wine

It’s not Christmas without unicorns

My Fellow Inebriates,

I am giddy with excitement right now because—for perhaps the first time ever—I desperately want something that has nothing to do with alcohol.

It’s true!

I know it seems implausible. The quest for liquor completely dominates this bear for the most part, but every once in a while something cuts through the alcoholic miasma—something so sublimely beautiful that it gives me back my perspective.

Let me back up. I haven’t been feeling very festive. We put up the Christmas tree yesterday (three parts, stackable, lights included, plug-in-and-presto, instant Xmas), and—sigh—the middle part didn’t light up. The lights are in series, so when one goes kaput, the rest fail to light up, and no one felt like going through them all one by one to find the culprit.

My Christmas spirit was in the toilet.

So I started thinking about ways to cheer up. My alcohol inventory was just about exhausted (Santa??), and with the Backyardigans blaring all over the house, holiday music would have been a cacophonous choice. I decided to look for a nice Christmas picture, something serene and lovely.

As I surfed the web, I was thinking about red wine. Whenever I think about Christian holidays I think about wine, because Jesus made wine and also drank it. But I was thinking especially about malbec and ruminating that Jesus had missed out on malbec because I don’t think that varietal was available in his ‘hood. I don’t know if he knew about Argentina. I mean, he knew everything, so I guess he must have known about Argentina, but maybe he never really thought about it—who knows?

And then I saw a painting! A beautiful painting.

I’d never noticed art before. But this—this was transcendent. This awakened my emotions and enlivened my alcohol-deadened senses. I felt, truly, that by gazing on this beautiful painting, perhaps I could find proper happiness—the kind of joy you get from contemplating beautiful things, and not the temporary anaesthetic of a gin bottle.

And then it struck me: the painting was for sale on ebay.

I told my mum I had found something beautiful. She gave me this weird look 😐

I told her it was a painting and asked if we could bid on it. She said 😯 She said we needed to save money for the holidays so the kids can have gifts and we can have a turkey and maybe some wine, and was that last thing not one of our shared priorities?

I said yes, yes, but look. My mum was busy doing something, so she didn’t look at the painting.

I said, When have I ever asked you for anything???

She said ARE YOU F#CKING KIDDING ME? 🙄

I was bereft. She kept on sorting laundry.

And I started to cry. 😥

And then she must have caught a wisp of holiday spirit, because she put down the skid-marked Disney Princess underwear she was holding and went to look at the painting.

A new Barack Obama & Penelope the Unicorn painting, celebrating this most special season. This unique piece of art also features Baby Jesus in a manger, who is visibly overwhelmed by the unexpected display of reverence. This original painting is certain to become a family heirloom for the lucky bidder; unpacked with reverence each holiday season and displayed in a position of honor. - Artist Dan Lacey

And she agreed with me. We must have it.

I almost hesitate to tell you guys about it because we did it—we got ourselves an ebay account (it was easy!) and now we’re in a bidding war. And I’m so scared that somebody with more money might wrest it away from us. I hope that doesn’t happen, but I’d understand, because I can’t imagine anyone not coveting the painting.

The bidding war is on, people. Fa la la la la la la la la!

 

()wned! by CALIFORNIA CULT CLASSICS 2010 CHARDONNAY

My Fellow Inebriates,

California Cult Classics new label

I got my paws on something very special this week—something that probably should have been saved for a special occasion. But a new booze arrival is impossible to resist after the sort of liquor drought we’ve been suffering at LBHQ. I couldn’t help it—the bottle was urging me, speaking to me, singing to me—and once the voices in my head chimed in I couldn’t help it. I pestered my parents to get out that big bottle-opening thingie and save us from sobriety.

The bottle in question contained a 2010 chardonnay bottled at California Cult Classics, an elite North Vancouver outfit where oenophiles, celebrities, and Vancouver Canucks convene to produce and enjoy wine made from extremely select Napa Valley grapes and painstakingly crafted to a world-class standard. Ahhhh!

You cannot find CCC wine in your neighborhood liquor store; it is strictly for personal consumption and not for resale. CCC members plunk down $10,000 to embark on a two-year wine-making journey, at the end of which they walk away with 288 bottles of vino so exquisite as to make them weep with joy. At approximately $35 per bottle, CCC wine compares favorably with wine that retails for $150 in stores. It is not something alcoholics, or alcoholic bears for that matter, usually invest in.

So how on earth did I acquire it?

Well, my dad knows a lovely person named Pixie, who read my lament about our near-bare liquor cabinet, and asked him to take me some wine and vodka.

So how would you interpret that, my peeps? I think she meant these gifts were just for me, don’t you? Predictably, my parents thought they were included, and since they have thumbs that enabled them to extract the special Sardinian Ganau cork from the wine bottle, they did open it and freeload off me.

Not my granny but she could be yours

I felt a particular urgency to drink this chardonnay because that varietal was the favorite of my granny who died last month. I was afraid that if we left it in the house she would come back from the dead as a zombie and look for it.

And so we poured it.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! A heady tropical aroma wafted to my nose with knee-weakening significance—this is not a wine to be messed with. At full refrigeration it was almost too cold to appreciate fully, and I had to battle some mean-ass DTs while I waited for it to hit optimal temperature.

People talk about chardonnays being buttery, and sometimes I think those people are full of crap, but I kid you not, friends, this chardonnay is buttery. Buttery and creamy, rich with vanilla, sensuous and transporting. This is not a wine to swill absentmindedly while you play Farmville. This wine will make you weak at the knees. Full-bodied and subtly oaked, it beckons from the glass, tantalizing, urging, promising, fulfilling. This wine OWNED me, people.

I can’t imagine I’d be very welcome at California Cult Classics in North Vancouver. It’s a very pristine winery, and bears have been known to host at least 30 types of parasites, including “coccidian protozoans, flukes, tapeworms, intestinal roundworms, lungworms, filarial worms, lice, fleas, ticks, and mites.” I don’t think the CCC people would let me add the yeast to the fermentation tank.

A better bet might be getting to know Pixie. Between you and me, I can’t stop thinking about her. Maybe she would let me ride to California Cult Classics in her purse. That’s how my friend Scarybear went to see Avatar.

I’m going to stalk Pixie from afar for a while and see what happens.

No chardonnay for you, zombies!!

My Fellow Inebriates,

No matter what we like to think, the little people run the show around here. This makes my days much more wholesome than I’d prefer. It also means a lot of random and scary things happen to me. You never know—I could get sealed up in a fluffy pink purse for days, freaking out, and no one would help me.

It’s all about imagination, though. For four- and five-year-old girls it’s a pink and purple world, all unicorns and birthday parties and singing ponies. They love to make wishes. In fact, they’ll wish on anything: dandelion seeds, birthday candles, the moon—and lately the bay leaf in the soup. These monkeys will fight to get that bay leaf, because they believe it has magical powers. It’s a damn good thing no one’s grooming them to be albino hunters, because they have enough savagery to be good at it.

So last night the five-year-old emerged from the evening scrap with the coveted bay leaf. With 24 days to go until Santa comes, I figured she’d wish for presents or a big Christmas tree or maybe a trip to Walmart to buy some giant blow-up snowman or something. But she didn’t. Instead little Cindy-Lou Who said: “My wish is for Granny to come back so she can be here for Christmas.”

OMG. See, here’s the thing. Granny is dead. She died almost a month ago. So if Granny did come back she’d be, well, a zombie. My parents should really have explained that to their well-meaning little girl, don’t you think? They should have said, “Hey now, don’t go wishing for Granny to come back from the dead. We have to keep the dead dead. Otherwise they become the undead. The only way Granny can come back is as a zombie, and you don’t want that. Do you, kiddo?”

Just that simple! A five-year-old could totally understand that! But instead my parents just kept letting her make that scary wish on the bay leaf. I’m a tiny bit embarrassed to tell you…I’m actually terrified it will come true.

And I am freaking scared of zombies!!

Don’t get me wrong, I liked Granny. She was a person who understood bears, and she would sometimes split a bottle of chardonnay with me, although if we’re being honest she usually got most of it. It’s comforting to think she’s at some wine bar in the sky, but my fervent little human friends have seeded a more sinister idea now—that Granny will come lurching back from the dead looking for us. OMG!

The first order of business, then, is to eliminate the white wine, because ZG (Zombie Granny) would come looking for that first. Luckily (in this case at least) we don’t carry much inventory at LB HQ, but we do have one gorgeous bottle of California Cult Classics chardonnay tucked away. OMG, chardonnay! That would be ZG’s absolute favorite. So we obviously have to drink it so it’s not here, tempting the undead.