Mexican was busy dodging El Immigracion this week, so asked us to take over his beer reviews until the coast was clear. Sure, we’ll do some beer reviews. Snicker, snicker. Well, it’s our space now, and we’re doing wine. See, back in the day, Spud and I had something of a… reputation in the world of fine wine. I will not go so far as to say a good reputation, but still. Anyway, although we have walked away from the world of wine judging, reviewing, writing, and in my case making, we still are passionate about it and really enjoy pulling out gems for ourselves and appreciative friends.
As pretty serious/non-serious wine drinkers, Spud and I would have a ritual now and then of a Cull Party. Like many people on the fringes of celebrity in the wine world, we end up with odd bottles which linger around our cellars, no real occasion to bring up and drink. So to clear the shelves, we have a mass tasting and try to describe the aspects which caused those bottles to be marooned in the first place. One strict rule- you have to actually put the wine in your mouth and swallow it. Just sniffing is not allowed.
Some of these bottles were donated by you fine people, so if you see one in there that you brought, enjoy the fun.
Non Vintage Bully Hill Chardonnay Riesling “Fusion”– 60% Chard 40% Riesling from the Finger Lakes. There’s a distinct aroma of freshly shorn sheep wool from around the vaginal region, mingled with rotten fruit. The taste is reminiscent of post-apocalyptic Skittles. The finish was mercifully short.
2009 Ridge Lytton Viognier – Viognier is the premium white wine grape from the northern Rhone Valley, where it yields amazing wines like Condrieu and Chateau-Grillet. So of course people from California are trying to make it work there. Basically, it doesn’t, nor does Viognier normally age well. So here’s proof of both contentions.
One of the disadvantages of living in this area is how quickly things mold; bread or rolls have a bout 2 days before the blue beard starts growing. And if, perchance, one left an apple pie out, really letting the mold and rot set in, you’d have the aroma of this wine, with a strong whiff of dusty linoleum thrown in. And sipping it caused Spud to do some loud yelling. “OH, IT’S IN MY MOUTH! IT’S LIKE A PRISON RAPE!!! ohhhhh NO! THAT WAS… not good.” Tragically long finish.
2012 Chambourcin Hopewell Valley, NJ: When swirled and sniffed, this wine combined all the essences of New Jersey in a glass- oil refineries, chemical companies, decaying Mafiosi, Chris Christie’s FUPA perspiration… The amazing thing happened when drinking it: it had shockingly little flavor.
1987 Chateau La Louviere (Pessac-Léognan, Bordeaux) – I smell dead people.
Spud went back to it a half hour later and sipped. “I… should not have done that.”
This point of the tasting caused us to segue into a discussion about broken penises. OK, we were approaching some legal limits. And that leads us to the 2019 Talon Winery Wingspan Red (Grand Valley, CO) with the classic pickle jar and chocolate smell from American oak, in fact, it’s almost a dead ringer for Silver Oak (a very expensive Napa Cabernet). Then I tasted it. In the mouth, it is what I would use to teach someone what a fine tannin is (“Not this.”).
1989 Ridge Jimsomare Cabernet (Santa Cruz, CA)- Spud sniffed it and started screaming, “OH DUDE! OH FUCK!!! DUDE!! OH FUCK!!!”
“How am I gonna put this in my mouth?”
He did.
“It’s actually OK tasting. It’s like eating a skanky pussy, ya just hold your nose and it’s all OK.” Why do the bad ones always seem to have such a long finish?
Non Vintage Forestedge Winery Rhubarb Wine (Laporte, MN)- I’m not actually sure what this wine is made out of. Certainly not just rhubarb. And really, how fucking drunk and addled would you have to be to think, “Know what would be a great idea? Yep, make some wine from rhubarb, yessir!” But someone was and did. And shouldn’t have.
1990 Asiago Cellars Zinfandel (Santa Cruz)-
Nose: Death and decay ride the winds this day.
Palate: Darkness. Despair. Madness…
Fuck this, I need a drink.
Maybe he ran off with SugarFree?
Whew! I’m not the one who gave you any of those wines! I was skeert there for a minute.
Heh. Now that I know he does this, oh, the donations I could make.
I don’t normally look for bad wines, but I likewise might be inspired.
Since ‘bad’ is the default for wine, you don’t really have to look for the bad ones.
O ye of little taste
Some suggestions.
I was thinking a 20 year old bottle of Mad Dog found in an abandoned 7/11.
You have aged 20/20?
Fun fact- 20/20 got that name since originally it was 20%ABV in a 20 ounce bottle.
You magnificent, glorious, bastard!
As soon as I saw that (and w/o hovering) I was hoping….and not disappointed.
Tomb Raider and I were just talking about you. She also has never heard of The Ceremony Which May Not Be Named.
That was some grenade you threw last night
It turned into a really interesting discussion. And I am outlining a new Jewsday.
That interesting discussion turned rancorous really fast after you left.
True but it then turned into another interesting discussion about whether you should take pride in what your ancestors accomplished.
I don’t go to the zooms for rancour, regardless of what interestingness might come after. I go to the zooms for philosophical/theological/political discussion, and silliness, tit and fart jokes, and good-natured teasing. I do not go to fight.
Eeesh. Sorry.
You lost two of the civilizing influences at once.
r blessing there were no old Romanian wines on the list.
“count your” stupid keyboard
Spud and I went through a couple old bottles of Murfatlar back in the day. Surprisingly not bad.
I am starting to question your taste in wine
My Wine reviews:
Franzia-Got me drunk
Almaden-Got me drunk
Bartles and Jaymes- Didn’t get me drunk. Trash. Boo! Hiss!
So not giving them your support?
Spud and OldMan in their younger days.
I prefer my wine the way Democrats prefer their elections, fortified.
The drink of English upper middle class ladies?
Mexican was busy dodging El Immigracion
I heard this in Peggy Hill’s esspanyole.
https://youtu.be/U0kCRbSyjmo
Sure, we’ll do some beer reviews.
This is my review of Lane Kiffin.
Taurus enjoys silky underthings and laying around the oasis, NTTAWWI. Penn State will bring a jockstrap full, plays real football with a real O-line, so that TX HS BS Lane runs ain’t gonna work. Nittany tows the lion, Rebels lose by 9.
Lane Kiffin: 1.2/5 would not buy again
i wanna see a betting slip to know you really mean it
I put 320.759.408.432.390.652.084.580.469.984.423.579.723.975 bani down with my bookie; you can call him at 40-21-314 34 00
oh you never seen a ban in your life
I saw several streets paved with them in Krakow
What’s that in real money?
$20, same as downtown.
But I’m an American citizen
omwc what is the oldest good wine in your collection or at least 990% certain it is still good
I’m not sure what his oldest is, but I still have a couple of bottles of ’77 Dows. And an ’82 Leoville Las Cases that I plan on opening in February. And I have one bottle of ’83 Rieussec left.
Hmmm. Most of my older wines have been drunk up. There’s still a bunch of stuff from the ‘80s, though .
Isn’t that old for you?
Or is this the wine in your basement?
I have a bottle of Barboursville Cabernet Reserve 1998 in storage. Too bad I can’t drink wine anymore!
what kind of storage? temperature and humidity controlled?
I probably could have treated it better, but it has been indoors in my house in the dark until last year when it was in my dad’s basement, and now is in a temp controlled storage locker. I had intended to drink it years ago. I should dig it out and see if anyone will drink it with me with a nice steak.
Team spirit
Two-time AP All-America receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. opted out of playing in the Cotton Bowl for seventh-ranked Ohio State, though the junior has not revealed whether he will declare for the NFL draft.
Harrison wore his No. 18 jersey over a black hoodie when he ran out on the field with his Buckeyes teammates before Friday night’s 14-3 loss to No. 9 Missouri. He immediately went to the sideline and picked up a football, and held on to it throughout the game.
They should have paid him extra.
*I don’t really give a shit. I find it amusing.
Just finished wrapping the gifts for my sisters and BIL ahead of our meeting them for dinner and a belated holiday gathering tonight. And by “wrapping,” I mean finding appropriately sized gift bags in my bag of bags, stuffing the gifts down in the bags, and stuffing tissue paper around the gifts.
Reusable gift bags may be the greatest invention since inventing was invented.
Yah, I should buy many more of those during the sales.
I bought this on sale for half off at Sam’s Club the other day.
Concur.
Perils of keeping most wines too long. Surveys show most wine purchases are opened within a day or two. Some even on the way home (speaking for a friend.)
There was a study done a number of years ago by California winemakers. It was found that 95% of wine purchased is consumed within six months. It completely changed the way wine is made. Gone are balanced wines that take years of ageing to show their best. High extract, high alcohol, hit me in the face wines now saturate the market.
It was always the case that American table-quality wines crushed the European table-quality, because that’s how Americans buy and consume wine. And that was how American wines won competitions – by being ready to drink, not needing 5 or more years resting in bottle. So I can’t see this as some recent revelation.
I know a few French people and they aren’t wine snobs by and stretch. The vin ordinaire they drink is pretty good, and comparable to any American table wine I’ve come across, and it costs less.
Now, yes – didn’t necessarily used to be that way. The Europeans upped their game once they got beat a few times.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0914797
Not quite. The 1971 Ridge Monte Bello that kicked the frogs ass in the tasting that put California on the map was 12.2% alcohol. Modern cabernets, and now most bordeaux, run in the 14-15% range.
When I started collecting wine in the early ’80s, cabernet ran 12.5-13.5% typically. More than that was an outlier, considered overripe and a poor candidate for ageing. It has proven out over time. White wines have followed suit.
The other culprit is the wine critic, Robert Parker. OMWC and I both know him, and have dined with him on several occasions. His palate is geared towards big, fruit forward wines. That’s what got the high scores from him. Given his clout in the wine world, producers started changing their wine making styles to get a high score from Parker. OMWC helped a friend of ours in France create a cuvee just for that purpose, and it worked. That wine now retails for about $300 a bottle, if you can find it.
Sure, but as a wine collector you are not the core of the market. And that’s pretty much always been the case. I doubt that half of American wine consumers even know who Parker is; it’s exactly that you set yourself outside of that.
Growing up in Napa, I cut my teeth on inexpensive wines. The alcohol levels rarely went above 13.5%. Even low end producers wanted to produce balanced wines. I drank $8 bottles of Martini cabernet up to 20 years of age.
And it isn’t just high end producers we’re talking about here. Everybody has a “flagship” they point to to entice you to their other products. And the wine making style used in that flagship will trickle down through the line to reflect the house style. And over the last several decades, that style has trended towards higher alcohol, fruit forward, less balanced wines. It’s an easily proven fact. About the only place this hasn’t happened is in regions where the terroir doesn’t allow for the higher ripeness needed.
Down south myself, and Ernest & Julio was a staple in our house, just as was Regina vinegar – which was the winery my dad was GM of. We nearly moved up that way – more out in the valley, before I started high school.
Australia
Former U.S. Open champion Dominic Thiem had a brush with one of Australia’s most venomous snakes during a qualifying match at the Brisbane International on Saturday.
Thiem was a set down to Australian James McCabe when fans courtside spotted the 50-centimeter eastern brown snake, whose venom is rated the second most toxic in the world.
Article content
Security personnel quickly arrived, but the umpire had to stop play as the snake slithered onto the court to the shock of the players and fans.
——-
The snake was safely removed and play resumed.
Don’t pet the animals.
Don’t pet the animals
But cassowaries are so stinkin cute!
Quokkas FTW!
They really are cute tho.
https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2019/4/why-the-cassowary-is-the-worlds-most-dangerous-bird-568931
I’ve never seen a pic of one head-on before. Holy crap. That thing belongs in a different geological era.
I have safely removed several rattlers from my property.
Always in two pieces. Take off the head; they can still bite even after you done kilt them.
Now that I think about it, I didn’t actually remove them from my property. The wash I throw them into is still on my property.
Red wine isn’t worth the trouble, I find. But I inherited a few teenaged bottles from someone who had to give it up, and mmm. 😋
White wine removes* red wine stains.
*ameliorates?
Mechanical musical instruments
Mechanical computer
+floppotron
lol a literal one of those.
Linear cd player
Who remembers? I used to watch those things in amazement
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=piano+roll+blues+song&atb=v198-1&iax=videos&ia=videos&iai=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DMY8u2moWb8Y
Giant punch cards,
Tres Sr. would bring home boxes of used punch cards for me and my brother to have to color on.
And that leads us to the 2019 Talon Winery Wingspan Red (Grand Valley, CO) with the classic pickle jar and chocolate smell from American oak, in fact, it’s almost a dead ringer for Silver Oak (a very expensive Napa Cabernet). Then I tasted it. In the mouth, it is what I would use to teach someone what a fine tannin is (“Not this.”).
I think I left that there after SP’s memorial event. I got a case worth of wine and mead from the Meadery of the Rockies while I was on my FreedomFest 2022 road trip. I think I had a bottle of this red while in Vegas at FreedomFest. I might have been drunk at that point so I don’t remember it.
I remember all their mead being great.
Today I found out: The Beaver Dam pepper
“Mexican was busy dodging El Immigracion”
It’s La Migra.
Yankees. I swear.
https://youtu.be/rPrQ6d4k4XQ
“There’s a distinct aroma of freshly shorn sheep wool from around the vaginal region, mingled with rotten fruit.”
Even as a farm boy I have no experiences or knowledge of such things. As with voters, sheep were intended to be sheared.
Good reviews, learned that wine doesn’t have to come from a box.
Always in two pieces. Take off the head; they can still bite even after you done kilt them.
One of my friends in Montana used to say, “More people have been bitten by dead rattlesnakes than live ones.”
“Was you ever bit by a dead bee?”
Another sub-par performance against a real opponent by Coach Franklin’s tPSU squad. Let’s extend his contract another 10 years.
Why is it some topics, I can just sit and listen and soak it all in, but things like circuits or code I just end up zoning out unless I’m actively trying to put it together and make it do something?
Because you’re normal? Like ED, happens to all of us.
I’m converting a paper book into an ebook. It has lots and lots of higher math. Now, I was told there would be math. I even looked at it (cursorily, for me). I bid an ungodly amount of money. Author agreed. Now I’m into the weeds and thinking I didn’t charge enough.
c(A) = ∑ni=1ai, c(A) = ∑∞i=1ai iai < ∞
↑ Like that.
42
So you need to work on your sums?
I simply can’t do that kind of editing work. Probably part of the reason I struggle writing as opposed to reading Japanese.
https://www.tanoshiijapanese.com/dictionary/stroke_order_details.cfm?entry_id=55160&element_id=70300
Yikes. And it’s clearly for right-handers. For lefties, it must be even worse.
There is a reason Japan was noted for so long for its mechanical pencils.
I started using one again after studying the language. Before that it would have been high school.
Probably hammered down lefties like Germany did.
There’s superscripts and subscripts and italics in there, too. It didn’t translate. But it’s easier to do it in Word first than coding it straight. I know, I experimented with which one was more difficult.
薔薇 is “rose”?
Yes. “Bara”. Bah rah.
The Camp Lejeune ads are back.
Displacing the fire fighting foam?
Both are very popular on CNBC.
Do any of the above wines taste of Camp Lejeune water?
“distinct aroma of freshly shorn sheep wool from around the vaginal region”
What part of New York is the vaginal region?
Downstate, naturally.
With great tits come great responsibility.
https://archive.is/w48nE
Silicone Saturday.
The most popular girl at the office.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/dear-deidre/25147581/had-sex-christmas-party/
I… uhhhhhh….
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/love-sex/im-29-wifes-66–31571727
/teen girl:
Ewwwwww!
The largest blowout in Orange Bowl history was back in 1953, when Alabama boatraced Syracuse to the tune of 61-6.
Georgia are handling FSU in a manner to be expected. 49-3 in the early third quarter. Maybe they have a goal in mind.
IYKYK
IYKYK