Two online-ish wine tastings
Extra credit is possible. Pair your Gamay of choice with a meal and include photos and tasting notes. Or, have a group tasting with friends, or people pretending to be your friend just to drink your wine.The other event is based closer to home and is the fourth in a series of tastings using the messaging &c. service twitter (all you need is a twitter account and a spare hour or so from 9pm onwards on Sunday 25th April). Bubble Brothers, Curious Wines and Karwig Wines have led the charge, hosting the first three sessions in turn, and now it is O'Brien's who have volunteered to pick a mystery bottle for the pleasure and puzzlement of anyone who wishes to join in. Once you've bought your bottle from O'Briens, who will have done their all to render it outwardly unidentifiable, you keep an eye on twitter at the appointed hour while sniffing and slurping your purchase. Brian Clayton explains it all much less haphazardly than I do, here. There is a whole lot of this kind of virtual-social wine shakin' goin' on at the moment. Naturally this brings out of the woodwork a good few naysayers who think that wine tasting online is contrary to the sociable spirit of the stuff, if not contrary to human nature itself. Ah well.