Corey, Mel’s post in its context in that thread seemed to me to be sarcasm, but was not pretentious to me.
If it was sarcasm, I missed it. If it was genuine, then it was pretentious.
(where is that sarcasm font when you really need it?)
Understood. Easy to miss intended sarcasm on the internet. Actually, I took it as a sarcastic shot at the position taken by me (and a few others).
I fail at the Internet. 
OK, maybe that one… Clark Smith’s statement is certainly easily refuted, and maybe pretentious as well.
I think any discussion of an elusive concept such as “terroir” is inherently in danger of becoming pretentious. Such a topic needs to be between geeks, and avoided in the presence of “civilians” IMO.
+∞
When I worked at a high-end retailer in St. Helena, I met dozens of new vintners who wanted to be in the shop. They were always polite and made appointments. Some had an inflated sense of their wines though. One day, there was a couple looking over a particular rack of Spring Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon. Thinking they were shoppers I approached them and offered my help if they needed any assistance. The man was facing me, but the woman, who was between us had her back to me. Without even turning around, her hand comes up to her shoulder, offering me her business card held like a cigarette between the index and middle finger. “We’re owners”, she droned. I let her know that I wouldn’t forget that.
Another time, a well known wine magazine publisher came in to check things out. He chatted with my colleague and I then approached a young couple browsing the aisles. After awkwardly asking how they were doing, he bluntly said to them “Do you know who I am?” They both shook their heads ‘no’ as they nervously looked at each other. He then turned to us and explained to them that “both of these people know who I am!” My colleague, trying to decrease the tension cheerily said “of course we know who you are” adding in his name and the publication. The poor couple then had some brief inkling of who was now in their midst, but left. The publisher then gets on his cell phone to place a call to someone. He apparently reached the executive assistant and she wouldn’t put him on the phone with her boss, to which he uttered “If you knew how famous I was you would put me through immediately.” ![[swearing.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/8/8a0d3f3461d40641d294442fc2be78039bf94d19.gif "[swearing.gif]"){kind=small}
That’s going to be hard to beat.
I’ll take that challenge:
I dare you to watch this from beginning to end.
The beginning showing construction of the glassware and the box is actually quite nice to see… the craftsmanship is more than solid. The pain comes at around the 6 minute mark when Suckling starts his diatribe.
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Pure pretension. Whenever I hear this, I’m tempted to say, “No, but if you really can’t recall I can refer you to a good neurologist.”
To be clear, we’re talking about a case – for wine glasses – that The Suckling is pitching on his website for $8,500. (And no, I won’t even discuss that red thing around his neck in the video.)
Having been deep in the design world for close to a decade now the price and its application are somewhat irrelevant. I can appreciate the craftsmanship, attention to detail (down to their wrapping of the walking foot on the sewing machine during the label application on the leather) and construction. The soundtrack during this portion is a little ridiculous as it romanticizes the hard manual labor of all of these artisans (as they unfortunately couldn’t even afford the pieces they’re producing at retail).
There is nothing to excuse once Suckling hits the screen though.
I follow his twitter feed just because it serves as the pinnacle of excess (bordeaux, bordeaux, bordeaux, cuban cigars, hong kong exclusive events, foie gras foie gras foie gras, caviar, scotch, whiskey etc. etc. etc.) and it makes me shake my head to know that there is someone out there just consuming all of this. I can only wonder what his LDL and LFTs are like.
That’s the worst. Comes across as rank classism. Was her husband embarrassed, at least?
These are pure gold. I’m 98 points on them. I’m 100 points on Sting’s friend with scarfscot.
Co-organized an old Bordeaux dinner a number of years ago.
Was opening and sorting the evenings offerings when one gent (whom I didn’t know) who was attending brought his offering up.
Saw that I was opening 2 Aussie wines with the Bordeauxs, and went on to berate me that it wasn’t good enough that he had brought an expensive Bordeaux whilst some cheapskates had brought Aussie wines along instead blah, blah whinge for 5 minutes…(I think he had a brought a '69 Mouton, which was probably the worst wines of the evening).
I explained that I had brought them from my cellar, and that they were just for comparison purposes. With the wines being blind, they would also be a bit of fun.
The two Aussie wines were both classics that also sell for serious money - a '63 Mildara (aka Peppermint Pattie) and '62 Chateau Thabilk. Both were in the top 4 wines of the night, along with the other wine I and had brought along, a '49 Latour, which was WOTN by a mile.
The look on his face was priceless when the wine he pronounced his WOTN was unveiled as the '63 Mildara…
Had to have a dig at him afterwards, saying that he should consider trading in his crappy Bordeaux’s for some good old Aussie Cabs…
I’m slowly reading through the Manhattan District History and it’s just staggering to think about the speed and scale of it all, and that (relative) secrecy was maintained with over half a million employees. Groves deserves a huge amount of credit for steering that behemoth.
Thread drift risk…put on your goggles (pun intended):
I just read Joseph Kanon’s “Los Alamos,” his first novel (2005) and a very fine one. Bit of an off-center crime procedural during the build-up in late '44. Close ups of Oppenheimer, Groves, and a few others. Great read!
I am surprised that no one, not even Todd, has mentioned the use of “pain grillé” when “toast” would do just as well.
Well, the two are completely different.
