The M.S. Conspiracy

A HoseMaster of Wine Pulp Fiction Classic

Chapter 6 Anything Goes


After lunch I decided to tail Veronica. Which is the very definition of coals to Newcastle. She needed tail like Robert Mondavi needed a heat lamp. So I decided to follow her instead. This was a distinct pleasure. Watching her from behind was like watching a latex lava lamp. Veronica had missed her calling. She could have been a coffee grinder at Starbucks. I'd certainly pay to explore her grounds.

I was hoping that she'd lead me to her friends, but I didn't really expect her to. But it was a lovely day for a stroll, and I'd had worse jobs than following a gorgeous blonde pulling a trailer with two lovely lug boxes. I was so fixated on Veronica that I nearly missed spotting Fugly, the midget who'd held a gun on me in the late Lorna's room. So I was wrong; it turns out it was a lovely day for a troll. And I didn't think Fugly had spotted me at all, if you don't count the easily Wine Away-ed urine stains on my fly that the sight of his gun had caused to mysteriously appear. What was really strange was that the little guy appeared to also be tailing Miss Veronica. Why would Fugly want to know what Veronica was up to? What could be so important that he'd run the risk of following her too closely and end up getting bitch slapped by her buns? Which is better than having midget skid marks.

Veronica was taking her time, just wasting a day window shopping in the cutesy little boutiques Healdsburg was overpopulated with. Fugly was trying to look inconspicous by hiding behind fire hydrants and trash receptacles. Nothing more invisible than a midget humping a fire hydrant. Veronica seemed completely oblivious to her two tails. Or so I thought. I looked away for a moment and she ducked into a public restroom. Well, that made sense. You call it. Head or tails?

She was in there for a long time. But she was a woman, and that didn't seem out of the ordinary. So Fugly and I waited. And waited. This was getting weird. I was thinking about going in after her, hell, I'd been in lots of Ladies Rooms before, but usually with a drill and a minicam, but if I went in after her Fugly would undoubtedly see me. I was weighing my options when Fugly disappeared. I scanned the Square, I looked behind every trash can, fire hydrant and Labrador retriever but that fucking midget had vanished like a Murphy-Goode Social Media Consultant.

I casually walked over to the Ladies Room where I'd seen Veronica enter. I waited for the appropriate moment when no one was looking and I walked in. The stalls were emptier than Charlie Olken's arguments for the 100 point scale. Where the hell had Veronica gone? I don't mean where had she gone, I know where she peed, but where the hell was she? Now I'd lost her and the midget. I guess I'm not much of a tail. But maybe that comes from having a rather small coccyx.

"Hey, Hosefitter, you want to explain to me what you're doing in the Ladies Room?" It was Chief Jokes. This wasn't our first time together in a public toilet, we'd met at IHOP once, but that's another story.

"I'm looking for a client." Yeah, I know, that didn't come out right.

"Number one or number two?" I guess I had that coming.

"Were you following me, Jessica?"

"No, Hosepimple, don't flatter yourself. Even cops have to take a wiz now and then. Mind if I tinkle on the taxpayer's money?"

"You always do."

"Oh, in case you didn't know," Jessica said as she locked the door to her stall, "I'm going to take the M.S. exam next week."

My Old Addiction

I have a confession to make. This won't be easy for me. But it's time I do something about my addiction. No, not that one. I'm not giving up my membership in the Panty of the Month Club. Not when I've finally made it to the Bob Hope level! Thongs for the Memories. No, I have a much worse addiction. And, so, inspired by my friend Tom Wark's struggles with smoking at Fermentation, I have decided once and for all to try to come to terms with my horrific and crippling addiction, an addiction that has turned my waking hours into a living Hell, an addiction that has consumed me, ruined my life. And perhaps talking about my sickening addiction will help others out there begin to confront their own demons, help them stop before it's too late, before their lives are as empty and wasted as mine has become. I don't know if I can succeed, if I can put my life back together, return to the happy life I once had before this catastrophic addiction, but I have to try. I just can't take it any more. It's driving me to an early grave.

I'm talking about my addiction to wine blogging.

Wow. It felt good to admit to it, this ugly secret I've been hiding. Like the vast majority of wine bloggers, I work in secret. Very few people know of my desperate plight, so few people witness the horror that is my wine blogging. Sitting at my computer late at night, alone, typing words and sentences that no one will ever read, no one but other wine blogging addicts, those other lost souls who feel the pathetic and relentless urge to spout their mindless opinions about wine as though someone, anyone, will listen or care. And, glory Hallelujah, maybe even Comment! It is a cavalcade of the hopeless.

I know what you other wine bloggers are thinking, what your delusional mind is telling you to believe. That it's just the HoseMaster's problem, it's not mine. He has a problem with wine blogging, that's obvious, hell, the asshole relentlessly rambles on and on with stupid opinions about wine, the 100 point scale, the wine business, Robert Parker (still dead), and Jancis Robinson's pouty breasts, but I'm nothing like him. Wake up, Mutants! Read the following symptoms of wine blogging addiction and see if you fit the descriptions.

Symptoms of Third Stage Wine Blogging Addiction

I've begun to fall back on topics that are hackneyed and utterly devoid of originality in order to post five days a week.

The need, the craving, to wine blog often leads to this kind of behavior. See Steve Heimoff's latest post about Chardonnay. Read it and see if your reaction isn't the only possible reaction, "Duh!" Steve! Get Help! This kind of crap does not bode well for your mental health.


I check my blog's hit counter twenty times a day hoping it will move past eight.

No one is reading your brilliance. No one. There are freaks out there who stumble across your wine blog because they've done a Google Search for "girls who spit," but, other than that, you have no followers. You imagine you do, you fantasize about long responses to the comments you're sure are going to come from admirers of your palate and wine acuity, but they don't exist. I'm talking to you Brix Chicks. No one reads you. You might as well be the ads on buses.

I spend hours every day posting comments on more successful wine blogs trying to capture more hits.

You know who you are, you find a way to comment on Fermentation, The Pour, Heimoff, all the top 10 blogs, even though your comments are nearly as stupid and unfathomable as the blog you write, hoping their readers will click on your link out of boredom. You heard me 1WineDude, get help! And you, Dylan, whatever your blog is, man, let it go, stop before it's too late, your name on a comment is the wine blog equivalent of Quaaludes, but with greater laxative effects.


I spend hours and hours writing tasting notes even though I've cribbed most of the descriptors from winery websites because I don't really have any experience with wine, but, hey, I'm entitled to my opinions and wineries should send me free samples.

The laboring over tasting notes is a sure sign of the wine blogging addiction. It is the equivalent of other emotional disorders and bizarre delusions like collecting gigantic balls of twine, or building replicas of venereal disease sufferers out of toothpicks, or liking cats. There are wine bloggers in this category too numerous to mention. Folks trying too hard, locked inside their horrible wine blog addiction, dedicated to their delusions. Which wine is best with what music. Might be interesting if it weren't so pathetic. And then there's the abomination known as Wine Blogging Wednesday--the monthly meeting of Wine Blog Abusers. It's like watching the Napa Valley Wine Train derail--funny, at first, until you think of the waste of life it entails. All of those who participate in Wine Blogging Wednesday need professional help. Say, an English grammar tutor. And the saddest case of all, the addicted Wine Blogger whose every post is an obvious cry for help, the 10 point scalemeister himself, Alder Yarrow of Vinography. A life wasted.


It's too late for Alder. I'm just praying it's not too late for me.