Fellow Wine Lovers,<\/p>\n
Finally we\u2019ve managed to stop focusing on Zika, unfinished stadiums and leaky pipes in the Olympic village to concentrate on the main purpose of Rio 2016 \u2013 to make us all vocal experts on sports that we hadn\u2019t worried about since 2012.<\/p>\n
Wayne is an acknowledged expert on cycling and thus we have had reasonably coherent, technical conversations on this subject, however handball is discussed more at the level \u2018don\u2019t they throw the ball hard\u2019<\/em>, gymnastics is \u2018wow, they\u2019re strong\u2019<\/em> and double trap shooting \u2018looks fun to do but is no real spectators sport\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n However, with our perceived expert status, we have also had to field questions from the younger members of our families regarding the penalty system in water polo – \u2018I think something must have happened underwater\u2019<\/em>, the scoring system in beach volleyball \u2013 \u2018I don\u2019t know why they only go to fifteen in the third set, nor do I know why the ladies only wear bikinis and the gents surf shorts and singlets…\u2019<\/em> and \u2018yes, that is what happens if you pee in the diving pool!\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Suffice to say, we\u2019re thoroughly enjoying the games and debates that ensue.<\/p>\n You can be an expert too…<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n According to an untraceable survey conducted by the Coop, and subsequently rewritten in a number of trade rags trying to fill pages during slow news August, 38% of British wine drinkers consider themselves to be extremely knowledgeable about wine and 70% of those polled are more interested in wine than they were 10 years ago. Quite where the Coop fits into this wine revolution I\u2019m not sure, having watched their selection over the years, I don\u2019t think they have brought a great deal to the table.<\/p>\n Having consulted our calculators we deduce that 62% of people, in a wine survey, don\u2019t consider themselves experts (which I suspect is modesty on many people\u2019s part) yet clearly enjoy wine regularly enough to do the survey \u2013 time for a Wine School plug!<\/p>\n Let\u2019s try and get more experts out there before Christmas \u2013 Wine School starts Wednesday 28th September at 8pm and continues on until Wednesday 9th November<\/strong> \u2013 as we may have mentioned before, it\u2019s a six week course with a week off in the middle (Wednesday 26th October) for half term. According to the Coop, the four favourite wines are Ros\u00e9, Prosecco, Merlot and Chardonnay \u2013 we\u2019ll show you some of these of course but we\u2019ll also show you so much more exciting stuff amongst the 50+ wines you\u2019ll taste over the six weeks.<\/p>\n Become an expert by Christmas – \u00a3150 per person, just 5 spaces left<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Is Pok\u00e9mon killing the pub?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n No, Alex, it\u2019s not. Get off your Pok\u00e9mon high horse. True, 21 pubs are closing every week but this is better that 27 a week from a few years back. It\u2019ll take 38 years for them all to close by which time Pok\u00e9mon will be well and truly over. And since we both know how well we supported the pubs in Wimbledon Village last night, I wouldn\u2019t worry too much…<\/p>\n Is it just me, of is it getting hot in here?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Heatwave coming this weekend, lots of people already enjoying heatwaves elsewhere but we\u2019re still here tasting wine and talking twaddle \u2013 both before and definitely after.<\/p>\n For those of you lucky enough to still be around, we will be opening a couple of treats, things we just really enjoy.<\/p>\n Kalin Cellars Chardonnay Cuv\u00e9e W 1995, Livermore Valley, California – \u00a335.00 <\/strong>\u2013 we tasted this a few months back and were startled by the freshness, the length and the all round satisfaction a 21 year old Chardonnay could give at this price.<\/p>\n Geoff Merrill Reserve Shiraz 2007, McLaren Vale, South Australia – \u00a329.99<\/strong> \u2013 harvested in 2007, bottled in July 2010, drinking anytime from now until the last pub closes in 2050 \u2013 what Geoff can do with Shiraz is a gift few winemakers possess!<\/p>\n Come and taste them both, revel in their fine flavours and get one step closer to becoming an \u2018expert\u2019!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fellow Wine Lovers, Finally we\u2019ve managed to stop focusing on Zika, unfinished stadiums and leaky pipes in the Olympic village to concentrate on the main purpose of Rio 2016 \u2013 to make us all vocal experts on sports that we hadn\u2019t worried about since 2012. Wayne is an acknowledged expert on cycling and thus we […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=758"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":759,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758\/revisions\/759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}