JennieG, I almost mentioned the cardboard offerings in my list of inexpensive but acceptable wines - I haven't had any of them in many years, deciding to go with glass as it is completely recyclable. Meanwhile, it's good to know what was the unfortunately named progenitor of the House of Mudcat Collapso wines - though I can't find a trace of them for sale here in the US. A search on Google offers up other Italian red wine blends.

I've lived in a lot of different states and they each have their own rules for selling alcohol. There were dry cities here in Texas (there may still be) but the large city where I worked reversed that a dozen years ago and the liquor stores that sold everything at the city boundaries soon closed as businesses popped up in town. Beer and wine are ok in grocery stores, the hard stuff in their own stores. In Washington where I grew up there used to be state liquor stores until the Costco warehouses took it to court (Costco is also based in Washington) and now liquor sales are separate from wine and beer but not in state stores. In Arizona everything is sold in any store, it's just in it's own room. In Kentucky we used to have to drive a county to the west to buy cases of beer to bring home.

I haven't driven much of anywhere in ages except to buy gasoline without ethanol (next county west of here). I'm out of the habit, and if I go for more than I a day have to make arrangements to feed the dogs. And there is still COVID. There are fewer and fewer of us in public in face masks these days, but every time I think about maybe skipping it, an article comes along to convince me otherwise. This morning I read about the scourge of "brain fog" that goes with Long COVID. It's bad enough to feel that way temporarily after a medical procedure or in the grips of a cold or flu, but a prolonged episode, and no way to know if you'll end up with Long COVID or not - ugg. I'll keep wearing the masks.

Time to work on decluttering ugly potted plants out by the front porch and at the side door. Repot the contents or dump the contents if the plants died. It's all a bit of a tangle right now. And while doing this, work on the compost. I have a long hose that can be dragged to the compost are at the back of the yard. I need to turn and then water the contents of bins. After our hot summer the tops of the piles baked into hard cases and anything underneath hasn't had any water trickle through (even with that day of heavy rain) to help break down the contents. Repotting (and rearranging and sweeping) will provide an instant refresh to those areas. And while I'm at it, working out a way to make some small trellises (tee pees of cut branches or bamboo) for vines to climb. I recycled a lot of straight branches (curbside pickup) but I don't they they were particularly durable to use. Maybe cheap cedar furring strips in with other stuff.