North Star Writers Group

There’s this drinking game in college that I would strongly recommend avoiding, called the “Power Hour”. It’s not very complicated. Every participant is required to take one shot of beer every minute for an hour. Because the second hand on a clock gradually becomes very difficult to follow throughout the course of the game, it is helpful to have an officiator to count down before every minute. By the end of the game, participants who aren’t passed out under a coffee table are generally dancing sensually by themselves or singing to music that may or may not be playing.

Another enjoyable excursion commonly enjoyed during the college years is called “barhopping”. This activity consists of visiting as many bars as possible during a short period of time and ordering at least one drink at each one. “Hopping” between bars generally consists of a taxi ride or walking. Visiting at least seven or eight bars and making it home before passing out would be considered a successful outing.

As most of us know, college students are complete idiots, which, considering their location in the middle of academia is more than a little ironic. They don’t drink to appreciate the finer things in life. They drink because in college, hangovers are as celebrated as the Purple Heart.

After graduating college and moving to California, I was happy to leave my stupid years behind me and begin a life of a bit more sophistication. I had escaped the era of recklessness and irresponsibility and was ready to move on.

To get things started, two of my refined and sophisticated new neighbors invited my wife and me to accompany them on a wine-tasting trip to Livermore, an increasingly renowned winemaking city in Northern California. We had never been wine tasting before, but we both like wine and are incredibly undiscriminating of all activities that are free. We were both extremely excited during the ride there, laughing, chattering, our hands hanging carelessly out the backseat passenger windows.

About five hours later, we were stumbling up the stairs to our apartment. Five hours after that, we woke up in our bed with splitting headaches, trying to figure out what had happened. Our neighbors were kind enough to fill in some of the details, most of which are not important to relate at this time.

I finally realized that wine tasting is a sophisticated Californian activity that flawlessly amalgamates barhopping and the Power Hour with an interesting twist. Instead of doing shots of beer, you’re drinking shots of wine. And instead of taking a taxi or walking, it is typical to drive from one winery to the next.

Newcomers like me promptly realize that California has a lot to teach.

Livermore is a beautiful place to go wine tasting. It has that old-fashioned country charm, with huge expanses of open land, long pebble driveways and rows upon rows of grape vines in every direction.

At any given winery, each person is offered at least five free tastes of wine. Often the amount is more than double that, so essentially, you’re drinking anywhere from one to two glasses of wine per winery. After you’ve finished tasting at one winery, everyone hops in the car and drives to the closest winery down the street. If you haven’t yet, multiply one to two glasses of wine by whatever number of stops you might make and you’ll understand why no one ever remembers anything after the third winery.

Apparently, drinking too much is perfectly acceptable as long as someone gives you a thorough description of what it is that’s about to make you drunk. If you’re hearing strange new words like “tannins”, “oaky”, or even “steely”, you’ll know your situation qualifies.

What I eventually learned is that wine tasting is not about intoxication, although this is the inevitable result. It is about learning what it takes to become truly fastidious by listening to people who have already arrived. Once you sound like you actually know what you’re talking about when describing a wine – which essentially means no one understands you at all – you’re an official Northern Californian.

Perhaps the primary difference between wine-tasters and college students is that college students are perfectly aware of their intentions to get wasted, while wine-tasters seem to be under the delusion that they are culturally refined.

Having been a member of both clubs, I can only hope to learn the difference between drinking for drinking’s sake and drinking for the taste. And if I’m incredibly fortunate, I’ll learn what it takes to remember an entire trip to and from Livermore.

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This is Column # NS065. Request permission to publish here.