Delicious

Clocking in, for sips, scribbles.  ’07 Napa Valley Cab, my propeller.  Fanciful dissections, not needed.  Not with wine writing.  Not mine.  On this page, no policies.  Just the moment.  Dark presence in glass, tastefully tranquilizing me after a day dreary.  Blog’s life, my barreled reads, bottled soon, in book.  Have to save sentences, sip with sense.   

At this desk, moving at my pace.  On my clock.  My dime, devil.  “Peace, Mike, peace.  You speak of something, but change direction,” Shakespeare’d say.  In the book, all animus and umbrage projected.  Big Brother, with too few guns to mute my might.  Stay in front of this pen, mic.

Counting my cube notes.  Deciding where to blend.  Another sip of the Cab, encouragement.  Thinking of studies behind.  A return, to Plath, Poe, Shakur.  Not sure of the direction, thesis.  And maybe I don’t need one just yet.  In the most enjoyable stage of paper symmetry, coherence: storming brain lanes.  Scenic.  All to the page.  All.  Not storming senselessly.  Or maybe I am.  I’ll find out, soon I appraise.  The Cabernet, now telling me to fetch my Composition book, begin the Plath paper.  Not now.  I will get the pages, but not ignite any reactive fusions to Ms. Plath’s work, not tonight.  My mind’s shape, bent after day. 

Closing session.  Not in optimal manuscript mold.  Breathing, even in Orwellian octopus nooses.  Sips, sending me to collated safety, I think.  Plath said, “The blood jet is poetry and there is no stopping it.” So, to the notebook, for postmodern perforations, ink and paper blends.  The Wine Lounge beats aside me, assist Aesthetically, aphoristically.  Hope the book appreciates this moment, and what I’m about to write, outside this petty “wine blog,” for the book.  As one from the world of dusty texts, I’m not concerned with fallout, especially in “the industry.” 

vinoLit ... [8/15/2011]

Kaz Log, Day 2

Typing for Life, before tasting Room re-entry.  My book’s due date, nearing.  Love the pressure.  Last night, the ’01 Barbaresco paired magically with composition for its pages.  Not worried on how it’s to be received, reacted to, what have.  I just want it finished, the same way an independent winemaker anticipates his/her bottles on the dinner table of consumers.

Vineyards yesterday, struggling to care for their fruit, leaves.  The 2011 vintage seems to be just as nail-biting as 2010, it seems.  And I’ve discussed such with a couple winemakers, and they agree, partially.  Speaking of nurturing Self, I HAVE TO run today.  Would have yesterday, but returned home too late, and was quite famished from working all day.  Which reminds me, today is Day 7 in a row, of work.  But, at Kaz, I don’t feel like I’m “working.” More like I’m supporting a business I love, a friend, a family, an incredible colony of wines.  A favorite stage, honestly.  I’ll continue in return, even if I was to relocate.  Kaz’s winery serves as ample warrant for return, re-relocation. 

8pm.  Home from a tasting Room stretch quite levelly eased.  Maybe a bit more elevated in exterior/environmental degree than the previous shift.  Good for the grapes, good for us, the sippers.  Today’s shift, much more music with Luke and I throwing rhymes back and forth, doing repeated side-by-side’s of 2010 Cab Franc.  His vs. Kaz’s.  Cab Franc has always been a flirtatious quagmire to my palate and page.  Not sure what to scribble about its gravitating structure.  Before another week at NewWineGig, I do what I often do: Wine Lounge instrumentals and other velvet cushion tracks, alongthrow something in the glass, what remains of last night’s ’01 Barbaresco. 

Still typing for life.  But then, just before his third Italian palate connection, Mike halted.  Read over the spoken word he scribbled behind the bar, between pours.  He read, “...sexy cuddle of a Cubist finish...” More poetry, he thought.  That was artistic, autonomous.  Still pained from his run, Mike forced himSelf to stay in his chair, type.  The book needed to be finished.  Luke, his tasting Room conspirator, finished his project, that unsullied, shinning, playfully provocative Cabernet Franc.  Mike then resolved: he would publish every word he wrote from now on.  No more pages in the plastic coffin of writings.  No more in the drawer.  And if readers couldn’t keep up, became annoyed, tired, too bad.  Just as winemakers didn’t bury bottles, he would never waste words.  He felt sighted, for once.  Clear, coherent, creatively concise.  A writer, favorably impelled by wine, a day of wine, with wined characters.   

Kelly wasn’t in the Room with him, while he wrote.  At the winery, or presently, in the study.  She wouldn’t care if he finished anything, he thought.  She just wanted him to be even, peaced with his progress.  He wondered when she would find her Equilibrium, her “break.” He knew that she didn’t seek such.  She was in wonder, wonderfully.  He envied her curiosity, freedom.  He, his pen, his pages, his sip-motived scribbles sought to acquire such.

[8/14/2011, Sunday]