wine notes...

normally, we try to eat as much locally grown food as possible by shopping at local farmer's markets, supporting local co-op grocery stores, etc.; we believe that the only way to truly know what is in your food, and the only way to get the most actual nutrition out of it, is to buy fresh, local, organic produce whenever possible. you also support real humans doing work feeding their community rather than giant factory farms that yield sub par, tasteless, nutrient deficient, genetically modified trash, caring only for the bottom line of the shareholders and boardroom. it is a fact that small scale organic farming is an all around better way to grow food (and it also builds community bonds, the exact antidote to the type of ill-informed divisiveness that infects our country these days, as well as destroying the deadly paradigm of an oil-based food system that could fail with the slightest prodding from some external socio-political catastrophe). it is also good for wine.

there are not many organic Bordeaux wines, and the big business of Bordeaux wine sales is always a nagging problem with me (even though the wines are unreal when compared to most other wines; the terroir can't be beat). there are some, though many of those small scale vineyards that take into consideration bio-dynamic/organic farming do not have worldwide distribution systems (which is really how it should be), and are sadly unavailable here in the stinking goddamn south. so unless you do research, you cannot know the techniques involved at any given vineyard. it is one of the reasons I look into both my food and my wines in depth (hell, and my government for that matter). a variety of sources, all carefully researched and verified, then assembled into a larger picture is the only way to get at what's true. any time you take one source at its word, you are doing yourself a tragic disservice.

there is rampant use of pesticides and fungicides in not only wine, but the entire food system worldwide, and no FDA, bought and sold and run by industry insiders, will ever tell you exactly what is in everything you consume. there are many reasons for doing research into the shit we put into our bodies, just like there are many reasons for keeping informed about the corpocracy that runs this country, just like there are reasons to be aware of the many ways people are brainwashed every day by television, by careerist pundits, by those with a deep self-interest or hidden agenda; to be alert to the myriad ways misguided humans savage each other out of either malice or stupidity. and even though most of those reasons are considered out of our own self interest, they also insure that facts and education are the basis for our decisions rather than ignorant hatred or propagandistic lies and egotistical spin.

one would think that we are all just trying to live our lives with some measure of quiet, some measure of peace, and there are a few of us who are also trying to understand what it means to be a human, trying to grasp a bit of that magical essence, glimpse the mysterious workings of the soul. it is important to try and discover what higher things people are capable of. sometimes even simple expressions like a good organic tomato in the middle of summer, right from the hand of the farmer who grew it, like a well-made wine, like a small act of charity, can be like a short poem: a succint revelation about humanity's potential greatness. they show that some people can rise above the animal within and are trying to advance the human spirit, trying to move forward to some place where meaning infuses every action, where everything matters: how you spend your time, where you put your energy, what you do with your life, with your mind, with your hands. each life can be a work of art and it is up to each of us to decide if we will leave behind something beautiful or a shit-smeared canvas.

but I digress. sometimes the grocery store is a necessity, and when I was there recently I found an organic wine in the racks, a Chateau d'Estoublon. this was a 2003, from Les Baux de Provence. I wasn't familiar with either, so I bought a bottle. I enjoyed the hell out of it and its blend of grenache, syrah, mourvedre and cabernet sauvignon grapes. black pepper, cherries and spice with a bit of earth on the dry finish. tasty stuff, and a surprising reward for having to do some of the shopping at the fucking grocery store.

I also bought a bottle of organic Lolonis Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon since I was there. this is a solid wine, oak and black fruits, barely noticable tannins, a good domestic wine from the west coast at a good price.

anyway, life's too short to spend it drinking piss-lite beer or being poorly informed, and it's damn sure too short to spend it working at less than art in everything. it is up to us to decide what's important and where the meaning lies...