Sad News

I know I'm a little late, but I just found out today that the owner of Ridge Vineyards, Donn Reisen, has died of an apparent suicide. He will be missed.

On a morbid side note, does anyone know the actual method?

Spirits of Mt. Vernon, Seriously, WTF...

So this is my second trip to "Spirits of Mt. Vernon" today, as my first visit ended with an old man sitting in the window telling me to come back in 10 minutes.
"You're there, can't you help me?"
"No, ten minutes, ten minutes"
(Where'd they go, to get your heart pills?)

Seriously, if your hours state you're open from 11-9 p.m. then, WHY are you NOT OPEN?!? Are you too cheap to spring for a "closed be back in hour" sign? Shit, how about writing it on one of the many wine-ruining windows you've got all over your store? Yours truly, in a different city, being within walking distance to a "Fine Wine Store", and not having it open is tantamount to cruel and unusual punishment as far as I'm concerned.... It's just mean!

Every time I go in this sunshine-shithole of a store, I'm (barely) greeted by an older woman with bad manners and the personality of a pregnant, rabid, echidna. The selection is terrible, the wine is stored improperly. Here's a hint: if the sun has FADED your "Come In, We're Open" sign, imagine what it's doing to the WINE you have SITTING in the windows! IN DIRECT SUN.

I'm not a difficult customer, and trust me, if I have a question, I'll ask. Directly. Subtlety is not a strong point of mine.. So when I tell you for the THIRD time that I don't need any help or have any questions, that usually means I DON'T NEED ANY HELP. I'm sorry to bother you, as I know you were ever so busy sitting there with your piss drinking mother of a circus whore associate, discussing how terrible it is that you can't get out of jury duty for a second time. I just really wanted some Cava. And when I told you I wanted Cava, not something imported by Freixenet, and you sent me to the mini bottles of Freixenet, I knew ours was a relationship doomed.

Btw, next time, when you're giving the "hard sale" speech and recruiting your shriveled up coworker,going on about how much depth this one has as compared to the Cristalino, make sure you c-l-e-a-r-l-y say the name of whatever it is the customer is purchasing, as I bought a CAVA, not a comma..... Although maybe that's a business venture better suited to your temperament. And it would give you all the time in the world to gossip to your little group of twittering hags you had hanging out on the "tasting bar".

What's even funnier, is the people over at that Korean Market, who didn't know Cava from Crappola, were so awesome, I don't think I'll ever go anywhere else in Baltimore. The EXACT opposite from Spirits of Mt. Vernon; friendly, helpful, and has about just as a much of a selection, without the snooty exclusiveness...

I'm done ranting for the day... I hope....

Alice Feiring book review, or my book-based bitchfest...

So on a recent trip to Barnes & Noble, while wandering in their pathetically tiny wine section, I saw a book, "The Battle for Wine and Love: or How I Saved The World from Parkerization" and I bought it. With a title as arrogant as that, it was hard to resist! Here's a book about someone who's going to save us all! How can you not buy a book like that?!? I mean, there it is, salvation, supposedly without all the confession and need to say "Hail Mary" a billion times. I might even get away without a time out OR a spanking!!

I shoulda known it wasn't going to be that easy. If you were thinking about buying the book, don't! Seriously! It's 258 pages full of Alice's own mental masturbation! She spends about thirty pages actually giving information about wines, and the rest is just her whining. It's worse than reading Dostoevsky!!

The book is all about our "heroine's" *snort* journey through the sometimes convoluted world of wine, and her (mis)adventures along the way. It's a fucking joke, I don't care about her first wine love and the scandal that she's never been able to clear up surrounding the winemaker. I also don't care about her stupid ass (lack of) love affairs, her friends and roommates, her dance therapy shit, her travels, her amazing super tasting skills, or her allergies and aches and pains.

What I care about are her views of wine and the wine world, her insights, and her purported saving of the world. And so far, I haven't gotten much. All I've gotten is that she doesn't like Robert Parker, which I happen to agree with her on. I also agree that the reason he rates so many in-your-face fruit bombs so high is because he is, as she calls it, "quantifying" as opposed to the rest of us, who "qualify". I also happen to enjoy wines grown with sustainable practices, and am a big fan of artisan wines.

I missed the part in the book where she saved the world. Did they leave that chapter out? I know I'm being petty and trivial, but if she says she saved the world, I'd like to see some evidence of it. Why do I still see Robert Parker scores on everything? Is she not realizing that by saying shit like that, and writing a book that goes nowhere, she's becoming exactly like the man she loves to bitch about?


Maybe I need that spanking after all....

The fault, dear Riesling, is not in our stars....

So I was listening to NPR's Kojo Nnamdi show, with Michael Franz ( wine review online) and Paul Lukacs (Washington Times) as his guests. The topic of the segment was Riesling. Mainly, it was about Riesling's popularity, and yet it never actually manages to take off in the way of Merlot or Pinot Noir,or hell, even Pinot Grigio from Italy (lemon water) and exploring why that is. And then, naturally, callers called in claiming their undying love and allegiance to Rieslings.

This topic of discussion is getting old. Really old. Go to any wine tasting, read any wine article or blog or book, and sooner or later this debate comes up. Why are we beating a dead horse? Riesling is a wonderful grape, when vinified skillfully, it produces an amazing wine. Lots of people love it. I'm one of them! Just like pizza and sex, even when it's bad, it's still pretty good! I think most people start out on Riesling and then branch out from there, like Riesling is the gateway drug of the wine world.

Lots of people are still scarred from what I like to call the "Blue Nun" years. The demand increased for these amazing German babies, and then the market was flooded with horrible sugar bombs, even the hobos wouldn't touch it,stuff so bad it offended the jug wines! Then Germany stepped in and, well, you know the rest....

What I'm saying is that I think Riesling has HAD it's day. I think it will always be the next big thing, that perennial emotional favorite. That's it's place in the wine world. Riesling has it's niche, just like Merlot or Pinot or hell, even jug wine for that matter. Can't we just enjoy it and find something else to nitpick about already? Like the sad homogenization of wine, or the lack of easy to understand information. Or why don't we go back to the Right Bank vs. Left Bank one, I never get tired of that!

Gettin' Screwed

So I was reading this article on the fact that Stelvins are coming to pricey wines. And I'm thrilled, because this means people are finally waking up and smelling the rosé !
I'm still kind of incredulous because people are wary of this shiny new cylindrical wonder. Consumers are still holding onto their outdated hunks of bark. Is it the tradition? The romance? The noise? I got nothing....

I'm done whining now, at least for the moment.
Wait, I lied, I'm going insane over here, waiting for FedEx to deliver my wine!!
Seriously! This is important! It's hot outside!! According to the website, it's been on the delivery truck since 8:04 this morning! Vibrations are bad!!Rub some now on it already!!!!

Okay, now I'm done.

:)

Que Syrah,(petit) Sirah, Shiraz

I'm currently flipping through Jancis Robinson's *other* obscenely cumbrous book, "The World Atlas Of Wine" because I'm beginning to think I'm a glutton for punishment. Aside from that, it's dead useful, if a bit *ahem* sleep inducing? less than inspiring? stuffy? Whatever... And it just hit me, she never differentiates between Syrah and Shiraz, and skips over the Petit Sirah, aside from a few notes about Greece and California, where it does well. It's not a huge point, I know, but it's a handy one, none the less... A wine's name can *sometimes* give you a good clue as to where it came from, other times it just serves to confuse the crap out of you! Like, seriously, what's up with the weird name-swapping thing? Like Morio-Muskat, which is a Sylvaner & Pinot Blanc crossing. No Morio, Muscat, Muscadelle, Moscato, Moscatel, yada yada, we get the point...

Personally, I think we should start forcing a rename, and not in the oddball- marketing -Robert- Mondavi-Sauvignon-Blanc-as-Fume-Blanc (because we're afraid to screw up the pronunciation) kind of way, but in a more fun way... Sorry, I'm not creative enough to come up with a new name that doesn't involve a curse word... I'm open to suggestion though!


Incidentally, an easy way to remember is Syrah is "Old World" (basically France) and Shiraz is "New World" (or everwhere else that isn't France).
Winelabels.org has a very interesting article of Petit Sirah, in case you're interested....

And now I'm done whining for the day...