I get asked a lot if I’m offended by my nickname. After all, I’m a guy in his mid 40s known to a good portion of the world simply as “Stinky”. Really. It’s cool, I tell people – even my mom calls me Stinky.
That said, the irony of a guy named Stinky being asked to write about wine for Grizzly Wine and Spirits is not lost on me. Not by any stretch. Growing up in the shadow of Milwaukee macro-brews and in the era of Dick Butkus Miller Lite ensemble cast commercials, caring about wine is the last thing you’d expect from a guy whose dad gave tours at Pabst to make ends meet in college. While beer runs deep in my bloodline, in the end, I’m just a regular guy, who attended UM (for 8 years, for undergrad!) and time-clock puncher who appreciates the simple complexity of the world’s oldest adult beverage.
I get it, you’re rolling your eyes, half-dismissing another blow-hard wine snob using the interwebs as a platform to pontificate about the complexities wafting from the bouquet of Chateau Connerie or somesuch. Sometimes, that has its place, and I’m not afraid to say it when it merits saying so.
Or perhaps you anticipate I’m like one of your old college buddies who flew in from San Francisco last weekend to attend your homecoming party and sought to impress with the latest California micro-vineyard that cost more than his plane ticket while droning on about being “in at the equity level” for some social media company. I’m not that guy either. Sometimes wine is expensive, sometimes it’s not; what’s important is that you like it. If you like it enough, well, then it’s up for you to decide if it’s worth it; not your buddy.
I think it’s pretty simple: Wine tastes good; sometimes it tastes better with Double Front chicken, and at other times it’s perfectly reasonable as a “I just got my ass kicked at work” channel-surfing couch-slouching drink.
So here we go. I tell stories about why I like wine or where it’s from or who makes it. And if it’s not worth your time, I’m not going to recommend it. In the end it’s all interesting and what’s more interesting than a mysterious character named Stinky telling it like it is?
Stay tuned for my upcoming reviews, churned out of my living room from time to time for my pals at Grizzly Wine and Spirits.
