Because I am divorcing someone at fault, I have been on the receiving end of revisionist history, even when it seeks to conform to a false, self-serving narrative of cognitive dissonance.
It turns out, however, that revisionism towards an agenda of mollifying cognitive dissonance (“yeah, I did that nasty sh*t, but I am different and it’s ok because…”) is actually one of the core elements of a properly functioning human memory.
As strange as this may sound initially, revisionist memory is the reason why I am always carrying around pen and notebook when tasting wine, my friends, and why I think that any budding wine nerd needs to do the same (or an equivalent) when they are getting serious about appreciating wine (let alone criticizing it). Because if you’re anything like the majority of the human population (and, trust me, you are), then your memory is… well… crap.
Not only is your memory poor at capturing actual details as they happened (this includes about wine), it is an ever-changing, malleable storytelling machine, constantly revising and rewriting history, filling in the blanks between factual details in order to preserve whatever narrative best reduces any dissonance between what actually went down, and your (most likely overly-inflated) internal view of your self…
While I am flattered at the positive mention, I thought it worthwhile (because, hey, I need to kill time until it’s 4:30pm and I can drink wine without feeling too bad about it) to expand on a couple of things that author Viki Eierdam discusses in that write-up.
First, I am stoked that she picked up on something that I often mention during these talks, particularly when given to those who work inside of the wine biz…
While Jeff’s generous description of me is almost certainly incorrect (“the first wine blogger with a reach, an audience, and reputation that equaled many print writers” – I am, for sure, predated in those areas by Vinography.com, and DrVino.com, among others), Jeff’s take on what the wine biz is getting right/wrong for wine consumers is, in my view, spot-on.
You can download the podcast at http://winecurmudgeon.com/winecast-24-joe-roberts-1-wine-dude/, or listen to the embed below (browser capabilities allowing, of course). Best enjoyed, I think, at home with glass of wine in hand (and since it’s Jeff’s podcast, the wine ought to be priced at under $15 / bottle… just sayin’…).
Here’s a look at the Delectable data as graphed by NYT:
image: NYT
And here’s what they had to say about wine consumption trends suggested by those data:
“…wines from the Loire Valley in France and Piedmont in Italy — again already favored among the wine pros — have become slightly more popular among regular users, while interest in the typically bolder wines of Tuscany and especially Bordeaux has fallen. Ms. Weinberg said that does not necessarily mean that drinkers are souring on Tuscany and Bordeaux but rather that they are consuming a broader array of wines. ‘It’s always a tricky question,’ she said. ‘Are these kind of higher-acid, lower-alcohol hipster wines taking over? Or is there just so much more access to a greater diversity of wines? One of the reasons why wine is so exciting these days is there’s so much more in the mix.'”
I’ve got a problem with this.
Not because I question the data, but because we have people referring to higher-acid, lower-alcohol wines as “hipster.” It’s not hipster if it’s already mainstream, folks…
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