Maynard Wine Signing...

Well my husband and I went to the Whole Foods on Stevens Creek Blvd. in Cupertino to meet Maynard James Keenan of the bands Tool, A Perfect Circle, and his new side project band Pucifer. Anyway, our meeting with him was incredibly very, very brief as he signed our bottles of wine. He had tons of people waiting for signatures so of course we couldn't take too much of his valuable time.

It was a trippy experience and we had a friend who happens to work for Whole Foods; she actually got to meet with him prior to the event. I guess she may have told him about us; but who knows. We were grateful just to meet him and to have him sign our special bottles of wine.

We had numbers (90 & 91) for each of us and we could only have 1 bottle each to have signed. I had planned on bringing my old snowboarding helmet to sign and of course get a photo of us together for this very inspirational blog! Just to prove that life definitely goes on despite stupid cancer. We got there a little past 1pm and had to wait in a long line (but not too long) to buy our wine.

They only allowed groups of 20. 20 to go in and buy the wine and then 20 to go in for the signing only 1 at a time. We waited a little over 2 hours and we were worried that I might not make it for my blood test. I needed to get my blood drawn for chemo the next morning. I would have gladly postponed the chemo for this very important signing event. The line for which to get your bottles signed was a couple hundred. It was quite a long a wait as we worried if we would be on time for my blood test.

Prior to going to this event, I went ahead and drank lots of fluids for my blood test which I needed to take sometime before 4:30pm (lab would be closed by then). I think I must have had to go to the bathroom about 5 times during the whole wait and it just happened to be in the same area where the signing was taking place or right in front . There were several huge Sheriff's deputies guiding the premises in several location and 1 inside and some huge body guards. I was grateful to be able to go to the bathroom as many times as I needed to go.

Every one was very nice and there were a few who were quite irritated at all the rules and such. I never once let all those rules bother me and I knew it was for his protection. They are lots of crazy people in this world and then there are lots of excellent people in this world as well. Hopefully, we all outnumber the bad!

Some of the rules were NO sweatshirts, NO purses (now it says large purses, but it turned out NO purses, NO hoodies, NO cameras, NO cell phones. Now once we walked in, he and Eric Glomski the wine maker; were behind this barrier along with lots of security and a large Sheriff Deputy. Quite intimidating but I asked to find out which of the two wines that we had picked out would be best in close to 5 more years. I got to tell both of them that I am actually saving one of the wines for our 10 year Advanced Ovarian Cancer survival/wedding anniversary. (I hope & pray that I get to celebrate:) Maynard looked right at me, very genuinely (I know I heard him ask me "how long has it been") and I got to tell him "over 6 years". He had such a sweet expression on his face which I will never forget. My husband really wanted to ask him about his army experience as both did a short stint in the Army. Oh well.

He really is quite a multi-talented artist; he has 2 wineries. (Caduceus Cellars - Merkin Vineyards and Arizona Stronghold Wineries). We bought two wines; the "Arizona Stronghold Nachise" and the "Merkin Chupacabra".

I had read in their blog (http://azstronghold.blogspot.com) about the Nachise blend that had been agreed upon for this particular wine back in May. This particular bottle will be enjoyed on our lucky 7 year anniversary (December 3, 2009).

Feel free to read this interesting article in the SF Gate about this wine tour:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/01/DD85152HKD.DTL

Now our bottle of the Merkin Chupacabra will be popped open during our 10 year Survival/Wedding Anniversary (December 3, 2012). I'm so thankful that Eric Glomski made that suggestion for us. I personally don't know too much about certain types of grapes. I do know that Zins are only good for less than 5 years but the Nachise is a blend of several types and this one would need to be enjoyed within 2-3 years. That's pretty bad memory for an ex-waitress and bartender.

Now since I never got to take any cool photos of Maynard; here are some cool cats that allowed for photos. Perhaps one day I will have an excellent photo to share of Maynard. Here is one photo of me and Steve Caballero. This was actually taken about 7 years ago at a Ski and Snowboard expo in 2001.

Now about 2 years ago, we actually sat right next to him and his very cute daughter at our favorite sushi joint (Kazoo) I was so shy and couldn't say a word to him. His daughter was so incredibly sweet. I can't get over how fat and happy I look in this photo. I must have lost at least 40 lbs since then.

Here is a very, very cool photo of our friend Mike with Pete Townsend of "the Who". What a cool cat! We had a friend who was visiting us at the time from Chippewa Falls Wisconsin and he used to work an annual concert called "Rock Fest" which is held in Cadott, Wisconsin. My husband have been a few times together. He has gone to this quite a bit in the past. Anyway our friend had only 1 backstage pass and we decided Mike should go. Here he is with Mr. Blue Eyes himself.

Mike is such a good friend of ours and we actually got him deputized to do our wedding for us at the Moss Beach Distillery. I know I have tons more photos, but for now these two will have to do!

I have chemo in the morning so I will end it here. Hope you enjoyed this post. Peace & Love!)