The Wine Commonsewer™

Life Is Too Short To Drink Bad Coffee (Coyotes & Coffee)

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Zipping up the hill this morning in Mrs TWC's dinky Hamster Car*, I caught the image of a dead coyote pup on the side of the road. No carnage. No blood. Nothing twisted out of place. It was likely a quick and painless death resulting from a youthful miscalculation as to the speed of the truck that tossed him onto the roadside.

We have more coyotes in this valley than the entire state of Texas and they are a nuisance and a threat to small animals. On account of that, I ordinarily don't pay a dead coyote much mind, but this was a young critter and my first reaction was: Life is exceptionally fragile and when it goes the eyes tell the tale first.  

 Mrs TWC's Kia is Bigger Inside than Outside.

The coffee maker here at the Casa does not have a carafe, it stores coffee internally in an aluminum tank and keeps it hot for as long as you want, though I set it to shut down after an hour. Mainly that's because we charge through our morning brew and I hate burnt coffee. Even an hour is too long to bake coffee, but that's the lightest setting. 

After depositing the House Blond at school, I had a jones for another cup of joe and was delighted to see the red light still glowing on the coffee maker when I got back. I drew me a cup but even though I sissified it properly, the coffee was, shall we say, disappointing. I made a McKayla Maroney face, but I was about to trudge off to my desk with it anyway. Just then the image of that baby coyote surfaced just behind my retinas. 

Lesson de Jour: Life is way too short to drink bad coffee. Just dump it out and make a fresh pot. 

As Always,

TWC

*We're counting on savings from the fuel economy to cover at least 2/3 of the car payment. The gas mileage is super and the Kia Soul comes with a 100k warranty. It's inexpensive, roomy, fun to drive, and has outstanding safety ratings. 

 

A Brief History of Merlot

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

This is very nicely done.

As Ever,

TWC

Tip of the glass to Mrs TWC

Wine & Duct Tape

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Duct tape and WD-40 have replaced baling wire as a staple in everyman's bag of tricks. I think I'd also add hot melt glue, which can fix flip-flops and install baseboard. 

I'll take wine and duct tape, in that order, cuz wine fixes aches and pains as well as a myriad of other cares of the day.

As Ever,

TWC

Tip of the glass to Holly M. 

The Screwpull Is Showing Signs of Wear (a long term review)

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

The Rabbit didn't die, but I hadn't seen it for a while, which is how the Screwpull got pulled (heh) from special occasions and assigned to regular duty in the first place. It is showing some signs of wear, which shouldn't surprise me, it has seen several years of near-flawless service, pulling a cork a day (which keeps the doctor away).

This isn't really a shortcoming, but the Screwpull doesn't like synthetic closures and will occasionally balk at yanking them out. Synthetics are slick and waxy, which causes the worm to occasionally slip right back out as easy as it went in, sans cork, which remains in the bottle. BTW, the worm is the spiral corkscrew-lookin' part of the opener that is inserted into the cork.

All in all, the Screwpull is a great wine opener that will faithfully labor for years. The only drawback is price. It ain't cheap, unless you can find it for a special price at some place like Costco or Amazon. 

As Always,

TWC

Sunset Last Night

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Looking west toward Los Angeles where MRS TWC touched down on her way back from The Windy City last night. 

The white lights in the lower left are from the football field at Santiago High School in Corona Ca. 

In other news, it feels like we moved to Baton Rouge during the night. Sticky, sultry, and temps in the mid-80's at sunrise. 

As Always,

TWC

The Book Club Meets Every Evening

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

As Always,

TWC

Tip of the glass to J. C. 

2008 Santa Ema Merlot

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Greetings from the desert. By the time I finished my seven A.M. constitutional around the golf course and went for coffee it was a balmy 95 degrees. Nah, TWC don't golf, it was a moderately paced trek around the north end of the course. My only company were the cottontails, a surprisingly alert foursome on one green, and the gardeners mounted on their mowing machines.

Back in the day, inexpensive Chilean cabs and merlots were plagued with a cloying, off-sweet, off-putting cherry-like flavor. We don't see that as much today because it seems like Chilean winemakers have switched gears and begun dumping oak chips by the bushel basket into their vats. IMO, a little oak goes a long dam way and a lot of oak will not help a wine get past being less than stellar.

The Santa Ema is no exception, it is over-oaked to the point of rendering this wine undrinkable. At least for moi. Those who enjoy a lot of oak may disagree, but a word to the rest of you should be sufficient.

Defintiely not the worst wine ever, but ultimately a sink-pourin' wine for me. Life is way too short to drink bad wine and there isn't any reason to do so. There are dozens of pretty decent wines in the same price range as the Santa Ema, including mass-marketed ($7.99 US) Bogle Old Vine Zinfandel, which I opened after pouring the Santa Ema down the sink.

As Always,

TWC

Melon Daiquiri

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Just the ticket to take the sultry out of an oppressive summer afternoon. 

• 1 cup (roughly cubed) very ripe melon (Tuscan cantaloupe is a good choice)
• 1 jigger white rum (1.5 oz)
• 1/2 jigger Triple Sec (Curacao)
• Juice of one lime
• 2 tsp sugar (or simple syrup as you like)
• cup of crushed ice
• Turn it into a slurpee in the blender
• Pour into a chilled martini glass

Shortcut: Chill the martooni glass with the ice you will use to make the drink. 

For a nice extra touch.....

• Sprinkle fine sugar on a plate about 1/8 inch deep.
• Rub the rim of the martooni glass with a slice of lime
• Slowly spin the edge of the glass in fine sugar to coat the edge. It's just like rimming a margarita glass, only with sugar instead of salt. Diabetics may omit this step and may substitute Splenda for sugar in the drink.

Enjoy.

As Always,

TWC

First Picture From Mars

Tower Butte, Lake Powell

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

Taken from our campsite, which was a couple of miles across Padre Bay using a telephoto lens.  As you might imagine, it is late in the day and the setting sun provides some interesting lighting. 

We spent about a week boat camping on Lake Powell (no houseboat). Our boat sleeps four decently. We might have stayed a bit longer but we ran out of wine, water, and food.  

Familia, a little Beach Boys, campfire, sunset, and, well, you know......

The wine? I believe that was a Santa Rita Cabernet, but I could be mistaken. 

As Always,

TWC

photo credits: TWC, all rights reserved ©