Drinking Silver Oak on a school night

When friends showed up with a 2001 Silver Oak Cabernet I knew this would be a great night for a Monday. I worked until 6:30 at the office and rushed home to begin cooking before our friends arrived at 7. The menu: mangrove snapper (I caught them chumming and fishing poagie chunks near a natural gas rig in 104 feet of water 18 miles southwest of the lighthouse at Dauphin Island) pan seared and topped with a crab meat and wine reduction sauce, garlic beans, cheese grits, and a salad of tomato/avocado/vidalia onion drowned in Ken's Italian dressing. A great Southern meal. Of course, we drank the Silver Oak before the meal. Silver Oak 1982 was the wine Reagan served the Queen--at least that's what my college roommate Larry told me. Larry presented us with a bottle of '82 Silver Oak in 1992 as a tenth anniversary present, which I've kept stored away in the cellar for this year--25th anniversary. I put my I-Pod playlist titled PS High School, full of songs from 1970-71 or so, as background tonight. It starts with a little Junior Walker and the All-Stars, with A Whiter Shade of Pale playing now. So what does this have to do with the book. Not a damn thing, other than to say that life goes on, book or no book. And sometimes the writing life takes a backseat. But not for long, and the alarm will be set for 6 a.m to get back on a couple of edits. Today I emailed back and forth a couple of times with the publisher David and editor Henry O ( I simply cannot resist calling Henry Henry O, for obvious reasons), forwarding them a nice email I received from a great writer who says he's eager to write a blurb for the book. Next up: cover designs and final details worked out on the contract. Fun stuff. My 13-year-old lab is looking over at me letting me know I've kept her up past her bedtime. Jerry Butler just came on the playlist...Later.