Beaujolais Nouveau 2004 has just been released! This is the very first wine from the harvest, from Beaujolais France. It's light and fruity and a celebration of the harvest being done. Have you tried any?

No - seen it in the supermarket but didn't feel inclined to buy it.

In years past it was quite a big event, but it seems to have declined.

One of the country pubs around here used to have a Beaujolais Nouveau lunch and we'd all go, have a meal and quaff lots of BN, but no more.

And shops had tastings, but no more.

Really? That's odd, it's still hugely popular around here. I wonder why it's fading away where you are? Are wine dinners in general becoming less popular, or just the BN ones? It seems there are now wine dinners every day of the week in Massachusetts ...

I do admit that it wasn't very tasty at all this year so it was more to drink it for the 'festival' aspect vs enjoying it

I didn't even see the usual 'its arrived' signs this year.

Don't know about wine dinners - the BN event was a special in a friends village, and the place would be packed.

Tell me more about wine dinners?

Oh by wine dinner I just mean where a given restaurant would have a special dinner that had wines paired with each course - say an "Oregon Pinot Noir" dinner where they did a series of courses that all paired with chosen pinot noirs from Oregon. For the past two months I was going to about one a week with various friends and family members. There are a ton of restaurants around here that do that, so there's always one going on somewhere, it seems. They're a lot of fun - a great way to learn about wine and socialize at the same time

It's neat that my mom and sis both like the dinners, so it's a way for us all to spend time together that's educational and fun.