Dept. of Lame Premises

MY CRYSTAL BALLS

The beginning of the year brings out the prognosticator in all of us, and since I’m over 50 I had to have my prognostate checked. Everything came out fine, if slightly sulfurous around my fingernails. I have an amazing ability to predict the future of the wine business. Most of you will remember I predicted that HoseMaster of Wine would fold. That Jess Jackson would also fold. And that Constellation would sell off its Australian wine portfolio because they found out there aren’t any Mexicans in Australia. So as you read my predictions for 2012 keep my uncanny accuracy in mind. Now, if only my prognostate exam had been un-canny.

President Obama will serve a screwtop in the White House—Speaker of the House John Boehner.

"There ain't no flies on me. Ribbit"

Our quaint little print wine publications will start to slowly disband or merge. It will be revealed that Stephen Tanzer is actually Allen Meadows the Burghound, who, in turn, is actually a pseudonym for Stephen Hawking who tastes every wine submitted via an enema. The hard part is spitting. Ironic, considering his name… Robert Parker finally admits that he’s dead and points to hiring Jay Miller as proof of an EEG flatter than sales of Wine Advocate subscriptions…Jancis Robinson responds, “You think you’re dead! I hired that bozo from Vornography! I’m a suicide!”… Connoisseurs’ Guide, Wine and Spirits, and Wine Enthusiast merge to form “Connoisseurs’ Guide to Enthusiastic Spirits.” Tom Cruise gets Three Poofs and a Best Bi... Wine Spectator is sold to Riedel which then breaks it up into 29 different publications, each dedicated to only one variety. Riedel argues that the size of the print and the quality of the paper determine how much sense the ratings make. Consumers fall for their bullshit again… 

DNA evidence will show that Gruner Veltliner is a cross between Riesling and a durian.

An article in the “Journal of Psychiatry” will use wine blogs as a resource for studying megalomania. “Wine bloggers,” the authors say, “ exhibit the classic signs of megalomania—an unshakable belief in their importance mixed with the conviction that they and their opinions are special and powerful despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.” The only cure, the authors conclude, is for wine bloggers to be “…systematically neutered with the new Rabbit TM Genocide Edition...” Except for the HoseMaster, who should be “…lobotomized. Again.”

Pinot Noir’s popularity will begin to wane in the wake of the discovery that many of the most popular brands were made from expired cans of Cherry Coke. This is discovered by a Denny’s waitress at a blind tasting of Marcassin Pinot Noir… Helen Turley appears in a Super Bowl ad for Pepsi… Grenache replaces Pinot Noir as the red wine of choice for sissies, and everyone proclaims New Zealand the best place in the world to grow it even though no one believes it to be true… Constellation buys every New Zealand winery and bottles the same Sauvignon Blanc with 200 different labels. This was already being done.

Big Chief Enologist

The Natural Wine movement in California becomes contentious when Robert Sinskey Winery announces that, moving forward, not only will its wines be made with native yeast, but its grapes will be harvested by Native Americans. “And I’m doing it without reservation,” said Sinskey, “so Sioux me.” …Other Natural Wine halfwits up the ante by announcing they will only use barrels made from wood harvested within 50 miles of the winery, and not wood that was harvesting using a chainsaw. “We Hire Local Beavers” is their new marketing slogan…They are successfully sued by “Girls Gone Wild.”

Jess Jackson and Robert Mondavi form a partnership to start a winery in Hell. Prosecco is their first release, appropriate because, as is usual with Prosecco, it smells of embalming fluid... James Suckling rates it 94...Nobody gives an SO2 sandwich... Satan serves it as his house wine on the recommendation of his personal sommelier, Gary Vaynerchuk. Satan complains about the purchase of Vaynerchuk’s soul, “I got screwed like a Penn State ballboy on that deal.”

Climate change will drastically affect vineyards all over the world... Most of the wine world drops two degrees—the totally useless WSET and CSW… The average temperature in Napa Valley drops, forcing local wineries to pool their resources and raise the temperature by burning piles of money—as if hiring Michel Rolland wasn’t enough… The Germans are forced to make Eiswein by storing the Riesling grapes in Angela Merkel’s pantyhose… Champagne grapes are harvested at such a shocking level of ripeness that there is even detectable fruit flavor in Veuve Clicquot… In Italy, the government does nothing while native Sicilian grapes get super-ripe and create higher and higher alcohol levels, prompting the headline, “Rome fiddles while Nero d’Avola burns”…