devarim

I'm having major anxiety about the wine and cheese event that I'm coordinating for our shul. I haven't finished writing up the pamphlets with all the information on each wine and cheese. I haven't made up the little cards people fill out to say they're interested in future events. (Those two things both neeed to be sent out for copying, so I have to finish them tonight.) We don't have serving platters that I like...we have serving platters, you understand, just none that I'm happy with. I still need to buy fruit (pears, figs, grapes, and apples), though to my credit the grapes shouldn't be purchased too far in advance. I'm not certain how we're going to keep the white and dessert wines cold on Saturday night (I don't like the ice-in-a-disposable-aluminum-pan look). I keep second-guessing the pairings and wishing that I had enough time (and money and spare calories) to sit around and sample everything so I could be confident that the chevre will dance with the emerald riesling, the parmagiano won't scare the pants off either red (a cabernet and a merlot, if you're curious), and the mascarpone will properly stand up to the fruits without overwhelming the light dessert wines.

Oh, and as if that weren't enough (and it is, oh yes, it is), I discovered late last night that one of the wines I selected (and bought already, of course) is not labeled as mevushal. According to our shul's rules, any wine served on the premises must be mevushal. (I don't feel like getting into the explanation of what mevushal means right now. Google it.) Now, I'd bought this wine numerous times in the past, knowing that it was mevushal, so I didn't bother checkng the bottles too carefully when I was making purchases on Sunday. In the store, I noticed that instead of their usual all-English label, the back labels on these bottles were in Hebrew. Whatever.

Fast forward to last night, when I'm working on the aforementioned pamphlet. I turn the bottle over to see if I can piece together anything from the blurb that would be useful in my description, and I notice that I don't see the word "mevushal" anywhere, in any language. I read it all through a couple of times--nope. Julian looked as well--not there. I called the store this morning and their wine guy put in a call to the distributors (or something) to ask about the status of the wine. In the meantime, I am planning to buy three bottles of a comparable wine to use instead of this one. It's not a tremendously big deal, but it will eat up precious time this evening and it throws a bit of a wrench into my already uncertain pairings.

On a positive note, we now have about fifteen RSVPs for the event, not counting myself, Julian, or the shul's programming director and his wife. My goal was twenty (and at thirty we have to send someone out for emergency provisions), so at least we're in good shape numbers-wise.