Filibuster Alito! And pass on the Pinot.

The other day I unleashed a withering and largely unprovoked attack on Pinot Noirs for which I feel the need to explain.

It was like this: I had a rough day. A challenging day. A day where I inadvertently mailed a smarmy Web link to some friends; gave myself a fat lip; and scraped a cocklebur over my face. On such a day, let's face it, Pinots are an easy target.

The porn-ish URL I sent to some email buddies was the result of being a fan of rudepundit.blogspot.com. Which is over the top on the best of days. And on THIS day, AFTER I'd sent the link, I discovered Mr. Rude Pundit had written a new post. About our esteemed Commander in Chief being a serial masturbator, about which I can offer no information, except to apologize again to my friends for the very very very detailed depiction of the aforementioned activity. If "activity" is the right word.

On this same day, I had developed a little blister on the inside of my bottom lip, aggravated by salty foods at a potluck. I love salty foods. I don't love cold sores or fever blisters or whatever the heck this annoying little thing was. So I dabbed it with a solution given to me by a friend for just such a purpose. I thought. This liquid, Ora5 I believe it's called, is actually copper sulfate. Which apparently is a chemical developed to burn human skin. What it did was annihilate the blister, oh yes indeedy, in about three seconds flat, the same amount of time it took to give me a lip that puffed up like a poisonous toad.

My day was not over, sadly. Later that evening, I selected a clean washcloth from the laundry basket and proceeded to wash my face. Oh what a selection that was: As I was rinsing, I felt a big owie on my forehead. And stared at the washcloth in disbelief. There, embedded in the dark fabric, was a cocklebur. This was not an ordinary, flea-sized cocklebur, but a largish cocklebur. A cocklebur on steroids. Which had left its marks, nay its RUNNELS, on my face.

Following the tearful icing of my lacerated lip and grooved forehead, and leaving aside the unanswerable question of how Atlas Cocklebur came to live in my clothes hamper, I reflected on my misfortune. 'Twas then I realized that it was no ordinary day, no, for I had sipped a Pinot Noir with dinner. I had my culprit.

I also have fresh gashes on my neck courtesy of my step-cat Jake, who has taken to using me as both rickshaw and rickshaw driver, soaring to my shoulder to hitch a free ride anytime he dam' well feels like it. As his mother was ignorant in her youth and so had him declawed, which is essentially like having the first joint lopped from one's fingers, Jakie clings with his back claws. Clings for dear life.

But really, what are neck scratches when compared to, let's say, the lower right quadrant of a mouth that is shedding flesh like a legless reptile? And what is THAT shredded flesh set next to the prospect of Samuel Alito protecting our Lawbreaker in Chief and other corporate miscreants from his lifetime perch on the Supreme Court? (Interestingly, it is Rude Pundit who offers the best summary of the Much Scalito Ado About Nothing brouhaha. So go here, if you dare: rudepundit.blogspot.com)

And now, dear reader, I head into the weekend, scarred and humbled, sure of only one thing: 'Twill be a while before I again try a Pinot.

WWJD?

The Princess and the Pea (no)

We pause here for a word about Pinot.

Okay, several words.

Pinot Noir, not Pinot Blanc. This is a red wine blog, in case you hadn't noticed.

Pinot Noir. Eh. I simply am not wild about it. I know, I know, the movie Sideways kicked Pinot Noir into high gear, popularity-wise. Big deal. My tastebuds don't know from popular. And Pinot is all over the map. Yeah, yeah, it's a "finicky" grape. Very sensitive, very reactive to, I dunno, everything. Fog, sun, clouds, wind, weather, bumptious tourists clumping past the vines. . .

Here's what I say: Get over yourself, Pinot. What a wuss you are. Suck it up like the big boys, the Cabs and Zins and Petite Syrahs. Get some STRUCTURE already. Burgundy shmurgundy.

Yes yes, I'm quite sure you're right, and the problem is that I just haven't had a fine example of the grape. So ship me one, already. I keep trying Pinots, goodness knows I keep TRYING, and for what? They fail to impress. And woe is me, my beloved Costco is pushing the Pinots heavily, allowing them to take up a good third of the top-tier wine bins. Argyle, Erath, King Estate, Yadda Yadda. It's like a bad wine cable show: All Pinot, All the Time.

I did like the 2003 Mirassou Pinot Noir well enough. Cherry, vanilla, easy drinking. Not bad at all, and you can't beat the price with a gnarly stick. The 2003 Stephen Vincent Pinot that Laura popped over with is decent. I suppose. Can you hear the enthusiasm dripping from the keyboard? Pinot for me is like an okay writer; he's sometimes a good writer, sometimes not so good, but he's yet to be memorable. Who the hell wants to read an "okay" writer? I'm too OLD to spend time with "okay" books! I want GREAT books. Like books, wines are ubiquitous, and there are many many good, and some great, examples out there. (And yes, this is a wake-up call to the members of my reading group. Why why WHY are we still plodding through "okay" or "merely good" books? Your assignment: find some GREAT ones to recommend. And YES, Rule Number One still goes: You have to have read it yourSELF! and LOVED it!)

But Pinot Noir ain't cuttin' it for me. Which is why I can't remember the ones I've sampled. I do remember that, when someone orders a Pinot at a restaurant (needless to say, that someone ain't ME), they're generally pricey. Yes, yes, it's true, Pinot Noir is a good food wine - for when you want a red wine but all that seems to go with the salad or fish or whatever dish is white wine; then Pinot is an option.

Just not a very attractive option. I give you television, where show after show features characters sipping on a glass of some supposedly red wine. These "red" wines are always anemic-looking, as if the props people just couldn't be bothered to add a touch more dye to the dam' colored water in the goblet. This makes me CRAZY, as when someone throws in an irrelevant and highly irritating apostrophe, especially when trying to form the possessive "its," or when butchering a simple plural. As the pirate said, "ARRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHH!"

People, is it so hard to find a REAL red wine for the show???? These "television wines" are not the right color for a blush wine (rose'), and they simply don't have enough hue or density to be red wines. They're not crimson, or deep reddish-orange, or purply. They look fake. They do not look like wine. They are WEAK. They are the centrist Democrats of the wine world, DINOs (Democrats In Name Only) doing a lousy imitation of the real thing. Chateau Lieberman, that's what I'm saying.

My point here is that either these insipid-looking faux wines are BAD PROPS, or they're Pinots, or they're suPPOSED to be Pinots, because gee, what ELSE would our characters be delicately slurping? Gosh, I dunno, how about a Shiraz? A Tempranillo? A Malbec, a meritage, a modest Sangiovese? A wine with legs, a wine with body, a wine with COLOR? Is that too much to ask from a red wine????? I think not. And given the flaccid look of these made-for-TV wines, this wonkette would even settle for a Merlot.

What would Sandra Oh drink? Heck, what would JESUS drink? Ask yourself that. Because I do not think the Big Guy would have wasted His time turning water into Pinot. At least not the Pinots I've had.

Fine/Fun Wines of '05

My motor is still running on '05 time. That's the only excuse I can muster at this hour for my shameful delay in publishing my wholly arbitrary Best Wines I Tasted in 2005 list. To wit, and in no particular order of merit:

The 1998 Gallo of Sonoma Barrelli Creek Vineyard Zinfandel (and I only wish I'd had the funds or foolhardiness to clean out the shelf at Hy-Vee Wines. Thank the gods I still have one or two left.) $22 or thereabouts. A favorite.

The 2001 Guenoc Petite Syrah (no surprise there). Sigh. I love this wine, at home or at Pot Pie, but not at Poco's, where they want close to $50 for it, dammit. You can find it for $17.

Every single yumalicious Zin I tasted from Seghesio. From the blue-cap Sonoma to the red-top San Lorenzo Alexander Valley, this vineyard iz a Zin master. $17 to $40. Definitely my favorite winery of the year. Their Barbera is good as well. . . we're saving the Omaggio Super-Tuscan for another year.

The St. Francis Zinfandel, 2001 AND 2002. We found this in Nancy's wine rack last summer, and oh what a pleasant find it was! (Nancy, if you're reading this, I'm very sorry you weren't home to enjoy the wine. Rest assured the rest of us did.)

A nod of best-value admiration to the Columbia Crests Two Vines Shiraz, both the 2001 and 2002. 88 to 90 points, and $6!!!! Can't argue with THAT.

The 2001 Columbia Crest Grand Estates Merlot, at $10 a total steal, 90 Wine Spectator points of smooth lusciousness.

The 2001 Simi Cabernet Sauvignon. Of course. 90 or 91 points, and $18 at Costco. And to think I squirreled away a bottle of the hard-to-find Simi Landslide, which rates even HIGHER! Life is good.

The 2001 Dry Creek Mood Hill Cabernet. IMHO, if it says Dry Creek on it, you're home free. Probably about $17 at the winery, which also makes good Zin and a great Meritage.

The 2001 Flora Springs Cabernet Sauvignon (89 points, if it matters). Actually, as was the case at Seghesio, I liked every single wine I tasted at Flora Springs. "Spring" for the Trilogy sometime, and call me! ($60)

Nobilo Sauvignon Blanc, 2003, 2004. . . and every other S.B. I've tasted from New Zealand's Marlborough County. Kiwi, lime, grapefruit, wonderful summery goodness. Yep, a white wine made my list!

The 1999 and 2000 Masi Campofiorin Ripasso - Kim Tappan votes with me on this big guy from Veneto (Italy), a brawny Valpolicella that's fantastic every vintage I've tried. Dudes, it's only $15! (Although if wine push comes to wine shove I'll take my tried-and-true Tomassi Ripasso any old night of the week. Heaven.)

I almost forgot: 2001 Dark Star Cellars Paso Robles Syrah from Meeker Vineyard. Don't know why the guys at Gomer's Liquors dog Paso Robles; not when there's this wine to sip.

For everyday drinking: Always decent, and decently priced: Hess Cabernet Sauvignon; Bogle Petite Syrah AND Bogle Chardonnay.

Emotional favorite: the Icon Syrah Laura brought on our late-season camping trip. Although she spilled most of hers, several times, this Ravenswood bottling won "best of campsite," which wasn't hard given the Croatian bottlecap swill we began with -- but it also beat out a stellar Merlot. I blame the Icon for the out-of-context crude-sounding phrase with which I assaulted everyone within earshot as we snortingly shared, 'round the campfire, what we remembered of our first sexual experiences; it was a rousing, soused evening highlighted by Sus's observation that, in my knit cap and jacket, I looked like "a salmon fisherman setting out to sea." This from a woman so bundled up all we could see of her was her perky little nose. . . and why SALMON, I ask you? What was there in my drunken demeanor and carefree ensemble that spoke of SALMON? Why not swordfish? Why not tuna, or tilapia? And while I'm at it, do I LOOK like the old man in The Old Man and the Sea? ("No," I can hear Sus saying thoughtfully, "but you do remind me of my Polish grandmother." Sus is given to such cryptic pronouncements. Pronouncements that do not sound flattering, drunk OR sober.)

The morning after gets my nod for second-worst morning of 2005. A hangover, a hard bed, a cold tent, a disgruntled girlfriend, and a lost key. The key to the car. The car that held our food. Our breakfast. And it started raining.

Happy new year to you, and remember: All bad mornings must end eventually, and all bad wines can be recycled. Poured out, or given to Mom for cooking, or foisted on friends who ain't so picky.

Hedonism in November

It was a wine-off.

I suppose it was because no one was going to try to compete with Leeser in the food department.

It was her housewarming party, and as usual she was working under the "Nothing succeeds like excess" credo. The girl, brought up on a dairy farm, doesn't know how to make a normal amount of food. (I don't know that her outsized cooking is a result of the cows surrounding her childhood home, but SOMETHING about her family background is surely responsible.)

Figure maybe 15 or 20 people invited to her party. Figure a few of them won't show. Figure she had enough food for dozens more: Hummus oozing with olive oil, roasted garlic and peppers. Brie buried under pounds of walnuts and clover honey. An antipasto platter groaning with meats, artichokes, tomatoes and olives. Mango salsa, tomatillo sauce, breads and crackers and chips of every variety. And Rotel burning in a crockpot in the kitchen (not Lisa's fault, or mine, neither the Rotel nor the burning thereof).

All this from a kitchen the size of a car mat.

And there was enough beer stacked on the back porch to satisfy a concert crowd. But enough about beer: I selected a half dozen wines for the party by virtue of their sale price and drinkability - Rosemount reds, for the most part, blends of Cab/Shiraz, Grenache/Shiraz, Cab/Merlot. Perfectly respectable wines for casual drinkers. . . But I had no intention of drinking any of THAT.

For myself and a few select others, I chose the Guenoc North Coast 2001 Petite Syrah, and it was a highly inspired choice: Rich and fruity, balanced and big, it went with EVERYTHING on the overloaded table. Plus it was PRETTY, inky and purply dark. I poured a wee glass for myself, Andie and Lisa, then tucked the bottle carefully behind a stack of cups and plates, from which discreet location it was steadily, happily depleted*.

The next bottle through the door was a Nouveau Beaujolais, always festive in November. Except it was dreadful, according to those unlucky enough to try it. I never expect much from a Nouveau Beaujolais, with reason. So who cares who made it? Not I.

Then Laura arrived, with her own bottle -- not, as I might have expected, the Icon Syrah, which we had camping and which I liked quite a bit and which Laura didn't get much of, on account of she kept knocking over her glass -- and it was (practically) our first bottle -- but with the Sin Zin. A fine name, a fun label, featuring a 17th centry German etching. I'd been wanting to try the Sin Zin, and it was good, warm and spicy/peppery (someone else said it had raspberry-rhubarb notes), although I still preferred the Guenoc P.S. And so did Laura*.

Another guest -- Kathy? Sue? -- brought in a Sangiovese, the Italian Di Majo Norante. It was ruby colored, tasting of plums and earth. I'd had it before, and while it was no Sin Zin or Guenoc Petite Syrah, it was decent. Price breakdown on the featured bottles? About $17 for the Guenoc P.S., about $20 for the Sin Zin, maybe $10 for the Nouveau Beaujolais and the Sangiovese. The Rosemount blends run about $8, the more flavorful single grape bottlings a few dollars more.

I confess a nostalgic fondness for Rosemount wines, as it was the Rosemount Merlot that got me started on my love affair with reds. And oh baby, Rosemount doesn't make solely inexpensive, easy-quaffing wines. Their 2001 GSM, which I believe is a Grenache/Syrah/Mourvedre, racked up 93 points from Wine Spectator and costs less than $30 at GOC (good old Costco). That's considerably less than Lisa spent on the spread for her little housewarming, the leftovers from which fed Andie and me for days.