I thought of the Annie Hall scene where young Alvie Singer and his mother are seeing a doctor (who is smoking) Alvie refuses to do his homework because “the universe is expanding and it will be the end of everything.”
You may want to consider other people’s relationship to wine before posting. I don’t need to enjoy my wine either in a fancy restaurant or with 20 bottles lined up, but I live alone, and wine to me is fundamentally social. I like sharing it (whether with my significant other or friends) and like talking about it. So while you might drink 99% of it at home, I don’t. But I wouldn’t suggest that you drinking a ton at home “says a lot about your relationship with wine” as if it’s a bad thing.
People should enjoy their wine however they want. And I, personally, can’t wait until I can drink wine with my friends.
Perhaps I overstated. Doing big tastings at restaurants can be fun, and I like them too from time to time! All I’m saying is, I think some people value the performative and showing off aspect of it more than anything.
Maybe we should just put it this way - there are a lot of different ways to enjoy wine, and some of us tend to do so more often in some settings than others, but it’s fine whatever way works for you. One way is not inherently superior to another way, it’s just what works for you.
Coming back to David Kubiak’s original post, we will be back to normal life before too long, whether it’s months, or a year or two. A year or two from now, there will be the same number and assortment of restaurants that there were last year, even if some individual ones don’t survive the shutdown and end up being replaced by something new. People will still gather with friends for dinners and cookouts and so forth.
There is always this “things will never again be the same” story writers run with during times like this, or after 9/11, or during the last big recession, but experience shows that life will return 99% the same before too long.
I do appreciate the candor of your post, David. Especially being a real names board, there can be a tendency to “say what you think you’re supposed to say” on here, and it’s refreshing to hear people’s candid thoughts. Please keep posting.
Why? My wife asks me that all the time.
The answer is that I can currently afford to, and by doing so support producers who may be having a tough go of it.
The real question is “Why am I still buying toilet paper?” No where near as much fun as buying wine yet I feel compelled.
The spirits themselves! We’re just biding time until there is something to look forward to again, and there will be at some point. I’m looking forward to sports and travel myself.
Curating a collection in and of itself is wonderful. I do it with films and novels, in addition to wine and booze. I even used to do it when I was younger with video games, amassing a huge collection I would never have time to consume.
Thank you for that, David.
When I picked up K the boy, motor city kitty and Guido for $19.99 is the reason I am buying wine. Normally shut down over the summer but can’t say no to that deal!
Incredibly short sighted view…
I’m not buying much wine (I think a half dozen bottles since lockdown) but the virus has almost no impact on that decision. Like David, I drink almost 100% of my wine at home or out to dinner with my fam. I have decided to continue eating dinner, so I will continue to drink while as I do. Hasn’t changed a thing.
I can thank my teenagers and 5 year old, working from home, not being able to leave the house till possibly June/July and a rather prolific virus to account for buying wine during this pandemic. Need “Cellar Defenders” from drinking stuff I otherwise should hold onto for later consumption…
We had a fix for smallpox in the late 1700’s. May take some time, but I think we got this.
I’m not buying much wine (I think a half dozen bottles since lockdown) but the virus has almost no impact on that decision. Like David, I drink almost 100% of my wine at home or out to dinner with my fam. I have decided to continue eating dinner, so I will continue to drink while as I do. Hasn’t changed a thing.
Agree!
Yep, well said.
(1) While a lot of people have lost jobs and are having a very difficult time right now, there are a lot of people (including many higher income people) working from home or otherwise still earning the same money they ever have. They are not spending that money on restaurants, travel, ball games, etc. One of the few luxuries available to purchase right now are fine wines. So, people with means are buying them.
(2) It is very possible that there will not be a “post-virus” time. But that does not mean things will not change. At some point, there likely are going to be treatments to reduce the severity of the virus in most people (hopefully this will happen sooner or later) and eventually vaccines, much like the flu vaccine. While the virus could continue to be a threat, I have confidence in world medicine that it likely won’t be nearly as deadly forever.
I refuse to engage in this negative type of thinking. If you walk back through the cycles of most bad times, we tend to recover fully and grow from it. I’ve now been through five recessions, 2008, 9/11, dot.com bust, the 90/91 real estate market dump, and now this. Buy wine, pull corks, drink. We will soon be through this ugliness.
Agreed! We can all smartly acknowledge dire straits by preparing for harsher circumstances while also continuing to acquire items we enjoy for a possible/probable positive future.
Regardless of whether things are good or bad, it makes sense to keep an attachment to the things I normally work at.
And in a year from now, it’s for damn sure that whether I am picking which restaurant I want to dine at that night or still stuck in quarantine, I want to have a good supply of German Riesling and champagne with me.
Thank you David for continuing to support the wineries(including mine). It does make a huge difference.
I’m buying less simply because I can no longer stick my nose into wine shops here and randomly buy things. I’ve bought a few things online, but to be honest, it just seems less interesting right now.
I do drink the same amount, and probably better since I am cooking much better meals and choosing better wines to go with it.