Kate and Susie had Monday and Tuesday off so Pat and I accompanied them to San Francisco. Their choice of entertainment was to see Fantasia 2000 at the Sony IMAX theater. It was my first experience at Imax. I had heard that the screen was big, but didn't expect a 70 foot high wall. The movie was great, but I expected a new version of "The Sorcerers' Apprentice". My diet has continued and even Pat was amazed how well I did. In San Francisco I concentrated mainly on salad and steak--virtually no carbohydrates. I have continued my liberal consumption of wine (no carbos, but acts somewhat like some) only in the evening. Time will tell whether I can lose weight when a good portion of my calories consist of wine.

Winter Wineland was good to us. We had about 200 people come thru and sold a great deal of wine. We introduced our 1998 Estate Zin again and sold over a case. We will be releasing only 84 cases to our distributor in March. We have about 10 cases of our 1998 Zin for sale at the winery. If any of you are interested just write it in the 1998 form at $22 net. The suggested retail is $24. We will be open unofficially most Saturdays except Feb 5th(my Mother's birthday).

I received an E-Mail from one of our customers regarding a tasting of our Estate Cuvee's. The 95, 96, 97, and 98. The 97 came in last and the 95 came in first. That surprised me so I brought up my 95 and 96 tonight and tasted them blind. I have been praising my 96 and criticizing my 95 for the last year or so. I have thought my 96 was showing the most complexity and my 95 had been tasting somewhat thin and young. The 95 is more acidic than other years as is my 99. I still feel the 99 is more balanced though. Well after tasting them blind, I was surprised by the obvious choice I had. One wine had more intensity--seemed younger. Yes I picked the 95! Yes the 95 was a better wine. I must compliment two of my biggest customers Mark and Doug who predicted that the 95 was one of my best wines. Every year they have tried to convince me to keep the faith. You were right. This wine has come around finally. If any of you reading this diary still have some, I would retaste the 1995 Estate Cuvee again. And the 1996 is tasting great also.