Was there any kind of budget for this trip??? I would be impressed to see the restaurant bills. It must be weird to come back to what many of us know as the “real world”. I must say the documentation was pretty thorough. I cannot remember any thread that comes close to this one in terms of drinking highlights. Would be happy to attend one of these dinners with your group in the future…that would require a second mortgage however!
Where is this a complaint? The person basically says he’d love to go and complimented the documentation. He just realizes it’d be expensive to do so…
I propose WB institute a sliding scale of access to posts. All current members will have to submit copies of their tax returns or other statements to verify their financial condition, and this will be a requirement of all future members. Each member will be assigned a posting level commensurate with their income level/net worth. Each member shall then only be allowed to view posts from members either at or below their own posting level or one level above.
That way, no one’s feelings will be hurt and there will be no jealousy from someone reading about wines that, based on the member’s financial situation, are out of reach of that member. That will allow them to sleep at night instead of endlessly tossing and turning in turmoil.
Conversely, that will remove the motivation of the rich and famous to lord it over their less financially well-off fellow members by posting about wines that these lesser members can’t possibly afford.
Or just chuck what I proposed above and let the 1st Amendment be observed.
We all grapple with a limit on cost per bottle and also how much wine we can buy and store at any one time. Everyone has a different pool of resources they are working with. For those of us who can’t justify premium high dollar wines, at least we get to see some feedback on those wines because we sure aren’t buying them.
I stick to what I feel I can afford within my own price threshold and when a wine I like crosses an invisible price line, I stop buying it and move on to something else.
Thing is, how many people have the resources to be buying in Britain? I’m all for good wine prices, but I don’t purchase in pallet quantities that Mark has said he does on occasion, and I don’t think most of us here could do either.
It’s part of some discussion about whether there is enough of a point in trying to get better wine pricing out of the current dip in the Pound, by ordering in large quantities from England.
Neither quote seems to be the “you should not post tasting notes about expensive wines” thing the original post claims. Or even close.
I’ve been an active poster here a long time and that frankly just isn’t a significant issue here. There have been a handful of times over the years someone had made a snipe about when six dudes have dinner and open $10k worth of wine for it or something, but even that represents less than 1% of the reaction to those kinds of posts.
To me there is nothing illegitimate about these posts. The parties involved have these bottles and are drinking them. More power to them, let them enjoy themselves.
I agree with all the comments here.
That said…
10 years and 16,000 posts and you ask this?
Really a pretty silly question.
This thread belongs in the asylum.
Anyone who complains about the cost of the wines other people write about is barred from the obnoxious hedonistic bashes I host in my back yard and eating the ridiculous food. I have tasted lots of great wines because they were shared by others. In my experience, wine collectors are more than willing to share fancy expensive wines with others. How else do you explain the Roumier that someone opened last week in my backyard? I’m still waiting for someone to show up with a DRC, and I apologize for not opening the 1973 Mouton (RMP 65 Points) which I had intended to open with the steak, but I spent too much time cutting meat.
Although it pains me to come to Howard’s defense, he says that he doesn’t like the posts in question. This topic has been vetted before and and I think it is worthy of periodic resurfacing.
I think my response would be no to both questions.
Re Price/Quantity, Let them post and let the rest of us live vicariously, drop our jaws, rue our cursed lives, ignore, or whatever seems appropriate.
Re “complaints”, I don’t mind the occasional negative comment or snide remark or contrarian opinion, but I do not like to see personalized nastiness.
To paraphrase: Is it legitimate to suggest creating a safe space for all those snowflake winos who are butthurt about not being able to afford to drink the same wine as someone else. Perhaps a new forum is required for those snowflakes - winewhiners.com?
Did you read the posts he references? Neither of them seem at be at all what he’s claiming (“calling people out for spending too much money or for buying things only a limited number of people could afford”), nor what you are defending him about.
I imagine if you looked hard enough, you might find a couple of times over the years someone has done what Howard claims, but neither of those two posts are it.
As Shakespeare would write, Howard, Much ado about nothing. Drink what you want, post what you want. I don’t think anybody really cares unless it seems excessibe. We all like to hear about wine.
My view, as I expressed in my OP and on the threads I linked to, is that everyone should post what they want to post on and that people should not be showing their jealousy.
As I specifically said: “Obviously, I don’t like the posts I have referenced or things like them - I think they reek too much of jealousy and not much else.”
![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}
