Welcome to my blog, where I take pleasure in words and pictures, be they my own or those of others. I'm a creative individual, and the crafty side I explore on my 'other blog', Picking Up The Threads, which I hope you'll visit too. I'm sure you understand that I have sole copyright of my original work and any of my contributions, so please ask if you want to use them. A polite request is rarely refused. So, as they used to say on the BBC's 'Listen With Mother' radio programme, many years ago: "Are you sitting comfortably? Then we'll begin."

Friday 1 August 2014

When the Cat’s Away

























These alcoholic mice are having a fine old time drinking sherry. They even have a little mouse-ladder provided! When it’s quiet at the Gonzalez Byass bodega in Spain’s Jerez, these little rodents sneak out and enjoy their favourite tipple.

The pictures are a little wonky, not because I’d had a drink myself (this was at the the very start of the tour) but because they were on the wall of the cellar, quite high up.

Our charming guide pointed to the the glass of sherry and the ladder on the cellar floor and told us the story. Apparently it stops them gnawing away at the barrels to get to the contents.

They wouldn’t want the barrels spoiled because some of them are rather special, signed by famous people; artists, racing drivers, British Prime Ministers, actors and film-makers.





We were in Jerez earlier this year for my husband’s birthday and after the tour of the cellars and the obligatory video, we had a sherry-tasting and thereafter were steered inevitably towards the shop on the way out.

We managed to restrain ourselves and left with nothing more than our souvenir pictures and an appetite for lunch.




This week Sepia Saturday has proverbs as a possible theme so I thought of my sepia mice. Apparently the management wanted to introduce a cat but the workers threatened to strike if they did so. I bet there is one, otherwise they’d be overrun with the little squeakers. Imagine that, lots of drunken mice tearing all over the place! Not good for anyone with musophobia. The cat can’t cover all angles though and when the cat’s away the mice will play.



Why not join other Sepians to see what they made of this week’s prompt?



15 comments:

  1. Have you read my blog yet? I recommend Gonzalez Byass stock a steady supply of shoes. That's all I'm going to say about that ;-)
    I'm not sure those pictures encourage me to buy their sherry.

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  2. A rather cute & ingenious solution to a serious problem. But you're right - there must have been a cat somewhere around. Either that, or the drunken mice weren't able to, er, perform?

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  3. All things considered I think tipsy mice would be preferred to drunk cats. And let's not think of hungover dogs.

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  4. A proverb brought to life beautifully. Inebriated mice is a bit like Drunken Parrot Season in Darwin when certain birds shows all the signs after feeding on fermenting fruit which is prevalent at the time. They stagger around and can't fly and are sick for days

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  5. I think they need some mouse traps there.

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  6. That's some lateral thinking going on there.

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  7. I agree, a few mousetraps or a cat would do the trick!

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  8. Very amusing. A perfect story for the proverb. How funny that the workers sympathized with the mice!
    Aren't those mouse ladders the cutest things?

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  9. There should be a proverb which says something like "To waste wine on a mouse is like having no door on your house". If I catch a mouse sippy my best malt whisky it will be one dead mouse.

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  10. Ha Ha Ha. Made me think of Mr Jingles in the Green Mile. Most know the movie but don't realise that it was the first "series" of short story books written by Stephen King. As an avid Stephen King fan, I was not happy. I read quickly and the books came out every fortnight. I would finish a book in a couple of days then have to wait for the next installment. I suppose it stopped me reading "one more chapter" and staying up to the early hours of the morning!

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  11. I've visited a bodega in Jerez de la Frontera, but I'm not sure if it was this one. I didn't notice any mice, drunk or sober. But there were a lot of barrels signed by celebrities. And a tasting afterwards (after which I decided this was not my kind of liquor).

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  12. I'm with Alan...don't waste good alcohol on critters. Amazing to hear about drunken parrots in Darwin. I've got cats, but bought traps for the mice so I didn't end up having the leavings following the cats playing with the mouse that came inside last year. I caught it in the trap just fine!

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  13. I'm assuming humans are not required to climb a ladder in order to get a taste.

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  14. rather creepy! but if it keeps them away from the barrels, so be it.

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  15. You must not be a fan of sherry, to leave without buying any bottles. We are always offered a glass when we visit my husband's English relatives. You didn't actually see the mice drinking, or the after effects, did you?

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