Where should I start? Well yes, I have let you all down, I promised to keep this updated, but I was just too busy and too tired! We got up at 5am and usually came home around 7 pm only to have two more hours of work in the cellar! Now, of course this doesn't sound unusual to all who are in the wine business, but for those of you who aren't, I wanted you to understand. On Monday the 5th we finished picking the Syrah vineyard in the rain! It started raining pretty early on and by the time we finished we were soaked. Not exactly what we had hoped for, but we were really happy to get the rest in before everything got too water logged. Everything was in by 4:00 pm and then we just watched it rain. Matt popped a hole in one of the trailor tires so we had to leave it out there and hoped to get new tires the next day. It rained all day Tuesday, the autoroute was closed inbetween Nimes and Montpellier, all of the schools were closed, the TGV stopped, everyone was thinking of the floods in 2002. Luckily the rain stopped the next morning and we all breathed a sigh of relief, there wasn't any major flooding in the area and the rain had come gradually so there wasn't too much that was washed out. Wednesday we waited since it would have been extremely muddy in the vineyards, and we wanted to give the grapes a chance to dry out. We had no idea if the enologist would want us to wait or if he would tell us to go ahead and pick so I waited until I got ahold of him to make a decision. He said as soon as we could get into the vineyards to go ahead and start, and to get everything in as soon as possible, before the fruit started to rot... So, even though they called for more rain in the forecast, we all went out Thursday morning with rain gear in hopes that we could start picking again. When we got there the sky looked threatening, then it started to pour down rain. So, plush as we are, we decided to go have a coffee in the village and wait it out, maybe it was just a brief shower. The whole time we were at the cafe, it didn't rain, but as soon as we got back, it started to sprinkle again, then the sky opened up, and it didn't stop until late that night. The amount of rain that fell was amazing, it just didn't let up. Meanwhile, Matt and my sister Molly stayed behind to change the tires on the tractor trailer, and ended up getting both the big rental van and Molly's rental car stuck in the mud! What a day, just as I was pulling up to rescue them, they succeeded in getting Molly's rental car out, but the van would have to wait until the rain stopped.