So
a week has passed since all the excitement, and it's back to
business, here in the parched and seamy banlieue
which I call home.
10.10:
I read an email from PK in which he talks urgently about
storytelling.
I have no idea what he means. I go and make a cup of (instant)
coffee.
10.25:
For
no good reason, I decide to get back to basics and investigate those
low-level supermarket chains which I haven't already had a brush
with, i.e. Costcutter, Londis, Nisa, Mace. These are the real
out-of-town, abandoned A-road, padlocked light-industrial, single
chiller-cabinet operations, the sort who sell you a top-up for your
electricity bill and keep the liquors and spirits in a special unit
behind the counter. These are places for the desperate and the
feckless. Depressingly, it turns out my nearest Costcutter is less
than a mile away. Londis is even nearer.
10.34:
Actually, I know why I'm being drawn to Londis, Costcutter et
al.
I'm punishing myself for an unexpectedly bibulous few days, starting
with a Dry Martini on prize night, followed by some impromptu
wine-packed dinner invites on subsequent nights, in the course of
which I put on four pounds and my wife lost her voice. Oh, and it
involved a Costières
de Nîmes which somehow took five days to finish, and was great at
the start, but tragic, frankly, by the end.
Still slightly dizzy with liver fatigue, I know that I must atone for
this, somehow, and that somehow
means drinking nothing but the least best wine money can buy.
10.52:
Yes, but this is fruitless. A moment's thought (eighteen vague
minutes by the clock) is enough to remind me that just because the
shops are small and charmless, it doesn't mean that the drink is
going to be cheaper than anywhere else. Generic reds and whites are
going for a fiver plus at Costcutter, and that's on
special offer. Convenience stores (for that's what they are, even
allowing for the branding) are graveyards of good value. What I need
to do, of course, is drag myself to the nearest Asda or Aldi, some
inhuman hypermarket, and prowl the bin-ends like a ghoul, picking
among shreds of cold cardboard and damaged plastic for something that
costs less than two quid if you buy eighty. The thought is too sad
for words.
11.14:
No! Here's what I'm going to do. I'm not going to lumber myself with
yet another pile of low-end grifter's slurry. I'm going to snap out
of the impasse
by nipping down to the inexpressible Waitrose at the end of the road,
and buying the first wine I see which has no
resonance for me at all.
A wine about which I know nothing, in which I don't even recognise
the grapes, let alone the maker's name. I'm talking about a whole new
taste sensation. I'm talking about the thrill of the unknown,
something to startle me back into life. It's crazy; but it might just
work.
12.03:
English
wine.
A bottle of Denbies Surrey Gold.
It's made in Dorking, Surrey, an otherwise charisma-free commuter
town! That's about fifteen miles from where I live! This is my local
wine, practically. Yes, £7.63 seems a lot to pay for something that
I could almost harvest and press myself, but there you are. I can't
get beyond Waitrose, I haven't the strength. Handsome label, nice
pale straw colour. A mixture of Müller-Thurgau, Ortega and Bacchus,
the website informs me. Denbies do reds, as well. And organise tours
round the vineyard. Some good reviews. I'm excited.
12.45:
It's not without merit. I would query, though, the 'Fragrant nose of
peaches' which leads to 'a well structured fruit driven palate with a
flinty backbone and hints of ginger', as trumpeted on the packaging.
I'm getting almost nothing at the start or finish, but a lot of
posturing right in the centre of my mouth, roughly one-third of the
way through the encounter - zesty, yes, slightly antiseptic, a kind
of palatable rinse if you're suffering from, say, mouth ulcers or
thrush, and that's good, we all respond to that. Maybe it's too cold.
It does get a bit more articulate over time, and at least it's not a
Pinot Grigio, which must now be cultivated on half the planet's land
mass, judging by the number of Pinot Grigios filling the shelves.
13.12:
And it goes very nicely with a piece of Cambozola which I find in the
fridge, or nicely enough, at any rate. Am I going to argue? The day
has regained its colour. There are
good
times ahead. Seriously, that's how they roll in Dorking.
CJ
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