Wig It

When the weather is nice, one of my favorite things to do around Charlottesville is to go wine-tasting.  My vineyard of choice is called Veritas:

I've spent a few fun afternoons at Veritas, but the trip I took with my friend, Chad, this past fall, remains the most absurd.  It all began as soon as we got in the car.

Me: "It smells weird in here."

Chad: "It smells like poop."

Me: "You're right!! It really does!!"

Chad: "It smells like a lot of poop!"

Me:   "Seriously, WHAT is THAT?!  This is getting out of control."

Chad: "I feel like I'm rolling around in poop."

At this point we started to frantically search the car.  I heard Chad scream and my eyes darted to the floorboard on the Driver's side, where he was staring in horror.  There was dog poop everywhere.  

"AAHH I must have stepped in it in the yard!!! It's EVERYWHERE! What do we do?!!"  

Panicked, I started screaming and threw myself against the window.  I was panting on the glass, gasping for any hint of untainted air.  I pulled at the door handle and fell out onto the asphalt.  Meanwhile, Chad had gone through a similar process and was now running around looking for a natural equivalent to a paper-towel; a leaf, a stick, a wad of grass, a stray paper bag.  Chad cleaned up his shoes and placemat as best as he could, and we pressed on; riding to Veritas with the windows down.

  

We stopped at this cute grocer that is on the way to the vineyard, called Greenwood Grocery.  The wrap-around porch was overflowing with lawn decorations, pumpkins, and colorful gourds.  We bought a box of crackers and a wedge of my favorite cheese, Midnight Moon, to take with us.  

Once at Veritas, we unpacked our cheese and crackers and uncorked a bottle of Red Star, setting up our picnic on one of the tables on the porch.  We were having a great time, when I noticed the baby at the table next to us.  It had A LOT of hair.  It was tiny, weighing maybe 10 pounds, with its squinty eyes poking out beneath this dark mop of hair.  I'm pretty sure the hair weighed more than the baby.

"Psst, Chad!"

"What?"

"Look at that baby behind you.  Do you think that's its real hair?"

Chad turned around. "Oh my god!!"

"I think it's wearing a wig!!  There's no way that's real!"

Just then, two women walked up to the couple with the wiggin' baby.  "Look at that full head of hair!!"  This was painfully obvious to me.  The mother passed the baby over to the father, allowing me to get a full view of the haircut.  This baby had layers in the back and sweeping bangs across-the-forehead!!  To make matters worse, I realized that the baby had the exact same haircut as its dad, who was sporting a mid-20s hipster 'do.  I needed documentation and to consult back-up, but all I had was my cell phone.  I made Chad pose as if I was taking a picture of him, but really focused my phone's camera on the baby.  I couldn't zoom in far enough, and, just like that, Operation Sneaky Picture was a failure.

I couldn't bare it any longer.  "We need to figure this out.  Maybe I'll walk by and tug on the hair...see if it comes off."

Chad: "Let's be more subtle about this.  I'll just walk up to the mom and say 'Great haircut! Where do you get it done?' and when she thanks me and starts talking about her own hairdresser, I'll cut her off and say 'Oh no no, your baby's!'"

PS:  In case anyone was wondering...yes, this did happen once: