The Good
Once again there was too much good this week to limit myself to just one thing. The week started off with a bang, and faded into outrageous hilarity.
There was an awesome Twitter tasting event featuring Michigan winery Black Star Farms (on Twitter at @bstar2009) that was organized by Shannon Casey from Michigan by the Bottle. There were a lot of cool winos who were involved in the event, including Mike Fifer from the Wine Monologues, Bill Wilson from Wine for Newbies, and @winegenie from Twitter. Watch the video review of the Black Star wines here, and read about the event here. I love the way that this event was conducted. The level of engagement on the part of the winery was really fun to see, and it was great to see a wine region that a lot of us don’t have much familiarity with get some well deserved exposure.
On the more humorous side of things, we saw the introduction of the new wine label called Crazy Bear on the Dirty South Wine blog. Joe, the Suburban Wino even contributed a logo for the wine. The great Hardy Wallace also posted a hilarious video for the previously mentioned label -
Enter the Crazy Bear from Kevin Kelley on Vimeo.
The Bad
So, I know this is probably a huge surprise, but there was more bad news in the wine shipping front this week. The state of Maryland is determined to plug it’s ears to common sense, as well as to the voice of the people. Dr. Vino has a great post up profiling the shipping laws of the state of Maryland.
Tom Wark has a great post up on his Fermentation blog about the frustration that he experienced in testifying before the legislature in Maryland. It’s hard to talk to people who have no interest in listening.
The Ugly
The behavior, as reported by Gonzo Gastronomy, of the two major shipping companies when it comes to beer. I have to say that I find the double standard between wine and beer to be a bit head scratchingly confusing. I think that Katie is right, it wouldn’t be helpful to raise a big stink about it, but it’s still perplexing. This weekend, while I’m conducting my fantasy baseball draft, I’ll raise a glass of brew to my friends who are being hassled by UPS and FedEx when it comes to receiving beer shipments. There, but for the grace of some fickle whore of a legislative body or shipping company, go I.
Cheers to you this weekend, and remember to drink well, drink often, and drink local.
Oh, man the bad and the ugly get my blood pressure up. I missed both those posts, but now I’m afraid to read them. Maybe I’ll pour a glass of wine and grab a beer – it may help relax me.
Josh
Yeah, it’s pretty infuriating. The Maryland story really pissed me off. I get so tired of politicians basically giving the finger to their constituents. I say, throw the bums out!
Thanks for the name-drop!
To be fair, the “ad” on my site features a picture of a bear that I did not draw (credit to Tracy Cermak).
I am having fun, however, dropping designs on the crazy bear facebook page.
I concur with Josh. I missed all of this this week, and that thing about Maryland is just infuriating. Thanks for bringing it to the attention of blog-reading slackers such as myself… where would I be without TGTBTU?
Thanks for the shout-out! I really appreciate it. Also, thanks for posting the #crazybear video- This thing is taking on a life of its own. Kevin Kelley deserves killer props for the editing. He can make wine like a mofo, but edit like a champ. He’s on fire.
Joe, you may not have drawn it, but you turned into a wicked awesome wine label.
Joshua, for sure. The Maryland deal is horrible, and yet it’s not surprising in the least. Just goes to show that people in government all over the country are a bunch of ass hats.
Hardy, that was some killer video editing. I can’t speak for the winemaking yet (someday I’ll get within the distribution radius and try it), but that was a masterful job of video production. Very entertaining stuff.
Thanks so much for the mention. I appreciate your support. I am looking forward to the wino fantasy baseball draft tomorrow!
Thanks for plugging Tweet & Taste! Next one is in April with Shady Lane Cellars!