STRANGER THAN FICTION

All the news that throws a fit

           Enophiles will want to know about these important developments in the wine world:

Behind the Green Bottle
Sogno Uno, a new Italian blend that just garnered 91 points from critic Robert Parker, is a joint project of award-winning porn-film star Savanna Samson and winemaker Robert Cipresso, vintner to the Vatican. The picture on the label consists of a little nightie and a lot of Samson. "Trust me, I didn't add any points for... personal presentation," wrote Parker.

Samson, a devote Catholic, notes, "My priest said in Mass, 'Violence or pleasures of the flesh. What is the greater of two evils?' I felt like he was saying that toward me."

Better safe than Osama
A truck driver waited ten hours to cross the Swiss border while customs officials puzzled over a suspicious word in his documents. The driver spoke no Italian, and the guards, no German. Finally, someone pointed out that "Laden" is German for "load." The truck was "Laden mit wein" and had nothing to do with Osama.

Lions & Tigers & Bears, Oh, My
It’s a jungle out there, according to market analysts AC Nielsen. This year in America, animal brands like [Yellowtail], Smoking Loon and Wasted Walrus outsold other wine species two to one. Though they represent only 18% of wines successfully introduced, their combined sales totalled over $600 million.

The Ruvriness of Paris…
Vietnam’s 10,000-plus karaoke bars are notorious hotbeds of drugs and prostitution. In an attempt to crack down on “social evils,” officials have decided to ban all alcohol in these establishments. Don't know if this will affect the pimps and ho’s, but it sure looks like the death of Karaoke. Not to be cynical or anything, but how many tone-deaf, sober people want to belt out New York, New York to a room full of equally sober strangers? I mean, besides my ex-husband, Mike? But he's so cute when he's off key...

Ve hav vays to make you vine
Germany’s newest vineyard scourge: Nazi Raccoons. In 1934, Luftwaffe chief Hermann Goering introduced racoons to Germany to enrich the nation’s fauna. The masked critters are extremely adaptable, breed like rabbits and have no natural predators. In 2004, thousands began descending on vineyard land in Brandenburg and destroying the harvest. How bout we round up our prairie dogs and subway rats and launch an allied invasion?

Domaine DDT
Russia banned imports of Georgian and Moldovan wines when they were found to contain highly toxic DDT, along with traces of other dangerous pesticides banned in the 1970s. In addition, more than half the wines tested did not meet sanitary standards. Georgia is protesting, claiming French tests cleared its wine. Athough it’s not clear what constitutes sanitary standards in France.

Two scoops of subtle nuance
As if the wine kind wasn't bad enough, get ready for raisin snobs. “Softer texture and finer wrinkling," was the consensus of panelists comparing two varieties of raisin in a study by the enology department of UC Davis. “The DOV (dried on the vine) raisins are more football- or teardrop-shaped, less flat like tray-dried raisins,” they added, also detecting hints of spice, caramel, bitterness and astringency. Beleaguered growers think raisin-connoisseurship might kindle interest in their crop. That and a 91-point rating from the Raisin Dehydrator.

He drinks like a fish. Wait, he is a fish.
Three poachers at Poland's Lake Opole were arrested for for fish abuse when they celebrated the New Year by pouring bubbly down the mouth of a pike. They claimed the fish was half-dead, and they meant to "restore it to consciousness by treating it with champagne". They should know better. Poaching fish calls for white wine.

Three left feet
The Shanghai zoo has teamed up with an alcohol producer to make a medicinal wine from the bones of endangered tigers. At $30 a bottle, it's touted to cure arthritis, headaches, ulcers and burns. The zoo claims the tigers in question all died of old age or accidents. Clumsy tigers! Stop running into guns!

WinePAL wants YOU!
Appalled by wine list prices, Lance Cutler created WinePAL, the Wine Patrol Approved List, to recognize restaurants who abide by his group's standards:

a) At least one wine in each category under $30 - ideally 10% of the list.

b) Corkage fees less than $10. Even better--none at all.

Deserving restaurants earn a colorful certificate suitable for framing. As for bad ones, Wine Patrol is recruiting deputies. Sign up at www.winepatrol.com. For $5, you get two IDs, plus 18 cards to leave at restaurants informing them that you doubt you’ll return thanks to their stratospheric wine prices. Do your part to make the world a better place to drink in!

Stay tuned for more. As Dr Seuss observed,: "From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere."