Yesterday was a day of firsts; today was an evening with a “last”. We had been members of Fleming-Jenkins Winery in Los Gatos from the day they opened in 2008 until they closed a few years later. We enjoyed their wines a lot, and their tasting room was a great place to stop when we were walking in downtown Los Gatos.

We’d bought a 375ml bottle of their 2006 Napa Valley Red Dessert Wine in late 2011. We’re not big dessert wine drinkers, so it’s been gathering dust in the wine rack for many years. Tonight, though, felt like an appropriate time to drink it during our weekly Trivial Zoom call.

The cork had not weathered the years well; it flaked into pieces as I tried to extract it. Eventually, I pushed it into the bottle so I could pour the wine – it was drinkable, but nothing special. On the other hand, we did finish the bottle!

.בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה, יְיָ אֱלֹהֵינוּ, מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, שֶׁהֶחֱיָנוּ וְקִיְּמָנוּ וְהִגִּיעָנוּ לַזְּמַן הַזֶּה

Baruch atah, Adonai Eloheinu, Melech haolam, shehecheyanu, v’kiy’manu, v’higiyanu laz’man hazeh.

TRANSLATION
Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of all, who has kept us alive, sustained us, and brought us to this season.

I knew I was going to post a shehecheyanu (the prayer above) today in gratitude for reaching the beginning of the Biden Administration, but I didn’t expect to have more than that one reason to post it. But it turns out I have two more reasons to be grateful for reaching this day.

Stanford Healthcare had already announced that people over 65 could start making appointments for the COVID-19 vaccine starting today. I tried to sign up before the inauguration, but they hadn’t updated the website yet. And by the time we’d watched the ceremony and a lot of the post-ceremony, drunk a bottle of California sparkling wine, taken a walk, and had lunch, I’d forgotten I needed to do it – until we turned the TV back on to watch Vice President Harris swear in Senators Padilla, Ossoff, and Warnock. The swearing-in was running late, so Katy Tur was talking to someone and happened to mention the vaccine – I rushed over to my computer to sign up. It took a few tries (the website was less than cooperative, and every time it glitched, we had to go back to Step 1), but as Chuck Schumer was making his first remarks as Senate Majority Leader, both of us had appointments for five weeks from today. Our appointments are 90 minutes apart, but the site is only a 25-minute walk from home (or a ten-minute drive and a five-minute struggle for parking), so we’ll be OK.

And the induction burner I ordered through Silicon Valley Clean Energy’s discount program arrived in time for me to use it to make dinner (One-Pot Spaghetti with Cherry Tomatoes and Kale). It’s fast but is going to require some getting used to – and I can see at least one more cookware purchase in our future.

Not a bad day, not at all!