That's what I do...I make glass tubes.

So, Rosa left out a very important fact from our walk in the city (our city walk, if you will). One of the points on the tour was the site of Philo Farnsworth's lab when he was developing all his patents for the first television. This is the best Sportsnight reference I have ever seen in real life. Seriously, I was REALLY excited. Probably inappropriately so.



Rosa left Thursday evening, which was really sad because we won't see her for the next YEAR while she's off traveling the world. Who does that?!?! Oh right, Rosa. Too bad everyone else will soon quit their job and start traveling, learning languages and working on organic farms in Australia, because you know if Ro does it, it MUST be cool.

After we finished being sad that Ro left, on Saturday Dan and I went back to Napa because...we wanted to and we like wine and stuff. We went to four wineries we'd never been to before, and ate some yummy lunch and came home with some yummy wine. The owner of the first place we went, Turnbull Cellars, has the largest privately owned collection of Ansel Adams work in the world and a lot of it was on display. There were signed prints from the 1920s, it was really nice.


The second place we went, Grgich Hills (pronounced grrr-gich...we had to ask) was founded by Mike Grgich who is kind of a big deal. In 1976, he entered a California wine in a blind taste test in France (you know, where they're all snooty like) and his wine won, and was declared best in the world. But the French were completely outraged that this upstart kid from Napa won, and didn't want word to get out about it. That didn't work out. So, he basically put Napa Valley on the map, and he's in his 80s and is still the winemaker for his own winery. Pretty sweet deal. While we were there, Dan got to stomp grapes. He got into it.




I'm kind of blanking on a fun fact about the third place we went, except that it was called Clos Pegasse, and it has a lot of modern art. And it had some wine too.



And the last place is called Merryvale, and is famous for it's cask room, where they hold private events. I mean, and their wine and stuff. But the room is super dramatic, lined with huge casks and barrels that hold thousands of gallons of wine with candles and dramaticness. See photo. We didn't get to Merryvale until about 6 PM - and it's one of the wineries that is open late (6 PM is late in Napa) and so, clearly, there are a lot of people there at that time trying to squeeze in one last tasting, kind of like Dan and I were doing. Except, we weren't sloshed like the middle aged people next to us chanting "chug chug chug!" or the people on the other side of us who totally skipped out on their bill while our wine server man had temporarily walked away. Who lets these people out in public?? Sigh.


But, the day wrapped up by going out to a new favorite restaurant that serves Burmese - yummmmm. And then coming home to watch the Tech/Clemson game that we had recorded. NICE. I was proud. Even though we didn't really have any offense. And even though Clemson got a safety. I love a good safety, don't get me wrong, but only when my team scores them.

What else to report? The kitties are getting bigger, almost by the day and I'm sad about that, but what can you do. Kids these days. Thursday, Dan and I are going to see a touring production of Sweeney Todd with a bunch of the other RDs, and then this weekend is homecoming for Cal, and since they're ranked SECOND in the COUNTRY, it should be a pretty crazy weekend. Next week, Dan's parents are coming to visit and then the next weekend we're going to Vegas to celebrate my birthday. Huzzah.

Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEN!!!