Enough Wine to Choke a Transient

**UPDATE** - here's my wine/champagne stock
Nando Chianti Classico 2003
Nando Pinot Grigio 2004
Galasso Trebbiano D'Abruzzo 2001
Luna di Luna Merlot-Cabernet 2002
Luna di Luna Chardonnay-Pinot Grigio 2003
Sutter Home White Zinfandel 2004
Sutter Home Chardonnay 1996
Chateau La Salle Blanc
Avery Lane Merlot 2001
Leonardini Chardonnay 1998
Forest Glen White Zinfandel 2003
Tomasello Cranberry wine
Paul Laurent Champagne
Moet & Chandon Champagne
****

Well, now that the holidays have come and gone, the wine cellar at Dubé Bidet Vineyards has expanded again.

Some people get fruitcake for the holidays. Others get ugly sweaters. I get wine.

I can't complain too much...it's a nice gift...it really is...it's just that neither Debbie nor I are wine drinkers. We get them as occasional gifts from co-workers and on the rare occasion we throw a party, we wind up receiving more wine than we consume.

This past New Year's Eve I was hoping to at least go through a bottle of champagne that's been sitting downstairs for about three years, but then we had to back out of plans with my sister. I'd have talked Debbie into plunging into a bottle ourselves, but she doesn't like champagne. So the bottle sits downstairs for another year, next to the other bottle of champagne we got two years ago. Maybe I'll get lucky and there'll be something to celebrate that'll require me to open a bottle or...zounds...perhaps both! But, in reality, they'll both be there on 12/31/2006. And then plans will fall through again and they'll continue sitting there, with the Don Ho bubbles slowly losing their will to escape, until one day I'll realize the champagne is too old and I'll have to throw it away...which will probably be in 2012 when everybody will be over and then I go to open my six bottles of champagne (trust me, I'll receive more by then) only to find all of them flat.

But the champagne is the least of my problems. I'm up to about a dozen bottles of wine. And the worst part about wine is that you can't just easily open one up, have a glass here and there, and let it sit in fridge for a few months. You have to drink it all relatively close to the time you open it. And I'm an impulsive guy. Knowing all this, if I see an open bottle of wine in the fridge, I'll start thinking "Boy, I really should drink that before I have to throw it out". And the next thing you know, I'll be sitting around the house drunk in my underwear and a wife-beater T-shirt while my lawn grows out of control. Wait. I do that already...just with a Winnipeg Jets T-shirt and a coffee buzz.

So I don't know what to do. I'm not even enough of a wine connoisseur to be able to tell if that 1998 White Zinfandel is good enough to drink, or if it's become vinegar. If I knew that, I might at least be able to ditch a good portion of my stock now...maybe even regift the rest while pushing the values of a 1999 Corbett Canyon Cabernet Sauvignon ("I'm telling you Dave, you just can't find those around anymore!").

I might even just have an impromptu party where the theme is "Drink all my wine, goddamn it!"

And the first one who brings another bottle of wine as a present will discover why it's called Dubé Bidet Vineyards.