Mar 6, 2006
PROGRAM NOTE… It’s the first Monday of the Month and that can only mean it’s time for my monthly appearance on WineBiz 2.4 with Kaz and Erik. A great show on the wine business from a Sonoma perspective. I’ll be on to….well, to be on. I guess I’m considered a "guest commentator." You can listen in by heading over here to KSVY.or….THE VOICE OF SONOMA!! Kaz is one of Sonoma’s true originals. He’s a winery owner with an intense sense…
Mar 6, 2006
Rodney Strong Died. Many of you may know the wine brand that carries his name. But there was a real, and very impressive, person behind the brand. Rodney strong was a very important person in the Sonoma wine industry; a promoter of the industry and the region. He started in wine in the late 1950s after a career as a Broadway dancer. He and his wife Charlotte, also a dancer, were a ubiquitous couple around Sonoma County and within the…
Mar 3, 2006
Once again the world, as it does every spring, became a much better place to live. Yesterday the San Francisco Giants played their first Spring Training game. What this means is that baseball season is just around the corner. I do feel a need to make a statement however about the nature of being a San Francisco Giant fan. Besides being very patient (1954), we are also much better mannered than those teams’ fans from, say, the East Coast and…
Mar 3, 2006
Having grown up and lived all my life in California there is one thing I’ve never had to live with: Blue Laws. These are laws that usually take the form of prohibiting sales of alcohol on particular days, most often on Sunday. I simply don’t understand the laws. Well, that’s not true. Clearly they are a reflection of our country’s puritan origins, our continued commitment to religion as well as reflecting the prohibitionist streak that runs through parts of the…
Mar 2, 2006
Is there a good way to leave a tasting room without buying any wine so the person who spent all that time pouring and talking to you doesn’t feel insulted? Not really. However, this has worked for my wife and I: First, she tugs on my ear to let me know we are going to put the "Wallet Get-Away". Then, she says to me, "honey, I left my wallet in the car." She leaves. I wait five minutes. Then I…