Outstanding rose--dry, spicy, all the usual good things--and a great value, if not actually dirt-cheap, at $13 (although I'm seeing it for $6-10 online.) From Corbieres in Languedoc-Roussilon, a place I'll have to learn more about.
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Outstanding rose--dry, spicy, all the usual good things--and a great value, if not actually dirt-cheap, at $13 (although I'm seeing it for $6-10 online.) From Corbieres in Languedoc-Roussilon, a place I'll have to learn more about.
June 30, 2005 in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Tonight we had our second bottle of the 2003 Tres Ojos rose from the Calatayud D.O. in northeastern Spain. The first bottle, about two weeks ago, struck me as too sweet, but tonight it seemed perfect--spicy, crisp, and a bargain at $8 from the S.F. Wine Trading Co. It's 50% garnacha (grenache) and 50% tempranillo.
June 28, 2005 in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
A dirty job, but someone's gotta do it. We've had too many gutless roses this year, so we were very happy to come across the Ojai Vineyard's simply-named 2004 Rose. Very spicy and refreshing. Lots of flavor, but not too fruity. A little spendy for a rose at $13, but life's too short to complain too much.
In contrast, we were sorely disappointed by Lang & Reed's 2004 Wild Hare Cabernet Franc Rose. (Their site is absolute shite, BTW. What is it with wineries? They're like sitting ducks for unscrupulous web designers.) But the rose was worse: Flat, watery, blah--and $15 to boot. We'd shelled out for it on the strength of the L&R name, which supposedly grows only Cab Franc (not that I could discern that from their site), and I recall some very nice full-on reds from them for about $17 or so, but this rose isn't worth a damn. Once again, life's too short.
June 28, 2005 in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
I was reminded of this story by a funny post of Dr. Frank's:
On my only trip to Paris, five years ago, my wife and I were in a full Metro car when two men started arguing. We don't speak French, so all we could do was observe them and our fellow passengers. The argument began to grow heated, and the atmosphere in the subway car grew tense as everyone strenuously tried to ignore the fighting men and pretend that nothing unusual was happening. The argument built to a crescendo of shouting and pushing, the other passengers were mortified, the tension seemed unbearable, when suddenly--Pop!--the men stopped fighting, turned to their fellow passengers and addressed us all, and revealed that they were actually performance artists and that this was a piece of street theater. (At least that's what we gathered.) The crowd's relief was palpable, and they burst into applause. Then the performers passed the hat--with great success--and got off at the next stop. I've never seen anything like it, and I can't imagine an "act" like that working here in the States, although I'm not sure what that says about the differences between American and French culture (and subway systems).
June 24, 2005 in Miscellany | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)
Can I just say how much I wish I were in New Orleans right now? Earlier tonight I was driving home and heard some blues-y buskers on a corner, and just now a car drove past my apartment with something funky coming through the open windows, and I was just hit with this urge to be in the Quarter, or perhaps the Marigny, hearing music from all directions, the air so moist and thick you can part it with your hands, the finest food on God's green earth, and a go-cup just for the hell of it. God damn, San Francisco's perfectly nice, but sometimes I feel like I'm just not in the right place, you know?
June 22, 2005 in Personal | Permalink | Comments (4)
Finally got around to Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Not as good at The Royal Tenenbaums, but in the same baroque/deadpan style. Weighed down by Owen Wilson's so-bad-it's-just-bad "Southern" accent (and overall superfluousness), Anjelica Huston's so-deadpan-it's-just-dead performance (in a small but central role), and so-cheesy-they're-not-ironic-they're-embarrassing CGI effects (which feature heavily in the climactic scene.)
Buoyed up by Bill Murray's brilliant reinvention of the same fuck-it-all character he's been playing for years now (not that I'm complaining); fantastic small parts from Willem Dafoe (simultaneously wrapped too tight and unhinged), Cate Blanchett (smart and sexy and, if anything, underutilized), and Jeff Goldblum (unctuous as ever); a handful of great scenes; and Anderson's usual deft touch with understated dialogue.
June 18, 2005 in Movies and Video | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBack (0)
Last week I read Kate Christensen's The Epicure's Lament, and it's a deeply satisfying book, although the author loses the courage of her convictions at the end. Suffice it to say that Hugo Whittier is one of the more inspiring protagonists I've come across lately, all the more so because his specific predjudices and general misanthropy make it clear that his tale wasn't originally intended to be an uplifting one, even if Christensen finds the temptation irresistable. A few choice quotes:
"Talking precludes thought or consideration; most interpersonal yakking is prompted by the concomitant desires to appear to be something and to get something, commerce and advertising masked as 'social communion.'" [p. 139]
"Underneath she was white and smooth as an oyster out of its shell, quivering with briny juices and piquantly yielding to the teeth." [pp. 178-9]
"I am still that young Hugo, the way a withered apple is its fresher self as well as its rotted self, both at once. Midlife is like standing on a high peak looking down at the plains, temporal and spatial simultaneity; it's a congruence of life and death, ashes that you came from and the ones you're headed toward becoming." [p. 203]
At least the optimistic coda makes it slightly more likely that we'll see Philip Seymour Hoffman in yet another role he'd be perfect for.
June 13, 2005 in Miscellany | Permalink | Comments (0)