Watch this blog for a major announcement on Wednesday of a new winery with an interesting pedigree. To find out about other such mischief, click on the image below:
Wine bloggers unite for a good cause
Archive for March, 2009
Mirth smirks and Catena Malbec and a sublime Nebbiolo
March 30, 2009The Negress pretty much has the feet and the knees working in tandem so she’s been out gamboling. She’s also in the hands of a personal trainer who doesn’t nkow a thing about nutrition but is superb with imbalanced and deconditioned muscles. Sore but happy, we celebrated by navigating the subway for the first time in ages. We’re back in French (zut alors!) as of April 6, and after that we listened to a band in Central Park playing jazz. Kids were dancing to “A Kiss to Build a Dream On.” This is what everyone in New York puts up with all the crap for — spring, dancing kids, impromptu outbursts of music, people smiling. So off the Negress went to the Museum of Modern Art to check out a pair of new exhibits, one of various photographers’ images of the American West, the other a Martin Kippenberger retrospective. The exhibits were splendid except for a large blister growing on my right foot from old socks and new sneakers. So I adjourned to the bar at the Modern. They ran out of Booker’s mid-pour so my first small-batch bourbon was on them. I followed up with Baker’s and then headed to dinner at LaVagna with the members of the Jeopardy! cabal. I broke my Lenten fast with some open-face ravioli and duck, but felt strangely forgiven. We shared a stunning Nebbiolo and I forgot to write it down but there was a red wiener dog on the label named Tom. At home, I’m almost done with a bottle of grippy 2006 Catena Malbec. It opens up in the glass pretty well, but it’s more a rustic than uptown Malbec.
Spring in New York in Central Park
I also drank some house Champagne with Chambord at a lengthy brunch I went to on Saturday. Blisters have been treated, and the gym beckons tomorrow.
Alright, Dad, now what?
March 24, 2009Today is the 15th anniversary of the Negress’ dad’s death. Maybe he was the Dadess. Anyway, after a series of strokes that deformed his brain, he passed away about 10 days after his feeding tube was removed. It was our mother’s decision and it was a good one. I was wandering the countryside in Rock Goddess mode, but came home to send him home.
In every two-kid, two-parent household, each kid gets a parent. The Dadess was my parent. He took me to every conceivable basketball event under the sun, and I suspect he would be proud that American University has made the NCAA tournament two years running ( He got a master’s there). I also traded attendance at basketball events for hockey outings, which before the Caps came to DC were scarce indeed. He told about seeing Josh Gibson hit a ball out dead center at Griffith Stadium when he was a kid. I love baseball in spite of everything. Thanks to Dad, I saw Roberto Clemente and Willie Mays. Mays was well past his prime, but Clemente was in his last season before his death, which hit hard.
Anyway, it seemed like a good idea to salute my Dadess. I will probably drink some more of the 2007 Corey Creek rose this evening. Other wines that have found their way onto the Negress’ coffee table are the 2006 Casa Lapostolle Cabernet Sauvignon (great little wine for the money, which is around $10), and a 2005 Las Rocas Garnacha. I opened the rose to summon spring, which began here with snowfall and wind-chills in the teens. Perhaps it will warm up enough for me to salvage the yard.
Speaking of spring training, the Astros have brought no joy to this house, so the Negress is clinging feverishly to her beloved New Jersey Devils, who sit atop a relentlessly mediocre division. The team has played like crap of late, and are not likely to make it past the second round of the playoffs if they even get out of the first. It’s nice that Marty Brodeur is back and breaking records for victories, but this team is too old and too inconsistent to win the Cup this year. I hate to say it, but it’s true.
House whine at the Metropolitan Opera
March 24, 2009The Negress is down to her last opera next week, but decided to celebrate a little at her penultimate opera, a new production of “La Sonnambula,” staged by Mary Zimmerman. Natalie Dessay and Juan Diego Florez were in the lead roles and Zimmerman set the whole thing in a rehearsal for the production. I had one glass of the house white and two glasses of the house champagnes. Champagne makes parting sorrows all the sweeter. A lot of people, including Anthony Tomasini of the New York Times, lambasted this production for straining believability. Ok, let’s get this straight. The story of a sleepwalking maiden in a Swiss village who finds her drowsy way into the bed of a msyterious Count (nothing happens of course) and then is unceremoniously dumped by her lover. All is well when the maiden sleepwalks in front of her ex. The production moves in and out of the rehearsal trope, which seems to have troubled Tomasini, among others. This is a classic case of “What difference does it make?” It’s an opera plot (unlike most operas of its 1830s era, there is no body count at all). You’re worried about verisimilitude? At the Opera? Ye Gods! Anyway, it was lovely night for the Negress, who is not pleased that she is going to have to give this up.
How to be unproductive during a recession
March 7, 2009For those of us who are in the transition from mere unemployment to what seems like a lengthy period of enforced idleness, the Negress has some tips for ways to increase your burn rate for time on your hands. First of all, keep applying for jobs on-line, an activity which is a bit like shouting your career accomplishments into a hole in the backyard. Apparently human resources people don’t always read the media gossip sites, which say their companies are laying off people and packing positions in cryogenic storage. They are not hiring. Now you can spend your time relentlessly pursuing jobs that don’t exist. Talk to your friends, even when they bring you such happy news that all of the financial professionals who graduated from (insert name of well-regarded school here) are begging for work. Try not to grimace when they note that even lawyers are trolling for gigs. With all the business liquidations and bankruptcies looming, you would figure lawyers would be busy. This is not a good sign. Also, make sure you have added lots of word game applications on your home on Facebook. (For example, you can get “grates,” “greats” and “greets” out of the word “steerage,” which could be a description of any future travel plans). Coming up with anagrams and getting your butt kicked by venal Scrabble masters is another excellent way to murder time while you wait to hear back from all those companies who have posted frozen jobs on-line. If you still have health insurance, make sure you get every body part that is eligible for a tuneup oiled, shined, ultrasounded and tightened. Be somewhat envious of colleagues who are too busy to listen to your latest tales of fear and loathing. After all, you won four straight Solitaire games this afternoon so you are a golden god. They’re writing, running CSAs, raising children, maximizing publicity strategies, getting married and quitting smoking and all that other stuff. Also, in case you are sleeping too well of late, make sure you get news that opens up all sorts of possibilities about your future and where it may play out just a few hours before bedtime. Put the wine away. Drinking and sleeping don’t mix unless you are Dorothy Kilgallen. Make sure you play out every single potential outcome in your mind while playing endless games of Solitaire. Stop playing Solitaire long enough to update your spyware protection. Write a blog post, another topnotch way to become anxious and chatty with tens of people you have never met. Realize you are hitting the tape when it comes to self-imposed word limit. Before quitting, wonder why movie critics use words like “revanchist.” Stop.
Ian MacLagan and the Bump Band and wine like cough syrup
March 5, 2009The Negress shed her rock ‘n’ roll skin some years back like a lizard moving on to the next habitat. But a summons from an old friend had her out in the frigid climes to head to B.B. King’s Blues Club to hear Ian McLagan and the Bump Band. McLagan, a Face and Stone at some point, is on the road with his magic organ and a band of crack Austinites including drummer Don Harvey and guitarist “Scrappy” Jud Newcomb. They sounded good, almost as good as the old Faces (can we pray hard for a reunion and pry Rod away from Sam Cook and the American Songbook?). The Negress drank lightly confining her blues club minimum to one glass of Coppola Rosso Classico, which had a finish like Vicks 44 and a seriously indifferent Oxford Landing Australian Shiraz. As is usually the case, the evening was not about the wine but the company. Mac is lovely and drinker of pints as you would expect. The show did a lot to lift my spirits as I have been dealing with Medicaid and Mom and a somewhat erratic sister. I needed to rock with the old folks, the ones who know when to stop and play with fire and passion and dignity. It’s still a little weird to be integrating a blues club after all these years (I was the only Negro there who wasn’t in uniform), but Mac and some of my old friends made the trip out in the chilly night worthwhile. There was a lowkey afterparty at Manitoba’s, a bar run by Handsome Dick Manitoba of Dictators fame. The walls are covered with rock shooter photos and the booze is agreeable and cheap. I felt alive and comfortable in a way I hadn’t in a while and was delighted to see my old friend Jo Rae Di Menno of Hard Pressed Publicity. She’s working with Mac, and reminded me of how I had helped move an ex’s things out of their shared apartment. She’s friends with the ex now and has a 14 year old. Oh time, we love some of what you do to us, but sometimes I’d like to hold back the torrent long enough to let it all sink in. I was home at 3, like the old days but more satisfied with the night and less hungover. Go see Mac and the guys if they’re anywhere near you. Tell them the Negress asked about the organ. Buy the records and get happy. I did and it was utterly worth it.
