AA3406 CWA ORD 1626 1745 CRJ 4B
The Two Women beer that I'd got for a pretty exorbitant
price at the airport must have been higher in alcohol
than labeled, because I was exceedingly logy on this
flight and snoozed off and on for the whole hour, so
to me despite the weather-related bumpiness it was a
perfectly fine trip. We landed in the far nether parts
of the airport and had to hightail it to our next gate,
where they were boarding group 5 by the time we arrived,
by which time overhead space had gotten hard to find.

AA1172 ORD BOS 1829 2149 738 10B

It turns out that alcohol was free in these seats, though
my access to them was revoked as of the day after this
flight, so that's an unknown benefit that was given me
and then taken away almost immediately. After the effects
of my paid beverage, I was in no mood to take advantage of
the benefit, so Bonnie got a double Dewar's on me.

-

I was back in Boston to run some errands, including
a meeting of a committee that Nicholas had chaired and
had bequested a quarter million dollars to. I was
flabbergasted that the board seems to have highjacked
the money and granted us a 2% annual share, not enough,
we agreed at the meeting, to fund our lofty plans. Oh,
and our regular budgeted line item has been axed on the
theory that Nicholas's bequest would fully fund us.
There were some grumbles about this, but we've decided
(or rather the chairman decided for us) that we would
try to wheedle supplemental appropriations from the board
on a case-by-case basis, not my preferred course of
action at all. I left with a bad taste in my mouth,
not primarily due to the catering, which had been
ordered with Nicholas's memory in mind.

Amancaya (N. Catena & Domaines Rothschild) 15 was a
rather young tannic Cabernet Malbec blend, joint effort
of two heavy hitters, one from Bordeaux and one from
the Mendoza Valley. Like many 2- to 3-year-olds, it had
gone a bit dumb but showed brambly with a bit of plum,
but muted, and some cigar box in the Bordeaux way; the
dumbness was partially natural and partially because the
steward had opted to chill it owing to the temperature
outside being an eye-popping 97 (a thunderstorm brought
it down to 80 by the time we got there).

There was also a Sancerre Les Baronnes 17 (Henri
Bourgeois) that despite its exalted name was a very
thin quaffer with a weedy Sauvignon flavor - a
distinctly ungreat wine but appropriately quenching.

The wines were chosen in memory of Nicholas but limited
by our weakened budget - he would have offered a Bordeaux
and a Loire white but of a more substantial pedigree, but
he's dead now, and we have to make do without a strong
culinary advocate.

To accompany the wine and the arguments here were also
three sheep cheeses, which thrilled me not, and some
quite good prosciutto.

It appears that we will either have to restrict our
activities to one commission every two to three years or
stoop to collaborate with a third party (we have done so
before with Wigmore Hall, the Rockport Chamber Players,
and others.

The meeting broke up on a slightly sad note with a
further commemoration of an artistic colleague (not on
our committee) who had died recently by his own hand.
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