image: Fix.com

I am aware that it’s been a long, oh, I don’t know, five whole minutes since I last talked about a Fix.com article, but the fine folks over at that website have seen fit to publish yet another of my modest attempts at edu-taining the wine soaked masses yearning to be… well… edu-tained.

And so, because I’ve nothing more pressing to do (this nanosecond, anyway), I point you to my Fix.com take on wine prices (why they are what they are, and roughly what to expect with each increasing price band), titled Behind the Tag: The Scoop on Wine Prices. Once again, Fix.com’s images make my words look good.

In the attempts penned to answer the question “why does a wine cost what it costs?” I’ve yet to find any version that cannot be boiled down to the following answer: “because that’s what they think you’ll pay!” Of course, that’s not long enough for a standard article, but the devil’s in those pesky details. And the details are particularly, interestingly, peskily devilish. Like a black hole, a wine’s price incorporates a whole lot of data that isn’t necessarily visible (at least, not at first).

Also interesting, I think, is that the subjectivity of a wine’s upper price point (after normal economies of scale are taken into account) is the entire reason why wine critics have any power whatsoever (think about it…). We often talk about the diffusion of wine criticism, and the dwindling power of traditional wine coverage, but rarely do we make the mental leap to connect that decrease in critics’ power to the increase in wine quality at all price points (itself most probably a result of the earlier efforts of critics calling wines on the carpet… but now we’re well into black-hole-event-horizon-crazy recursive-ness, Interstellar style, so let’s just shut up about it now). Better quality products naturally require less direct critical assessment of their quality, after all.

Anyway… the full Fix.com infographic take on wine prices is embedded below after the jump. Enjoy!

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image: Fix.com

Attention, peeps!

My latest entry for Fix.com is now live; this time, we’re providing an overview of some of the world’s more exciting sparkling wine regions, titled Bubbling Over. See what they did there? Ok, I’ll shut up now.

Once again, the Fix.com crew’s stellar graphics talents are on full display, making the most (and then some!) of my modest attempt at the prose. The full info-graphic is embedded below for your viewing pleasure.

Most of these bubbly regions will be familiar to you geeks, though I think there’s one in there that might come as a slight surprise even to you fabulous wine nerds. Enjoy!

Cheers!

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image: wine.answers.com

A bit on the early side, but what the hell, we’re all drinking so it’s all good, right? Right?!? C’mon, don’t tell me I’m the only one of you tasting at 8AM ET (hell, some of you West Coasties might still be up drinking from last night as you read this…)!

Anyway…

Herewith you will find the roundup of this month’s articles from my Wine.Answers.com gig. Much edu-tainment, and, hopefully, some review-related insights await you:

Wine Product Review: Sommelier’s Preference Bordeaux 1855 Classique Wine Aerator

For those of you who don’t already own a Vinturi, there’s this little number, similar in appearance (and in sound) but quite different in terms of internal design, and about as effective. Apparently, we did, in fact, need yet another entrant into this crowded accessory market.

Wine Product Review: Sip & Save Vacuum Wine Pump

Vacuum wine pump style preservation systems either suck air, or just plain suck, depending on to whom you speak in the wine loving company that you keep. I take a middle-ground view here, in that I think they have their place in the preservation of simpler wines. If you fall on the “they’re not so bad” side of the debate, you’d be hard pressed to find a higher quality version than the Sip & Save.

 Wine Book Review: “Wine To Water” by Doc Hendley

Ok, technically this is far from a wine book. In fact, it has almost nothing to do with wine in the grand scheme of the memoir that Wine to Water founder Doc Hendley has spun. BUT… “Wine to Water” is a terse, friendly, and moving yarn of a tale, and it just might get you rethinking your jaded, wine-soaked stance that one person cannot really make a difference in this world.

Three Things You Didn’t Know About South African Wine Country

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, you already knew all of this stuff. Including the production figures. Because you are a bad-ass of the highest vinous order. Whatever…

Cheers!

There have been some behind-the-scenes changes going on here at 1WD HQ. The more observant among you will notice that I finally ditched the comment engines altogether and have declared that war officially over, it having ended in my inglorious defeat. We’ll be sticking to some enhanced WordPress comments from here on out.

1WD also has a new home, courtesy of WPPronto.com, with whom so far things have been going swimmingly. I’ve tweaked some other technical hosting items here and there; just enough to get me in trouble.

Anyway, today’s update is supposed to be about how this month, for the Wine.Answers.com gig, I decided to go with a double-shot of two themes. So let’s stop messin’ around and get to it, already. Those themes are —

1) The love-it-or-loathe-it “three things…” trivia (primarily because I am a nerd), and

2) Wine book reviews (primarily because I am getting sick of looking at the ever-increasing piles of yet-to-be-reviewed sample books on my office floor).

And so, linked for your reading edu-tainment:

Three Things that You Didn’t Know about Wine Tasting – Seriously, you need to respect the epithelium, people. I mean it. Get on it, your schnoz has power!

Three Things that You Didn’t Know about Burgundy – Yes, I mean besides the incredibly-priced rarities. Anyway, you’ll be able to impress your wine-snob friends with a few of these tidbits, I’ll wager.

Wine Book Review: “Wine and Climate Change” by L.J. Johnson-Bell – “Wine and Climate Change” is a bit of a schizophrenic read (in terms of tone), but it will likely have wine geeks fascinated anyway by its well-researched and well-argued opinions (not to mention the “what-if” scenarios) about how global warming is and will f*ck-up the wine world as we currently know it.

Wine Book Review: “Uncorking the Past: The Quest for Wine, Beer, and other Alcoholic Beverages” by Patrick McGovern – Call me a homer for a wine history tome written by a fellow PA guy, but nobody covers wine’s distant past like McGovern, and “Uncorking the Past” is at turns witty, insightful, and almost brilliant.

Cheers!