Holding pattern

Last week just a bust on the cheese shop front. After applying for licenses and permits galore, I learned that, in a nutshell, I can't get a liquor license that will give me the freedom I want in the shop. I appears that in order to have public tastings, I would either need a liquor license that dictates more than 50% sales from alcohol, or I sell unopened bottles and have no ability to give people tastings. There is one other option I'm going to discuss with my lawyer tomorrow morning that will hopefully resolve this issue, but if it doesn't work then I'm back to spreadsheets and business plan drama, editing everything I've worked so hard on to create a different type of store. But I'm not going to count on anything yet.

This weekend we got away for a bit and shot down to Newport, OR for the Annual Newport Seafood and Wine Festival. We ate the best Penn Cove mussels I've ever had, downed many a Rogue ale, trooped through two tent's worth of drunken, post Mardi-Gras idiots to taste dozens of wine, and then stuffed ourselves silly with more yummy things from shells out of the ocean. I now have a very good selection of Oregon wines to add to the inventory list. Among the shining stars of the afternoon were a Willamette Valley Syrah and a Columbia Valley Merlot, both of which are absolutely toe-curlingly fantastic.

Then I took advantage of the drive home to shove my nose back into my library of cheese porn; books full of the most luxurious photos and descriptions of cheeses the world over. That, a relaxing Sunday evening back with the furry children, an ice cold Brutal Bitter from the Rogue warehouse sale, and a hunk of Seastack I'd forgotten about, and call me good.