Good evening.

I’m fucking done with winter. Done!

We have, until a few weeks ago had quite a mild one. A couple days here and there at – 35 C but nothing extreme. The last 3 weeks have been a grey, white hellscape. Usually around this time I start to get pictures from BC Dick of his tulips sprouting and it throws me into a white hot rage.

How do I know this hell will end soon? March Madness is almost here! Have I watched more than one game this regular season? Hell no! Will I still become a college basket ball zombie for 2 weekends? You are god damned right I will. I ‘ve loved the tourney since I was a wee lad and in adulthood I usually take the 1st two days off of work and become a complete derelict. Unfortunately I have to work the Thursday but I am eyeing up the Friday for my transformation to a sloth. I believe that someone in the clubhouse will have a super in depth preview next week and we will certainly have a DFO bracket challenge like we do each year so sign up!

Travel story time!

I was a bartender in my late 20’s in Melbourne, Australia at a very busy wine bar in the neighboUrhood of St. Kilda. It was New Year’s Eve and the place was sold out and it was going to be busy.

Melbourne’s climate is not unlike Vancouver but from time to time they tend to get hot weather. The temperature that evening was 35 C and the restaurant was an old building and not equipped with air conditioning. This will become important later.

The bar itself was 2 bartenders, a bar back, and a food runner. All orders came through the two bartenders and the other 3 were support for the evening. At the very beginning of the shift the barback offered the three of us some MDMA (Ecstasy at the time) and we gladly took it as it would make the sweaty evening working way more fun!

We were starting to get busy with regulars starting to come in and I was just starting to feel the lift of the pill I had taken earlier. Music was starting to feel really good, people were happy, and I had the feeling that it was going to be a good night.

Mid rush at about 7 pm my bartending partner Paulie passes me a shot that was purchased for us from a regular. Cheers! Down the hatch. I then look at Paulie and say, “Damn that was good, what was it?”.

“Aww mate it was Frangeli-ohno.”

After having worked with Paul for 6 months and having become really close friends, he at that moment remembered that I was allergic to nuts. I did not have an epipen, I did not have any sudafed which I normally would take if I ingested any minute amount of tree nut product. No worries I thought, it was just a shot of Frangelico, how bad could it be? I took a jug of water to the dunny, chugged it all and then Karen Carpentered in hopes that not much was absorbed into my blood stream. Sad part was when I saw the half disintegrated pill in the midst of the mess.

I returned to bartending feeling like shit with hives starting to form on my arms when the barback came up and asked if I wanted another? I sure did but he had driven over it in his car and scraped it off the pavement. Reader I did not care. I felt like shit and anything would help. I have a phobia of nose drugs so I licked up the crumbled toxic tasting pill. It without question is the worst taste in the world, and I have eaten spiders!

The rest of the night I rollercoastered between having a really good time, and being a sweaty, sick mess.

Don’t do nuts on drugs kids.

Wine time!

Last week we covered the basics in the Loire region of France (Sauvignon Blanc). This week let’s head to Alsace and keep with the spring time white theme!

Alsace is basically Germany in France as far as their white wines go. It is tucked up in the northeast on the border and grows the same Germanic grapes like Gewurztraminer and Riesling as across the border. The reason for that is that they share the same climate and big reds have zero success growing up there due to heat and lack of prolonged daylight hours.

I’m a big fan of Rieslings from Alsace compared to the same grape from Germany because it’s handled differently resulting in very different tasting wines. In France their representation is very dry compared to the sweet German Rieslings that are exported overseas. No sweet Rieslings like Blue Nun here! That being said if I had to choose a certain grape from Alsace it would be Pinot Blanc. These are incredibly peachy and are fantastic with light cheeses or turkey, or roasted chicken.

Like other French regions Alsace also falls into the AOC designation. These are the super old laws that only allow certain grapes and size of vineyards. The whole region produces 90 percent white wines (Riesling, Pinot Blanc, Gewurz, Pinot Gris) with the only reds being Pinot Noir. They also use these white grapes to make Cremant d’Alsace which is the regions offering of sparkling wine.

One other characteristic is the long lean bottle which is just like the Germans presentation. This is a key to look for in a wine store as they usually are grouped together. If you are looking for something to drink on the patio, back alley, picnic this spring then give something from Alsace a try!

A Cola family fave is Paul Zinck Pinot Blanc, or Hugel Gewurz which you can see above. These are perfect wines to pair with spicy Thai, or Indian foods.

It is Conference championship season although up here you wouldn’t know as none of my 8 sports channels had any games whatsoever yesterday. There are too many games for me to list.

World Baseball Classic is going on. Japan v China was a great atmosphere.

NBA and NHL continue their long seasons.

AFL is right around the corner.

Coming soon a DFO meeting to a Cactus Lge game!

Have a good night!