Confessions of a Wino

Can you play a musical instrument? I’ve been trying to learn the guitar for more than 30 years and I am still useless. Every time I pick one up (I own two or three) and start making some progress, I am consumed by some other pastime, like blogging, or work, or trying to lose weight.

My life (and presumably yours) is controlled by one’s own priorities. On a scale of one to ten how do you rate: Family? Work? Music? Art? Science? Procrastination? Procreation? Playstation? It seems that music all too frequently falls down my list.

I once signed up to eBay, purely to sell some old punk singles. When I realised they were going for peanuts, I ended up buying more Monkeys; adding to my rarely played and esoteric collection. Whilst I am now the proud owner of the excellent original version of Banana Splits by The Dickies on yellow vinyl, did I really need it?

I paid for my new 7 inch 45s by auctioning an old mobile phone, which went for an incredible £60! But my budding eBay addiction took me to new, nonsensical levels. Despite hardly being able to play a note, I decided that a Fender Stratocaster was a household item that I could no longer live without. Several hundred pounds later, my bank manager enquired whether he could have a play on it. I managed to avoid repossession by the gauge of a G string, but still cannot play the beast properly 5 years on. Mind you, it is a beauty. Proper USA made in 1988 and I’m sure it would sound a dream if I could find anyone who could play it well. Much better than one of the cheaper Mexico models.

And this is what I used to think about French versus Chilean wines. Nowadays, based on my recent South American wine tastings, I am going back to eBay to bid for a Fender from the succulent state, and more wine from South America.

This wine came, not from Mexico, but from Chile via the Wine Society’s £82 case of Chilean Pinot Noirs. At 13.5%, De Martino 2006 Parcela 4, Single Vineyard was tastier than a Jimmy Page riff and more intense than Jimi Hendrix amp feedback.

On opening it smelt of onions. Quite earthy and vegetal. It developed like a Dire Straits melody into glacé cherries and raspberries – she’s makin’ movies on location… And for all the world like an urban toreador, this wine went slipping and a sliding away on a roller skate, different, intriguing, sexy, great.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 8th, 2008 at 8:53 pm and is filed under south america. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.