A Stroll Through History On The Roman Road To St.-Emilion
Chapter Sixteen. Part Six.
The wines of Bordeaux were my first oenological love, a passion I’ve shared with my wife Caroline for over thirty years. To rekindle our premier amour we visited Bordeaux and like the forgotten vignerons, monks and armies before us, we hiked an ancient Roman Road through historic vineyards to get to the higher place known as St.-Emilion.
The Roman Road, built to service a triumphant empire 2000 years ago, is now protected from development and allows travelers to walk through Bordeaux vineyards first planted in the 2nd century. As it passes through the vineyards of Chateau Franc-Mayne it is little more than a path strewn with broken cobblestones, sloping gently upward as if propelling you to a higher purpose. This seems somehow fitting as the road leads to the medieval village named for the Friar Emilion, a reclusive 8th century monk who achieved sainthood
Read MoreHarvard Study; Men Who Drink Wine Give Wives A Hard Time
A recent study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, conducted by the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England in conjunction with Harvard University concluded that a diet rich in flavonoids can improve erectile function. This is great news for wine drinkers as the flavonoid anthocyanin is prevalent in red wine. Men who drink white wine may be out of luck but apparently they won’t have any hard feelings.
When asked to comment on the findings, Adjunct Professor Willie B. Hardigan, from a local community college of little or no significance was quoted as saying, “WOO-HOO!”
Read MoreThe Best Snarcasms of 2015
It’s that time again – time to ring in the new and wring out the old. That means it’s time for writers to wring every possible article out of their year’s work by assembling “Best Of” compilations. This is one of many time-honored literary traditions, like plagiarism and making shit up.
I’m probably not smart enough to critique writing but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night. So I’ve compiled my own “Best Of” list, and for the record I unequivocally state that I am the sole judge of my work and I have not been unduly influenced by the author.
Read MoreThe Ghost of Christmas Past Keeps Calling and Calling
I think a lot about my father at Christmas.
My earliest Christmas memories always found my father behind a pair of blinding, 8-thousand gigawatt movie lights that generated so much heat that they may have triggered the dawn of global warming. He filmed all the family milestones with his 8mm (and later, Super 8mm) movie camera and a pair of lights that kept us squinting through a decade’s worth of home movies. In the future, when alien astronauts unearth my father’s film library, they’ll probably conclude that our species perished from a super-luminous supernova.
My dad wasn’t a wine guy and I’m not one of those wine professionals who got into the trade because my parents served wine at every meal. My parents were from the cocktail generation and by the time my younger sisters were nine years old they had mastered the construction of the perfect, extra dry vodka martini.
Read MoreTop Wine Stories of 2015 From The Star Wars Galactic Empire
Star Wars VII, The Force Awakens has landed in Hollywood and opens in theatres throughout the Galactic Empire in the next few days.¹ Will the Dark Side come out on top or will the Jedi bring balance to the Force. If you’ve just woken from a 40 year coma, the Force is “an energy field created by all living things that…binds the galaxy together”² kind of like a colossal, cosmic dose of Pepto Bismol.
If the past year for the wine trade is any indication, the Dark Side has the upper hand, as stories of discrimination, wine toxins, fires and drought monopolized the headlines. Following are the top wine stories of 2015 compiled from a galaxy far, far away.
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