A short tale of a sherry-sipper.

In my family lore there is the story of how, like the current monarch Queen Elizabeth II, my grandmother had two birthdays.  ER II, like all English monarchs since the mid 1700s, has a real birthday and an official birthday.  The date of the latter birthday, like much in rainy England, is dictated by the weather (too silly not to be true).  The circumstances surrounding the fact that my grandmother had two birthdays were not so, ceremonious.  Or weather related.
The family friend who had been tasked with registering the newborn's birth, on behalf of my great-grandmother who was on bed rest, was unfortunately illiterate.  Exactly one whole week had passed and the poor woman, unable to read or write, was not educated enough to catch the simple clerical error.  So, according to officialdom the date of my grandmother's birth was the 19th of September 1903.  In jest, sometimes my grandmother would insist upon the family observing both anniversaries of her birth.
I only ever knew my grandmother to imbibe alcohol at parties, usually Christmas and New Year's Eve.  And her drink of choice was always a cream sherry, but just a sip.  I'm sure more sherry went into my grandmother's trifles than into her glass.  Her generation weren't big drinkers, they couldn't afford to be.
Today would have been my grandmother's 117th birthday.  And next week she will have another 117th birthday: I will observe both.  Long gone, but not forgotten, she was the best gran a Vinogirl could have.

Just because 7...

...Today would have been my grandmother's 109th birthday.  My brother, Thud, posted this picture on his blog.  It is a photograph of the tenements in Liverpool city centre where my grandparents began their married life.  I fondly recall my gran's fabulous stories about all the Irish-Catholic immigrant families - with a smattering of Italians thrown in (for a little spice).  My gran was a great storyteller.
I still think of my grandmother nearly every day.