Updated sample from the previous day's wine list. 

Castillo de Enguera Crianza 03/04 – 4.65 - Nice rich color.  Wonderful nose.  Excellent flavor.  Ripe cherry.  Just enough tingle on the tongue.  I prefer this wine to what we tasted the other day (eusebio la casta)  My husband calls it a food wine as it's a bit fuller bodied.  He prefers the Eusebio to this one.  Different tastes.  That's why there is all sorts of wine right?

The title of this month's exhibit at the City Museum of Valencia is: Armando Serra en el Museo de la Ciudad en la Plaza del Arzobispado de Valencia del 7 al 30 de Noviembre de 2006: Drawings, Paintings, Collages, soul, heart, and feelings of a life that is dedicated to his city. 

What a wonderful exhibit.  City museums are free on the weekends in Valencia.  That's a treat.  What we didn't expect was a museum all to ourselves.  We were literally the only ones in the museum on a Saturday late morning.  

We loved the multi-texture aspect of the exhibit.  Rose petals and leaves on the floor; silk curtains draped around the paintings.  If you are in Valencia this month, the exhibit is a must.  The exposition definitely gives you a flavor of what inspires a talented Valencian.  

This morning as I was waiting for a fabric store to open, I noticed Las Anadas de Espana across the street.  Its windows were full of yummy looking cheeses, wines and other expensive things so I decided to browse.  The wine selection looked impressive so I decided to pick out a few slightly more upscale selections for our tasting.  I declined the salesman's help at first then quickly changed my mind.  I told him I was open to trying any sorts of reds.  That I liked complex reds but the cheaper the better.  Mind you,  I expected to receive a bit of snob appeal as a reaction but instead found some genuine enthusiasm to help me find wines in the 4 euro range.  I walked away with 6 bottles for a total of 30 euros.  They ranged from 3.95 to 7.45 euros. 

Tonight we tried a Tempranillo, Eusebio la Casta, Crianza 2002 by Bodegues J. Belda.  100% tempranillo from Finca el Pla.  Aged 10 months in oak with a total of 50,000 bottles produced.  A Valencian wine and an excellent one at that!  Well rounded and balanced.  My husband tasted a bit of pepper; I did not.  It was 3.95 euros.  A bargain for the quality.   We will definitely buy this again.

 A list of the other wines purchased.  Reviews to come!  Please note that to convert to U.S. dollars, you must multiply the euro price by 1.3.

Sonsierra Crianza 2003– 5.95

Castillo de Enguera Crianza 03/04 – 4.65 - the only one I picked out on my own although the salesman said it was quite good.!

Conde Valdemar Crianza 2002 – 7.45

Daniel Belda 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon – 3.95 

Luna beberide 2005 mencia 4.55

You'll never read a review in the Wine Spectator on the really cheap wines of Spain.  But now that we're living in Spain, and living as much like Spaniards as we can, we're drinking quite a bit of wine.  On the cheap that is.  The fact that our local supermarket Mercadona sells wine for anywhere between .70 euros and up, coupled with the fact that red wine and the Mediterranean diet can lower your cholesterol, has made my husband quite the enthusiastic wine taster.  It's easy to join him as our lifestyle so far has given us the luxury of nice midday meals "comidas" and dinners "cenas" at home.   I have made a recent decision to move a bit more upscale in wines - to the 4 to 5 euros a bottle range, I hope my reviews will make it a bit easy for anyone who may be reading this blog, and in Spain, to go out a buy a decent bottle of wine with confidence. 

Chin chin - y Que aprovechen!

_{Tinto (Red)}

• _{Gran Vinedo de Hacendado, Tempranillo y Tinto – from Ciudad Real –  Decent              Purchased – Mercadona - -  Price – 1 Euro}
• _{Vega Cristina – Crianza 2003 – granite color, nice bouquet, tastes of cherry and light tannins on the tongue.  Perfectly acceptable wine for "la comida" of chicken cutlets breaded with flour, garlic and tarragon and stir fry green beans with garlic, red pepper and tomato.                                                                                                                       Purchased – Mercadona   - -  Price – 1.65 Euros}

 _Blanco

• _{Vino Blanco Rueda - Palacio Vivero – Since it's been several days since we've had this wine, I will simply say that it's the brand I buy if I want a bottle of white wine.   I think it's delicious and the equivalent of a $9 or $10 bottle of wine in the States.}

_{Purchased – Mercadona - - Price - 2.75}

 _Sparkling

• _{Pinord Reynal - Blanco Suave – Vino de Aguja  Didn't like it at all.  Drank ¼ glass – save the rest for cooking.}  

_{Purchased – Mercadona - -  Price – 2.75}

I certainly don't want my blog to be about dog poop but I tell ya, although I'm not writing about it, I'm thinking about it.  How can I not?  The streets are relatively clean in the morning, but it's just a matter of hours before, well, you know what happens.  I do talk about it with the locals as well, and they are in agreement with me on how awful it is to see doggy waste everywhere. 

Just last week, someone wrote a letter to the editor of 20minutos.es asking if Valencia was a toilet for dogs.  A quick translation of her letter is - hey - it's gross to pick it up - but it's more gross to step in it.  

A quick search on the Internet here tells me that I'm not the only one who is fed up.  In 1995, 20minutos.es reported that the city of Zaragoza, Spain has three people employed just to pick up caca.   They pick up about 70 pounds a day and it costs the city about $90,000 for the three employees.   Another article in the same paper states that Madrid only issued three tickets last year for not "scooping" although they calculate they cleaned up forty million dog "deposits". 

Well, that's my doggy rant for the month.  With this off my chest, I can get on to the more enjoyable aspects of Valencia!

The following is a great article on both the history of fireworks in Spain as well as some interesting histories of the popular spanish festivals that use fireworks.

History of Pyrotechnics in Valencia and Spain

http://www.pyro4.nl/Articles/History_Spain.htm

I am searching for the perfect video to share with you.  Double parking protocol here in Valencia is hilarious.  I don't see this double parking phenomena in the business district downtown, but I have seen it in every single residential area.  Basically, everyone double parks.  EVERYONE.  But this rarely presents a  problem you see.  We have only once heard someone beep their horn for this reason, and we thought they looked like foreigners.  If you peer in the windows, you can see that all cars are left in neutral (no one drives an automatic).   If there is a car blocking your space, you simply push it out of the way.  Typically, you need to move several cars, but then again, this does not appear to pose a problem because even little old men push the obstructing cars out of the way.     

Well, on Monday morning, November 13th, SEUR delivered my printer cartridges.  I'm glad I was home, because they don't leave boxes by your door here.  Instead, they put a note in your box and you have to go to the post office to pick it up. 

Last Thursday, I stopped in a small, neighborhood store and inquired about an Epson T0611 black ink cartridge.  They had it for 10 euros, the exact same price as Pixmania, but without the shipping.  Hmm.

My products arrived in a box along with a catalog for pixmania - however there was no receipt or instructions for return should I need to.  Unlikely with this product but typically a standard feature in the U.S. when you buy something online.

Every day, I appreciate what I have right now.  Most of all of course, I appreciate that my husband returned from Iraq.  Before he left, the statistician that he is, Mitch reminded me of the common occurrence of auto accidents, etc,  and that statistically speaking, it was likely he would return.  But that is not how a wife looks at things. 

We're not really sure how Ben experienced Mitch's absence.  But lately, one question comes up about ten times per day.  Papa, was that in Iraq?  That question first started to appear when we read books about animals.  Ben was very curious about which animals were in Iraq because he had seen some pictures and videos of donkeys as well as puppies in Iraq.   Mitch says that the question tears his heart in two.  He has been back with us for three months now, and Ben is still curious.  For example - Papa, did you have that in Iraq - in reference to a new shirt Mitch was wearing. 

The following pictures are probably nothing special in terms of photography.  However, for me they capture so much of the tenderness that Ben and his papa share.  And I can just picture Ben leaning in to his papa on the metro while looking at a sign....papa...did they have that in Iraq?

 Valencia is famous for Las Fallas, a festival that takes place the week before March 19th each year.  The festival originates from an old carpenter tradition which took place on the eve of the city's patron saint day of Saint Joseph.  In front of their shops and in the streets and plazas, the carpenters burned all of their unusable material together with the wood scraps they used as torches while they worked in the winter.  By the 18^th century, the fallas simply became large bonfires on the eve of the 19^th.  However, over time, the contents of the bonfires developed into scenes that reflected the history and the ironies of the previous year.  Competitions developed among neighborhoods for the most artistic falla monuments.  Beginning in 1901, the Valencian government begann to give awards for the best fallas.  In 1929, the first poster competition bega and in 1932, the week of the Fallas began.  Nowadays, over 700 fallas are burned each year in Valencia. 

Today, I caught the last day of this year's poster competition.  The finalists were on display at the Valencia ayuntamiento (city hall)  My top choices did not match up with the winning selections.  But hey - I got to take pictures of them and I uploaded almost half of them in the photo section of this blog.  Which ones do you like best?  I included some of my favorites on this page, but you can see more in my photo gallery.

Wikipedia has a great description of  las Fallas and the Mascletas (the loud explosions to celebrate anything)

Honorable mention to the right

The winner for Las Fallas 2007