How It Works

As one of the commenters from my last post has noted–quite rightly–I have been procrastinating about writing my next post.  She should not have brought this to my attention, because before I read her comment I had not realized I was doing this.  I thought I was just waiting for the next idea for a topic to come and gobsmack me like it usually does.  But I know this about myself: once the spectre of procrastination is raised in regard to a task I should be performing, NOTHING CAN HAPPEN until a task I like even less rears its head, and it’s right then that I get the most interesting idea for a post and I sit down and write it straightaway, because I don’t want to do that other thing.  Does that make sense?  It’s pretty much how I operate.

 

So I started thinking about it this way, because I am a deep thinker with deeply analytical thinking skills (and a lot of caffeine in my system), and I thought: Why procrastinate now, when I can do it later?  In other words–and I’m really going down the rabbit hole with this–I have decided to procrastinate about procrastinating.  So I’m writing the blog now.  You see how it works?

 

I wish I could say that my motivation to write has nothing to do with how filthy my house is right now.  But it has EVERYTHING to do with that. 

 

Thanks, commenters! 

Now This Is a Job I Can Do!–Later

I saw this on craigslist the other day and, oh boy, was I excited!                   I CAN DO THIS!  Here is the job description, exactly as printed on craigslist:

_____________________________________________________

Writing coach to help with procrastination               

 please flag with care:

miscategorized
prohibited
spam/overpost
best of craigslist

---

Reply to:job-xsnty-1205493531@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}
Date: 2009-10-04, 3:59PM EDT

I need help with procrastination. I understand goal setting and motivation tactics, but I need some additional help keeping on task with the multiple writing projects I currently have. I need someone skilled — and hopefully experienced — with advising individuals with procrastination issues.

Please respond by email and let me know a little about your experience or special skills regarding procrastination.

Thanks!

• Compensation: negotiable
• Telecommuting is ok.
• This is a part-time job.
• This is a contract job.
• Principals only. Recruiters, please don’t contact this job poster.
• Please, no phone calls about this job!
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

PostingID: 1205493531

_________________________________________________

OMG!  I can TOTALLY help with procrastination—this is the other job I was born to do!  (My other dream job is being paid to drink wine someday, but until I land that one, this sounds promising.)

Not to give too much away—in case I actually do get around to responding to this ad—here is what I would advise the person who posted this ad, if he/she hired me as their procrastinating coach:

As you can see, because I am using actual words to blog about this, I am a writer, dammit, so I have a ton of stuff I could teach you about writing and stuff.  Like how to get your stuff on paper and sprinkle it with some sparkly new stuff so you don’t keep saying the same stuff the same way.  So that’s the writing part of the equation.

As for procrastinating (this is where you will get your money’s worth—there is money involved, right?):  I can also teach you about some websites to visit so you can more efficiently procrastinate, which is something all serious writers do (why stress out about writing bad crap today when you can do it tomorrow?).  And how to check your e-mail 17 times an hour.  And why playing around on Facebook can help take your mind off what a loser you are.  And aren’t you sitting there reading my blog right now?  Fantastic waste of time.  You’re already great at this.   Oh, and YouTube: Yes.

So, yep, I have loads of wisdom to share with you, so if you like what I am selling, meet me in the comments section and we’ll talk—eventually!

Again, With the Wine

As promised (because I sometimes keep my promises), here is part 2 of my 465-part series, Wine Baby.

II.  Time to Get Your Drink On!

In order to progress from wine baby to wine expert you have to taste the wines.  This may seem obvious, but at an honest-to-goodness, up-to-your-eyeballs-in-assholes Napa Valley wine tasting, it is not as much fun as you’d think.  This is mainly because the emphasis is on “tasting” rather than “drinking.”  I mean, when you put the words “wine” and “tasting” together, it sounds like fun, right?  Well, it didn’t take long for the smug attitudes of our wine instructor and fellow wine-tasters to put a major buzz-kill on this pleasant-sounding afternoon activity. 

I attended my first wine-tasting at a pretentiously decorated, somewhat cavelike tasting room.  For some reason, everyone wore sunglasses even though they were indoors, out of the sun, in a dark and cavernous space.  Clearly these West-coasters were not a sharp crowd.  I scanned the room for signs of intelligence and concluded I might be able to hold my own amongst them.  The dimly-lit room made it difficult for me to see the price list clearly, and this, coupled with my inability to look anyone directly in the eye (due to sunglasses), made me suspicious about the whole operation. 

Our wine-pourer—I had decided not to bestow the title of wine expert on him yet, reserving judgment until I had seen and heard more from him—passed out some handouts describing the wines we would be tasting.  There was also a worksheet on which we were to write our observations and impressions of the wine samplings.  Since this was like an essay portion of a college exam, as an English major, I had already proven I can BS with the best of them, so this was agreeable to me.  

The wine instructor began the session by informing us that true appreciation of wine involved all of the senses.  The color of the wine, the scent, the taste.  I took this information in, even while struggling to understand exactly how hearing would be involved.  He waxed poetic about wine.  I yawned, and hoped they would fill the glasses a little higher than they usually do.  I had heard wine tastings are notoriously stingy in that area. 

He brought out the first wine, a fruity Viognier, while describing the grape and the region from which it came.  We learned that swirling the wine around in the glass oxygenates it, which is necessary to release the full flavor and aromas.  He demonstrated the proper technique: wine glass base flat on the table, swirling in a circular manner, never lifting the glass from the table.  He guaranteed it would never splash over the sides that way.  I’m guessing this information would be helpful if one wanted to avoid the dry cleaning bills that could be incurred from over-zealous swirling.  I had a hunch this is why we started with the white wines. 

After the swirling, then comes the intense staring at the wine.  Yes, you must closely scrutinize every wine before you actually taste it to be taken as a serious wine connoisseur.  I imagine we are supposed to be contemplating the complexity of the wine, or the mysteries of the universe, or perhaps just looking for sediment, but I am distracted by the fact that my wine glass is about three-quarters empty.  There’s just a splash, barely lubricating the bottom!  Maybe the rest of the class were optimists and saw their glasses as one-quarter full, but I am quite the pessimist when faced with a mostly empty glass.  Especially when it’s mostly empty of wine that you are paying through the nose to taste. 

Speaking of nose, after the wine stare-down, now it’s time to stick your nose way down into that glass and vigorously sniff at the wine and notice all its subtle aromas.  This is what is called the wine’s “nose.”      Ha-ha.  That sounds funny to me until I notice no one else is laughing. 

Our wine instructor then took a slurpy sip that sounded a lot like how I used to drink chocolate milk in kindergarten and started in on something that looked almost like chewing the wine. 

“So, what is everyone getting here?” 

No one knew what to say, so we gazed into our wine glasses as if the answer lay somewhere in the liquid, like in some prescient Magic 8 Ball, where the answer might come floating up to the surface:  “My sources say fruity.”  Or “Ask again when you are sober.”  

With complete silence coming from his students, the pourer/instructor threw out this suggestion, asking, “Is anybody getting  a hint of grapefruit here?”  Everyone nodded in agreement.  Yes, definitely—grapefruit!   Yes.  Thank God.  I wrote “grapefruit” on my worksheet. 

We worked our way through the white wines.  While sniffing at the wine,  I almost wrote what I was actually thinking, which was, “this wine’s aroma reminds me of how my grandmother used to smell,” which was a combination of cigarette smoke, Nina Ricci’s “L’Air du Temps,” and pressed face powder.  I wondered, why would this wine remind me of my grandmother, anyway?  She was a scotch-drinker.  I worried this was not an adequate description.  And while I probably worry too much about things like this, I now had a new concern.  Actually, two. 

The first was the spit-bucket.  The idea behind the spit-bucket concept escapes me.  I have never had wine so awful that I’ve had to spit it out.  It’s just that I hate to part with something I’ve paid for.  But I noticed other people had no problem with this.  Then I realized they weren’t spitting it out because they didn’t like it; they spat it out because they were actually tasting the wine.  These people were serious about learning something.  I decided I would use the spit-bucket only enough to appear to be a serious wine student. 

Which brings me to my second concern:  Wasn’t the point of drinking wine to get a nice buzz on?  Weren’t any other folks in the room there for this reason?  Was I the only person there intent on getting drunk?  I worried that the wine instructor would see right through this—that I was someone more interested in drinking wine than in tasting it.  A philistine revealed! 

But I decided—as I had done in similar situations before—that getting tipsy might actually improve the situation.  Sad experience has shown that this is usually never the case, but at the time I thought being in this state might sharpen my perceptions about the wines.  I rationalized that I would get my money’s worth, and at the same time write much more imaginatively on my “Wine Notes” sheet.  This, unfortunately, works out much better with caffeine.  But since I have saved my wine tasting sheet as a souvenir, I now can look back proudly on some of my more florid, if not appetizing, descriptions of the wine selections.  Here are a few excerpts: 

The next wine, a hearty Medoc, I described on my wine-tasting sheet as “combustible.”  The red zin, to my palate, had a “baffling, yet intoxicating flavor of burnt rubber with black cherry notes.”  The pinot noir, I declared, had “spoiled to perfection and now had the tawny and foul-tasting tang of fear.”  I must have liked the Bordeaux, because I wrote: “This wine has overtones of musk, and something I cannot quite put my finger on—is it possum?  It has a peaty flavor with complex undertones of Brussels sprouts and sweat.  Very earthy!” 

Now I admit to being somewhat impaired while writing these descriptions, but upon rereading them later in a more, shall we say, lucid state, I noticed they were not much different from real ones I’ve read.  

I went on to create a special list in the margins of my “Wine Notes” (which by now was becoming alarmingly messy and wine-stained, as if some mental patient was scribbling down in a nervous, spiky hand her increasingly incoherent impressions after enjoying ten to twelve partially-filled glasses of wine).  I thought that in order for people to discern the difference between a real wine description—the sort done by serious winethusiasts, rather than non-sunglass-wearing impostors who never use the spit bucket–a  list like this might come in handy. 

Adjectives Not to Be Used In Describing Wine 

Chunky

Metallic

Swampy

Picante

Caffeine-free

Colon-cleansing

Grapealicious

If you see any of these words in a wine description, you can be reasonably sure the person writing it is either not a real wine connoisseur, or is a little bit drunk.  Or perhaps both. 

By now you may be wondering if I was accompanied by anyone on this little wine-tasting adventure.  Or you might be mildly concerned about how I made it back to my hotel safely after all my wine “research.”  I wouldn’t blame you, but you needn’t have worried, although it’s very kind of you.  The fact is, I was under the watchful eye and protective custody of my traveling companion, Jim.  He was in his full official capacity as designated adult.  While he shares my enthusiasm for wine, he has a certain sense of decorum that I sometimes lack, especially when I have been, as I like to call it, “over served.” 

Can I say that?  Yes.  I think I can.  At that particular wine-tasting venue, I can categorically state that I had been over served. It was the wine pourer’s lack of restraint that led to this sad end, and he should be held fully accountable for the consequences and repercussions that ensued from his total lack of judgment.  If you ever have the opportunity to go to a wine tasting, go to a reputable establishment and make sure the wine-pourer exercises some responsibility. 

You will notice that I am not referring to him as “wine expert” any more.  Please take this as both a sign of disrespect toward this individual, and a pointed reminder of my casual indifference toward traditional wine-tasting rituals that I chose to ignore. 

Which, do you suppose, would insult him more?

Seeing Some Old Friends

Went to see a couple of old friends last night in Tarrytown, NY:

They were in fine voice and looking well.

And tonight, I will be driving up the turnpike to see THIS GUY.

It’s fun to catch up with old friends. 

(J., I’ll tell Bruce you said hi.)

On Second Thought

Pay no attention to that last post.  I don’t know if I am ready to join the large-type club yet.  It makes me feel old.  I am currently reading the large-print version of Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol (and yes, I realize this selection alone makes me seem old), but I didn’t ASK for the large print version; that’s all the library had available–at least that’s what they said. 

Large print is very annoying.  You have to keep turning the page every 15 seconds (I am a fast reader–even faster with large print) and because of the extra pages the book weighs a ton!  And I haven’t been to the gym in a while.  The print is big enough to read from across the room!  I should know…I’ve thrown this book across the room in disgust several times already.  What a contrived plot!  All of Brown’s signature touches from his previous novels are in place.  Main character Robert Langdon and his Mickey Mouse watch are back.  Tweed jacket, check; freakish memory for all things symbolic, check; crippling claustrophobia, check; ZERO sexual tension with attractive, brainy, dark-haired, multi-lingual heroine, check.  I guess what I am saying is, this large-print book would make the perfect doorstop.  But I digress.

Using larger type will, unfortunately, make my posts seem longer.  And for those of you who are intimidated by lots of words (you know who you are), this might be a deal-breaker for some.  Imagine if I employed the “continued after the cut” application.  Readers might use this break to cut  all right–cut and run.

Also, I am afraid that posting in larger type will make me seem ANGRY.  You know, like an OLD PERSON.  Sometimes I like to USE CAPITALS  (I try to use them SPARINGLY, for ADDED EMPHASIS ONLY), but if my posts are in larger type, it might come across as too FLAMEY.  Since I do not wish to offend anyone, and because I don’t want my usually diplomatic and even-tempered prose to sound or look like I am screaming:  HEY, YOU KIDS, GET OFF MY LAWN! I am afraid this little experiment has come to an end. 

So never mind.

Just a Test

Just testing out a new font size. 

SOME PEOPLE are complaining about the type being a little too small.  SOME OF YOU say it interferes with the “readability” of my blog.  But more likely it is the poor quality of my writing that makes it tough to slog through this blog.  (Like that?)

OK, let’s also say that SOME OF YOU have commented that a cadre of drunken chimps could write this blog as well as I.  Well first, let me just say–that was cold.  And second, anyone who watches TV as much as I do would know that drunken chimps could not possibly write this blog, as they are all busily engaged with the next season’s story line for Grey’s Anatomy. 

So what do you think about this type size?  Or do we all just need to put on our reading glasses?  Hey, come to think of it, where are my reading glasses?  Oh, they’re up here on top of my head. 

And now I am officially my mother.

If I Subscribed to Twitter…

I would tweet these things:

Changing my blog’s title to “LatteButSoon” in honor of the return of Starbuck’s best flavor ever: pumpkin spice.

Nothing ever changes.  If you’re born a caterpillar, you die a caterpillar.

There are some mysteries that will never be fully explained–the Kennedy assassination, Bigfoot, why Bigfoot assassinated Kennedy.

I fear for Glenn Beck’s sanity as much as he fears for our country.  Perhaps more.

I’ll bet dollars to donuts that what God REALLY hates is people who claim to be experts about what God hates.

We all know that what Jesus wants most from us is to start fights with others in His name.  So, well done, crazy Christian fundamentalists!

I have no idea what this guy at the bar is talking about.  Yet we continue to converse.

Sarah Palin’s new book now coming out in November!  English version coming soon?  (Fingers crossed.)

Every time I hear a song that I absolutely hate, I ask someone if that’s Coldplay.  It usually is.

(That last one was for you, KM.) 

I am too lazy for a blog.  Twitter is to blogging as haiku is to poetry.  Quick and almost too easy.

McSweeney’s Doesn’t Know S*#t from Apple Butter

 

I sent this e-mail to my life coach someone.  Then I re-read it and laughed out loud (or LOLed, as the Internet hive-mind says we must) because I am such a sore loser.  I might as well have just written:  “Hmmph!” 

 

Dear ______,

 

I was reading McSweeney’s today.  It’s another wretched habit of mine I cannot break.  They have a new sporadically-appearing column that started today:  “Dispatches From a Guy Trying Unsuccessfully to Sell a Song in Nashville.”  I immediately thought of you, since the songwriting idea has long been an interest of yours.  (The songwriting part reminded me of you, not the unsuccessful part.  Just want to be clear on that.)  Perhaps you will gain information from this column.  But you will not laugh.

 

Now comes the sour grapes part:  McSweeney’s ran a contest inviting writers to submit entries for their own columns.  The winners, of which there were seven, will have their columns occasionally featured on the website.  I submitted one.  Guess how that turned out?

 

It turned out like this: There is absolutely no interest in a column called “ADVICE FROM A MIDDLE-AGED WINE-DRINKING INTERNET JUNKIE”!  What’s up with that?

 

The columns on McSweeney’s are supposed to be humorous.  While the column is kind of interesting, I am entirely missing the humor. 

 

FIRST HINT: The column immediately starts out on a negative note because it contains the word ”UNSUCCESSFULLY.”       It’s right there in the title, see?  So it’s already something of a bummer.  Does the writer not realize that his glass is half-full?  The good news is, even though failing as a songwriter–one assumes–he can now bill his column as “Dispatches from a Guy Successfully Getting His Lame Column Published on McSweeney’s.”  

  

McSweeney’s, we are over.  I have a blog now, which occupies me completely.  And is a better kisser.

 

Oh that stings, doesn’t it?

 

LBS

 

I’m glad I can still laugh at me.

 

Choose Booze

I must interrupt my 2-part (or is it 3-part?…let’s just say, multi-part) wine saga, to teach you all an important lesson about making choices.  Let it be known right now that I have a hard time making choices.  I am a Libra and it shows.  I can see both sides of every issue.  This means I would be either a really great Supreme Court Justice, or a really terrible one.  I don’t know; I can’t decide.

I already have a hard enough time choosing between red or white (when it comes to wine), or vanilla or chocolate (when it comes to Presidents.  Only kidding; I went for the mochaccino that time!  Still delicious.)        So imagine my difficulty when faced with choosing between having some authentic Italian gelato or an after-dinner drink, as we strolled down the Asbury Park boardwalk on a perfectly gorgeous Saturday night on the last weekend of summer.  There was a full moon shining down on the ocean.  There was a Black Crows concert going on at the Stone Pony.  There were happy crowds.  Perfect.  Perfect for something interesting to happen.

I was already stressing out about what flavor of gelato I would choose, when I was presented with yet another choice.  As we approached the place, my sister-in-law told me this gelato was the most delicious she had ever tasted–just like Italy!–she promised.  But then she suggested that we keep walking down the boardwalk to the Beach Bar (on the side of the Convention Center, overlooking the ocean) and see if we wanted to stop there for a drink.

Because we just had dinner, this seemed like a good plan.  We got to the Beach Bar and now the moment of truth had arrived: gelato or a drink?  We noticed it seemed a little packed in the bar (there was a section cordoned off for a private party–more on that later), so it seemed a little too much of a hassle to get in.  So we decided on gelato. 

That evening I came home, turned on the computer and obsessively checked to see if anyone had commented on my blog.  No one had.  (Perhaps because it was a beautiful, clear, full-mooned Saturday evening on Labor Day weekend and people have something better to do than look at a stupid blog!  Duh.)  But apparently I don’t, so after checking mine, I looked at a friend’s blog and…WHAT?!!!:

YOU WILL NOT BELIEVE!  My friend J. was there–she was also in AP that night–at the private party at the aforementioned bar.  She got her picture taken with BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN that night.  BECAUSE HE WAS AT THAT BAR!  As far as the reconstructed timing goes, J. was having her picture taken with Bruce at about the same time we were deciding that we would HAVE A FUCKING GELATO INSTEAD OF STOPPING THERE FOR A DRINK!  

This, I think, is when it all crystallized for me:  When in doubt–CHOOSE BOOZE!  More interesting things happen around alcohol than ice cream. 

[In case you were wondering, the gelato flavor I chose that night,    after much angst, was Nutella.  At the time it was really, really delicious.  Just like Italy!  But later on, the taste I felt in my mouth was kind of bitter.  I think they call that flavor Disappointment.]    

 

 

 

 

Let’s Talk About Wine!…Again

I.  Wine Baby 

Now that the heat of summer is less intense, and the browning and crisping of leaves signals harvest time is near—my thoughts turn to wine.  I know that the best season of the year is coming.  Autumn is in the air, and the beautiful month of October brings not only crisp, clear weather, but  my birthday and wedding anniversary.  Which, of course, makes me think about wine.  Come to think of it, it doesn’t take much to make me think about wine.  A couple of years ago, my husband asked me what I wanted for our 25^th anniversary.  I drolly offered, “Um…a divorce?”  Ignoring that, he continued with: “How about a trip to the wine country in California?”  I countered with, “Throw in an extra case of wine, and it’s a deal!”  “Done.”  And so we went. 

I’d been drinking wine for most of my adult life by the time we made the trip to Napa Valley.  And though I already thought of myself as something of a “winethusiast”—in that I enjoy drinking wine and am always enthusiastic about it—I was eager to learn more about wine.  I hoped that this trip to California’s famed wine country would enhance my wine knowledge.  Secretly, I was also hoping to pick up some pretentious wine terminology that I could impress others with, thereby upping my cool quotient.  But what I discovered there was that I was a classic “wine baby.” 

In the lead-up to this trip, which I kept calling the “Sideways tour,” referring to that film with Paul Giamatti that I liked so much, I imagined there might be some parallels between this movie and my trip.  But the only similarity was the wine-drinking part.  That and my steadfast refusal to use the spit-bucket.  As far as I remember, I did not drunk-dial anyone, nor make it my mission to get my traveling companion laid, nor obsess over a failed past relationship.  This would have been weird since my traveling companion was my husband and the purpose of our trip was to celebrate our anniversary.  So I stopped calling it that. 

But back to the topic at hand—wine.  Out in California, the label they give to novices in wine appreciation is “wine baby.”  And if this isn’t enough to lower your self-confidence, wait till you walk into some high-end wine tasting room, because then you will want to cry.  People in the trade take it upon themselves to give any tourist (read: potential wine buyer) a crash course in the intricacies of wine-making and wine-tasting, and they would have you believe it is an incredibly nuanced and complicated operation.  Which it is, but that’s not the point. 

The point is, I really like wine, but I do not necessarily like wine culture: how we write about it, talk about it, taste it, or buy it.  What I like is drinking it.  In fact, more than anything else I can think of, besides the bloviations of a second-tier university English professor, wine means pretentiousness.  There is no avoiding it—and believe me I try—but to talk about wine is to talk like an asshole. 

James Waller, in his leather-bound little tome called Drink-ol-o-gy:  Wine—A Guide to the Grape (which I picked up in the gift shop of one of those high-end wine operations), explains the term “wine baby” for us.  A wine baby is someone who has “not yet learned the basic facts… and lacks the proper vocabulary to intelligently appreciate and discuss wines”—so states Waller in his Drink-ol-o-gy book.  (While I appreciate the author’s helpfulness in breaking this tricky word down into syllables for me, it is a term I am familiar with and have no trouble pronouncing.)     I am beginning to notice a certain patronizing attitude among wine experts. 

Heretofore, I did not consider myself a wine baby.  Drinkology is a subject I have great interest in.  In fact, in college I minored in it.  I almost had enough credits to major in it, but I kept missing classes due to all the field work I was doing on the subject.  Some people I knew in college continued their work in this area at the postgraduate level.  They succeeded in earning the respected title of Drunkologist.   I, however, did not set such lofty goals for myself and wound up with a B.A. in English.  And here we are.  

According to Waller, a wine baby is someone who has a basic familiarity with wine, in that they may have tasted it once, or maybe a few times, perhaps with their younger sister when left at home without parental supervision; or gotten drunk on it at, let’s say, the movies, with a few high school friends, maybe up in the balcony while watching a Woody Allen picture, like Annie Hall, or maybe it was Play It Again, Sam—look, what movie it was doesn’t really matter.  Or perhaps they embarrassed themselves in front of their in-laws by making some wise-ass remark a little too loudly at someone’s bridal shower, or wedding, or funeral.  Maybe they did these things, but what should be noted is that they really regret it now. 

The point is that a wine baby may already know a few basic facts about wine—for instance, that it is made from a fruit known as the “grape.”  This may sound elementary, but the true definition of wine is: “an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grape juice.”  (By these standards Boone’s Farm Strawberry Wine does not count.)  Unless preceded by a qualifying adjective—rice, elderberry—the word wine denotes a beverage made from grapes.  It comes in different colors: red, white, or pink (rose to those who have progressed to the level of wine toddler).  It can be inexpensive or wantonly overpriced. 

Some wine babies know more:  there are still wines and there are sparkling wines; they know that you can’t call sparkling wine “champagne” unless it comes from the eponymously named region in France.  I don’t mean to imply that the champagne police will come and arrest you for calling it this, but you will not seem wine-savvy if you do.  And you know how the French can be. 

Wines can be described as either dry or sweet, but they are almost always wet, especially when spilled.  Sometimes they are named for the type of grape from which they’re made, i.e., Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Sauvignon Blanc, Welch, etc.  But here’s where it can get confusing—sometimes wines are named for their regions as well:  Bordeaux, Sauternes, Burgundy (a region, not a color; there are only three colors and they were named above—try to pay attention, will you?), Chianti–a region where wine bottles are encased in straw with drippy candle wax running down the sides.  (Some people think these bottles make cool candleholders, but these things went out with the 70s; I’m just saying it will not make you seem sophisticated if you order this on a date.) 

This is about the level I was at in terms of wine knowledge when I arrived in Napa Valley.  I was like a sponge, ready to absorb as much wine as I could.  Did I say “wine”?—I meant “wine facts.”  Yes.  Anyway.  On to the tasting room.

 

Next—Part II:  Time to Get Your Drink On!