A numbers game

I think I’ve found a new favourite red. It’s a lovely 2012 Cotes du Bourg, it’s full and delicious, it’s got heft, it’s £8.50 a bottle, and it’s got a label which doesn’t look like a breakfast cereal. And no, I’m not going to tell you what it is yet, because I want to buy some more while I still can. I just can’t decide whether to get six bottles or twelve.

I’ll get six. I might actually get bored with it if I get twelve. I’ll get six, and then if I’m still enjoying it after that, I’ll get another six.

No, I’ll get twelve. They’re bound to sell out once people discover it, and start appending those crude little online reviews. “Fill your boots!” indeed – what kind of place is that to put your wine??

Ah, but if I get twelve, who’s to say the wine will last? It’s drinking beautifully now, but does that mean it’s at its peak? I might not get through twelve bottles before it starts to fade. Why not get six, and if the last one’s still still drinking well, then get another six?

Because it’s just as much trouble to get twelve! You still have to go through the same delivery rigmarole for twice as much wine! There’s the text: Your wine will be delivered between 10am and 4pm tomorrow. And then there’s the subtext: Between those hours, do not leave the house. Do not take any phone call you will not mind being interrupted. Do not go into the garden where you can’t hear the doorbell. Do not take a bath. Do not go to the toilet.

Whereas, if I order six, I can get them ‘click and collect’ from the supermarket, and I know from experience that I can lug six bottles back by hand the next time Mrs K is out. That will avoid another one of those awkward conversations in the hall. And let’s face it, the cost of twelve is a lot of money to shell out all at once. No, get six; they'll still come in a nice box, even if it is the half-dozen which posh wine merchants call a Pauper's Case.

Oh don’t be silly. Order twelve with a credit card, and you’ll already be enjoying them before you have to pay!

No, don’t go there. Why do they advertise sofas on credit with ‘nothing to pay for the first year’? So after twelve months, when someone’s dropped some food on it, and the arms are starting to look a bit shiny, just as you’re looking at it and removing some more cat hair and thinking how the initial gloss has worn off and you don’t love it quite as much as when they first delivered it… then you start paying for it?

Look, six bottles is nothing. Six bottles won’t fill the yawning gaps in my cellar.

Which, according to Mrs K, don’t exist.

What if it’s about to go on offer? Those discount offers are constant nowadays. If I get 6, the price might drop, and I can get the next 6 cheaper.

But the price might go up! Christmas is coming, nothing’s going to be reduced now until the New Year at least. Inflation’s going up, and when people find out about this wine, the importers will want to cash in. Get it now!

Oh no, I’ve remembered Christmas. I shouldn’t be spending at all with Christmas coming up. I should only get six.

But… Christmas is coming up! People will be drinking, we’ll want bottles to take round to people, bottles for people who come round to us, wine for the wassailers… No, alright, I can’t honestly remember any wassailers in our bit of West London, but we’d better be prepared.

Look, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, so six bottles in the cellar must be worth twelve bottles in the… or I could have twelve in the cellar… Oh for goodness’ sake, just click and do it.

Oh. They’ve sold out.

PK