The Wine Commonsewer™

End of An Era

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

In the days of my vagrant yoot there was a shopping center across the street from Pacifica High School. Dottie's Beauty Salon was to the right, just before you plowed through the double glass electric automatically opening doors of the long-gone supermarket that is now condos. If you glanced inside on your way by, which we instinctively tried not to do, you could see those women. Hands animated, waving in the air. Smoking, snipping, gassing about the neighbors, and who was sleeping with who's husband.

The doors seemed like they were always open, leaking cigarette smoke and chemicals now banned by the ever-vigilant EPA. Dottie was the good looking red-headed southerner, but I didn’t know which one she was at the time. Later on I knew her because I knew her daughter Viv (who did not go to Pacifica). Viv was a fargin’ 10 (kid you not, man) in her day and is still pretty decent looking, even though she’s almost as old as El Jeronimo de Crow.

Dottie's is still around, too, down on Garden Grove Blvd I think, but it’s a mere shadow of its former glory. No faux Grecian urns, no web site, no potted palms just some hangers-on, clientèle that like things the way they once were.

Vivian left a tearful voicemail today, mama passed yesterday. 

Just a little piece of our lives, boys, forever and unchangeable......

Rest easy, Ma'am.

Joe (and Viv). Our thoughts are with you.

As Ever,

TWC

No Child Left Behind ('cept if you live in a bad part of town)

Gentle Readers,

Mrs TWC was in Sacramento today for a press conference and to testify in favor of a bill that would give lower income parents a tax credit to help out with private schooling if their kids are stuck in failing public schools by virtue of the neighborhood they live in.

As modest a proposal as this was, the teacher unions and other assorted cohorts rolled out the howitzers. Prognosis: Likely to be stillborn in committee, but it's for the children you know.

Mrs TWC is Director of Education at Reason Foundation, a free-market libertarian think tank. I don't know where those guys came up with that picture, but it doesn't look much like the chick I'm married to. She looks more like this.

As Ever,

TWC

Daddies & Daughters

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

TWC and The House Blond off to the Daddies & Daughters Dance at Eagle Glen Country Club.

As Ever,

TWC

American Blues: For No Star

Gentle Readers,

Long haired, drug crazed rockers will associate this tune more with Areosmith than Bull Moose Jackson, whose risque 1952 original didn't get much airplay on AM Radio but sold quite a few records. This, in the dark days of repression, or so we've been told they were.

During the course of some witty repartee somewhere back down the page, some-time contributor NoStar mentioned it as his fave but was thwarted trying to link by the comment span filters.

Ahhh, the modern world of technology, frustrating NoStar but without which Jackson's Big Ten Inch Record (not written about TWC) would be relegated to the collections of guys like Bobby, who not only knew who played sax on any given obscure 1950's jazz LP, but could tell you when the guy committed suicide together with all the lurid details. Instead, whole new generations can experience something that for all intents and purpose was long dead and largely unremembered. Jesse Walker would approve.

For those with the icky filters, the vid is here.

As Always,

TWC

Snakes On A Bottle! 2003 Red Snake Merlot

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

TWC was puttering in the kitchen throwing together some spaghetti sauce for dinner and I needed  some cheap red wine. This time for actual cooking. Swear it. Chianti works best but any dry red wine will do.

Somebody gave me two bottles of Red Snake Merlot and the first bottle was absolutely ghastly. Been meaning to pan this wine for a while now.

So I'm rummaging through the wine rack, looking for a cheap Chianti to open for the sauce. No. Not this one. Too expensive. MMMMM, I really liked that one. Nope. Nope again. Then: Light Bulb comes on. Cheap red wine? Spaghetti sauce. Okay. Let's get rid of this other bottle of lousy Red Snake Merlot.

And then, friends, the surprise. Yes, one of these hangs in the kitchen thereby ensuring a taste before dumping one third of the bottle into the sauce. The wine is either dramatically inconsistent from bottle to bottle or the first bottle was spoiled and I didn't realize it.

This was disappointing as I had already mentally worked out the screed, railing against the French for marketing undrinkable wine in a snake shaped bottle with a cool, kitschy label, thereby sucking in the unwashed so that Miles could look further askance at anyone who orders Merlot. And mutter bad words.

Instead, we get a dry, medium bodied Merlot with an earthy, mineral feeling. You get a bit of red fruit and it's a little medicinal on the finish. Although, Red Snake will never be a stellar wine, overall, the wine is well made and quite drinkable.

Red Snake comes from the Languedoc-Roussillon region of Southern France, the largest producing region in the world, where many of the vineyards overlook the Mediterranean Sea, and is bottled by Jeanjean.

As Ever,

TWC

2005 Earth, Zin, & Fire Front Row Zin

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Get outta town! Earth, Zin, & Fire? From fargin' Lodi? Jug wine capital of the great bread basket of America. Well, except maybe for Modesto.

As a near ironclad rule, you can figure that cutesy, clever, kitschy, cool wine labels are designed to sell crappy to marginal wine.

The timing wasn't that good with Mrs TWC in Scottsdale and April 15th bearing down like the freight train of death, but the boys showed anyway. These are my boys, with a shared bond of coming of age together. I told them I wasn't cleaning up but nobody cared. And TWC grilled them some steaks, which fared pretty well. The asparagus didn't.

UPDATE: Got a couple of emails asking about my "sons". The boys I refer to are some my old High School buddies.   

Bri pulls a bottle out of a paper bag and TWC groans (on the inside). Well, we gotta drink this first and get rid of it (on the inside). But a funny thing happened on the way from the bottle to the glass. This stuff is good. Really good. I'm thinking I must be deprived or depraved, but rules are made to be broken.

Turns out that Parker gives this wine a well-deserved 93 points. The wine is absolutely delicious. Truth is, I drank half the bottle while I was chopping chives from the garden and prepping the salad. Not sure how much anyone else got, but I got mine, dang it.

Sidebar: It is really slow going to write this with the House Blond dancing to Miley Cyrus, Hillary Duff, Jonas Brothers, and Gloria Estefan. No, Dad, Play Start All Over. No, play Wake Up. If that ain't enough, Jake and his friend Nick are watching some Sci-Fi adventure flick where the giant snake is eating the Huey Cobras while somebody just won't get off the M-60 and never seems to run out of ammo.

Winemakers Notes:

This wine has a deep opaque red-purple color and an intense nose, with forward fruit and a dense, jammy quality to the berry flavors hinted with exotic spice, soft tannins and a long smooth finish.   

TWC would concur. This is an excellent wine and an excellent value at ten bucks US. Prices may vary, but do partake. Word of warning: This is one of Rick's alcohol bombs. Bomb. Not Bong. 15.5% by volume. Well, that explains the burnt asparagus.

Bonus:

Can't see the vid? Lookit here.

As Ever,

TWC

If You Take A Walk, I'll Tax Your Feet

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

As promised, Tax Freedom Day in America arrived on April 23, 2008. That means, on average, you worked from New Year's Day until April 22 to pay your taxes. As you mop your brow with a ratty doo rag in relief, you may wonder what the Takers, er, I mean the Taxers will tax next.

As Ever,

TWC

Can't see the video? It's here.

Tip of the glass to Freedom Talks

She Was Robbed!

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Not an American Idol nutcase? You'll prolly want to pass this by.

We're not much for the Opiate of the People here at Casa de las Rocas Grandes (and they are big got dang rocks, man) but Idol is a staple.

TWC's two cents:

Why is Syesha Mercado in the bottom two?

Why is Carly voted off?

I love Brooke and Mr Dreds has an appealing style, but Dreds was dead bang boring on Tuesday and Brooke was just okay. David Enchilida is a talent and he's got the teeny-bopper unlimited texting vote, so he's not going anywhere until later, nor is David Cook. But how does this end up in the bottom two?

As Ever,

TWC

Mr Mom

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Mrs TWC's off carpetbagging in Carson City for a couple of days, arguing, er, debating school choice. You know how it is, everybody's pro-choice except when it comes to education. Then it's their choice, not yours, and boy howdy, they DO know what is best for Johnny.

Last time she got to the Silver State, her picture got drawn by Bob Beers, R-Henderson (not you Rick Henderson, Henderson Nv).

Carson City is still small-town Americana where most people at least know of each other and Mrs TWC gets treated pretty well when she's in town.

I know her Hopper Plane (her term, not mine) got off okay because I got a text message.....

On Plane. Please change over laundry. Love. Lisa.

Back in some other life, traveling north on Highway 395 outside of Carson City, TWC liked to froze to death, I ain't kidding you, neither. Wasn't even snowing, but every last trace of warmth had fled a deathly still and cloudless night sky. Sure, the car heater worked, it's just that by the time the engine coolant circulated to the heater core, it was twenty degrees. Found my way into the Carson Nugget about zero-dark-thirty AM and called out for hot coffee with a side of steak and eggs. Never been happier to be anywhere in my born days. We So Cal boys can't take anything vaguely resembling winter.   

uncirculated Morgan silver dollar minted at the Carson City Mint

As Ever,

TWC

Virtual Bubblewrap

Gentle Readers,

The House Blond and That Boy will love this. You will too.

Now, back to work, Schwinehunds!

As Ever,

TWC

Tip of the glass to Laurie