My 19 year-old and four friends are on a road trip and will travel about 14 hours today. I’m having what she’s having, but make it a double please.
My 23-year-old dd, who lives 7 hours away, has to move at the end of the month with her 55-lb dog and the apartment and roommate she had lined up fell through today. I will be out of the country July 23-August 15. Oy! Top off my NZ Sauvignon Blanc please.
You all have a seat in my husband’s midlife crisis new career brewery. If you don’t like beer or don’t drink, there are San Pellegrino sodas and ice tea in the fridge. If you’re a wine drinker like me, come back to the house and have a glass of sauvignon blanc or pinot noir.
Oh my, @mathmom! Pass the whiskey/gin/whatever! We had only one tarantula in a free cabin we won in Oklahoma and we left the next morning. It was so huge I thought it might actually eat my infant son.
How did I only find this thread a few days ago? Was it sleeping and recently revived? I skipped up to the last 10 pages or so. Anyway, cheers, I’ve got a Lagunitas Maximus.
Honestly, I have my distinct wine prefs (for reds: CA mid-coast, not easy to find a large selection in the northeast.) But when I need to make a choice about new bottles, I just read the Wine Spectator shelf summaries (those little cards stuck by the price tabs) for the descriptions and ratings. That got me better wine than DH’s choices (and still reasonably priced.)
Stores around here do a lot of wine tastings on the weekends and we find a lot of reasonably priced wines that way. We also have done a fair number of wine tasting minivacations - usually tacked on the business/family trips to the SF area. Last spring we did a Finger Lakes trip in NY. We belong to several wine clubs as well.
I was gone for two weeks without decent wifi and came back to a new cc format! Wow, I think the last time I posted on this thread was when S started college in 2010. Glad it’s back as my youngest is going into her senior year of HS. Oh, and on a recent trip with my college friends, I finally found out what a marmot is.
Vivino is a great app for wine reviews/selections. You can scan a label (at a restaurant or package store) and get information on it.
My secret weapon is Italian chocolate liqueur.
Here in “real life” we were given a celebratory bottle of sparkling wine, truffles, strawberries and fresh oranges. Mimosas, here we come.
If anyone is near a total wine, Fern Ridge Sav Blanc is very good, and it’s on sale for 11.99 a bottle. Plus, if you buy 16(?) bottles, you get 20% off. We just bought 48 bottles, so the next round is on me.
If you don’t like that we’re pouring King Estate Pinot Gris from Oregon, or I can always find something to mix with the grapefruit vodka.
My FIL, who makes the quintessentially perfect martini and who taught me how to drink them when DH and I were in our early twenties, is an artist and a charming old gentleman married to his opposite. We are staying with them for a few days (who the hell retires to LA?). Last night, as I was sure my eyes were betraying my (constant) annoyance with my MIL, he waltzes into the room with a tray of arctic cold martinis in graceful, frosty stems bathing olives the size of small eggs. Rescue and heaven in a glass! By the time I was enjoying the olive, my MIL was almost bearable. 
I am an “anything but beer” girl myself. My favorite, albeit redneck, libation is Jack and Diet Coke. My dh, on the other hand, LOVES beer - especially all the craft beers. My college roommate’s husband got him on the app “Untapped.” He loves it. Previously, the challenge for me has been going to the craft breweries with him. While many of them offer wine (and I do drink wine because it’s not beer), it is usually NOT good. As I have aged, I find that I tend to get “wine headaches,” if I have more than one glass. Especially if it is cheap wine. However, I am now happily starting to find “hard water” being brewed and offered at local breweries! I love it! It’s low-cal, gluten-free, and lower in ABV than wine. I am glad I can now more easily participate in the brewery fun, and it’s nice to have something that comes in a can that I can enjoy at the beach. I even bought a skinny coozi for the White Claw cans.
We used to be in a wine club. We took turns hosting in each others’ homes. It was a lot of fun and all people from our church (yay for being Methodist). One time (after likely all being overserved) when one of the wives had gone to the restroom, we all decided to hide in the garage so when she came back none of us would be there. Our goal was to make her think the rapture had occurred but she had been “left behind.” No, we did not all strip and leave piles of clothes in the living room! Cheers!
@Hoggirl, Jack and diet coke is one of my all time favorites! And I don’t consider it redneck at all. It was our go-to drink at college football games because our dates could easily bring in a flask of Jack Daniels and we could get big diet cokes from the concession guys in the stands. It’s one of those drinks that takes me back to to the good old days.
Now that my doctor has convinced me to break my Diet Coke habit, I’m switching to Buffalo Trace and soda. Sure wish it was easier to find Buffalo Trace in my area. Dang it’s good.
**Just a note to remind everyone that the purpose of this thread is not to talk about alcohol directly, but to share the stories the the alcohol unleashes as we rub elbows with fellow sinners along the bar. From the OP:
**Refer to post #1 for the rest of the “rules.”
For example: “So, a dyslexic walks into a bra…” (Pa dum pum.)
Cheers!**
Well they shut the “fresh new look” thread. Pour some Baileys in my coffee, please.
A UX designer comes into this bar…and leaves.
Oh no. A GOOD UX designer comes into the bar and it’s drinks all around!!
Open a new one.
Sorry. Just testing the reply function out which obviously doesn’t work right. Gonna need a cab ride home before this is over.
Bartender!!!