83 posts tagged “wine”

I swear, I couldn't make this shit up if I tried.

Stupid Man:  I usually buy the 3 liter bottles.  I want to buy the 4 liter bottles.
Me:  Yes?
Stupid Man:  How much more is in that?

Stupid Kid:  I want to buy this keg of Blue Moon Belgian White.
Nice Lady:  Have you ever tried it with an orange slice in it?  It's delicious.
Stupid Kid:  Uhhh, how do you get the orange in the keg?

Stupid Lady:  Do you carry the Neederburg Stein?
Me:  No, ma'am, we only carry the Neederburg Pinotage.
Stupid Lady:  Oh, so you don't have the Stein?
Me:  No, ma'am, we only carry the Neederburg Pinotage.
Stupid Lady:  Hrm.  Do you have any of the Stein in the back?

Where have I been?  The doctor's office.  More precisely, the doctors' offices.  Lots of them.  Often.  I got one of those "answer each question with one word" emails, and my response to "name 3 places you go often" was "work, home, doctor."  But modern science has worked its miracles, at least for now, and I'm back, as bitchy as ever.  And just in time for the holidays!

Honey, you've been planning your wedding since you were a little girl.  You've thought about your dress, your bridesmaids' dresses, your shoes, your flowers and your music.  You've envisioned your entrance, your first dance, your father's speech, and your bouquet toss.  You've spent months planning seating arrangements, your centrepieces, your appetisers, your entree, and your cake.

Yet, somehow, it escaped you that you might need to serve some booze.  It's Thursday, the big day is just two fucking days away, and it's just now occurring to you that your guests might want to drink?  I'm not going to drop everything and cater to your prissy little princess tantrum.

P.S.  Korbel sucks ass.

Me:  Hi, Delenn.  I had a terrible day.  How was yours?
Kitteh:  {purrs}
Me:  {cries}
Kitteh:  {purrs louder}
Me:  {sobs}
Kitteh:  {purrs even louder}
Me:  {wipes tears on cat}
Kitteh:  {purrs louder still, head butts for kisses}
Me:  {smiles, pours another glass of bubbly}

Lady:  Do you have Kendall-Jackson?
Me:  Which one?
Lady:  The Reserve.
Me:  Which one?
Lady:  The Vintner's Reserve.
Me:  Which one?
Lady:  The one that's $9.99.
Me:  Which one?
Lady:  The red one.
Me:  Which one?
Lady:  The one in your ad.
Me:  Which one?

I'm not sure if I'm impressed or disturbed.  Possibly both.  Just read it.

Day 1:
I leave at 0-dark-30 to head to the airport through one of the worst rush hour areas in the country.  Just like last time, I pull an all-nighter, afraid to oversleep and miss the flight.  The airport is full of uniformed young men who don't look old enough to vote, much less enlist.  This makes me sad.  The gift shop is full of bobble head dolls for each of the presidential candidates.  I wonder how many of them will still be there when I get back.

The first flight is horrible.  I'm a fearless flyer, but this is turbulence unlike any I've experienced before.  We are lifted out of our seats several times as the plane drops precipitously.  I am convinced I am going to die.  Arriving in Sacramento, we fly through thick fog and more turbulence.  When we descend through the clouds, I check to make sure there is an airport under us.

Day 2:
We pick zones to unpack the 4,000 cases of wine that have arrived.  I quickly discover that the shelves have not been tagged in the proper order, but am shot down by the wine manager.  I do it my way, anyway, and hope that JJ will arrive soon.  I can't wait for Akky to arrive, as we've developed a quiet rhythm after working so many resets together.

By 7:30 a.m., we've all worked up a sweat.  They have neglected to provide us with bottled water.  I smell a mutiny brewing.

JJ arrives mid-afternoon.  I corner him about the shelf order, and he promptly fixes the situation.  We will all be doing things my way properly from now on.  I spend a few hours going around the store and fixing the rest of the aisles.  Call me OCD, but it drives me nuts when things aren't in the right place.  By now, our arms feel like jello.  At the hotel, I crawl into the hot tub and plant my spine in front of the strongest jet.

Day 3:
I'm popping pain pills like candy.  The store is in chaos--pallets are unpacked, repacked, and moved multiple times.  Another 2,000 cases are delivered, and have to be worked around yesterday's leftovers.  There is absolutely no leadership.  JJ is already threatening to go home.

I've become the go-to girl for all questions.  I'm trying to find a balance between bossy bitch and experienced educator.  Apparently, I know everything, including who to ask to score some weed.  I guess correctly.

I've honed my skills at looking busy when I'm too tired to lift anymore.  I walk around with a list on a clipboard and stare at the stacks.  It's working--someone I have never spoken to tells me I'm kicking butt and he admires my work ethic.

Day 4:
Is Vicodin a food group?  I mix it with Flexeril and Ritalin for breakfast.  I like the California labour laws, with mandatory 10 minute breaks every few hours, and 2 lunches in a 12-hour day.  Sadly, we are not getting paid California wages, which would include more OT.

Another 3,000 cases arrive.  JJ takes charge, and things go more smoothly.  I give myself small tasks, mostly nit-picking.  I feel like I'm wussing out by not lifting, but JJ is happy to have me go around and fix all the minor things that are red flags for the top brass.

Dredge reminds me of our former wine guy known as Scary Gary, the Resident Psychopath.

At the hotel, I have no decanter for my red wine, so I resort to blowing bubbles in the wine with a pink bendy straw.  Crude but relatively effective.  The Bogle Old Vine Zin is suprisingly decent, but their chard is revolting.  I pour it down the drain.

Day 5:
A welcome day off.  I head into Old Sac with 2 other loaners, and then meet up with my dear friend Julie, whom I haven't seen in 5 years.

When we get together, we describe it as "How Thelma & Louise Got Their Groove Back."

She shows me where the Governator works, takes me to a friend's house, and then we walk around Davis for hours.  We hit up Seasons for dinner, and they let me pick the wine.  By the end of the day, she's tried 2 new grapes and learned what "jammy" means.

Day 6:
Akky arrives.  I am relieved to see him, as I know he will do things exactly the way they're supposed to be done.  He is as horrified by the disorder as I am.

My roomie finally arrives.  She's much younger than I expected.  At the end of the day, she receives a slew of phone calls and learns that her husband is cheating on her.

The competition keeps sending in spies who pretend to apply for jobs.  This happens about once per hour.

Day 7:
Roomie and I are stuck in the Girl Zone, unpacking gifts and making things pretty.  I hate when this happens, even though I'm glad the cases of glasses weigh significantly less than cases of wine.

We're all exhausted.  Everyone keeps trying to score my Vicodin.  We are now working 14-hour shifts.

Day 8:
The store gets an email asking me to call my district manager.  I wonder what I've done wrong this time, and who I've pissed off.  Nervously, I call him, and am shocked to hear him say he's promoting me.  I tell JJ, and he tells everyone.

We swing by the competition.  I am no longer scared of them--their store looks like shit, their selection is pathetic, there is absolutely no customer service, and the lines at the register are very long.  They won't know what hit them once we open.

We go out to celebrate my promotion.  Not a very long celebration, as the restaurant closes at 9:30.  WTF?

Day 9:
I call the Divine Miss M to tell her of my promotion.  I don't want this to be handled the way it was when Sparky moved up.

I am now part of the secret inner circle of managers, and get to go out to dinner at Biba with all the other managers and honchos.

Day 10:
All our muscles are screaming.  We realise we are spending our days doing lunges and squats whilst holding 35 pound weights.  I have developed a rash on my forearms that shows up as soon as I arrive in the store.  It's probably from the warehouse dust on the cases that I'm carrying.

I call the Queen of Mean about my promotion.  She is genuinely pleased for me.

Day 11:
Soooo fucking frustrated.  All the platforms need to be moved again.  On the Mad-o-meter, I'm well into the "kicking puppies" zone.  We're all so pissed off that we talk about getting completely wasted after work.  Unfortunately, we're all too tired, so we just go to bed.

Day 12:
JJ, Akky, Fuzzy and I escape for a few visits in Sonoma.  We hit up Kunde, where I get some Gewurztraminer juice for the Queen Mum and a Rhône-style blend for my beloved.

Next is Artesa, where the continuously lousy weather gives us enough of a break to enjoy the spectacular panoramic view.  We lunch at the Boonfly Café, where I sip on some Étude pinot noir Rosé and nibble on a smoked salmon and goat cheese flatbread.

Day 13:
There is no fucking way we're going to have this store open in 3 days.  Prices change several times each day, and we have to go to each of the gazillion secondary locations to make sure the new prices are updated.  Dredge is annoying everyone, and excels at doing nothing.  There's a braindead Barbie doll whose main qualification appears to be her tits, which she flaunts at every given opportunity.  She spends most of her time following the guys around and watching them work, without doing anything herself.  The merchandisers are good, though, and most of the cashiers seem okay.  I watch 2 cashiers knock over someone's drink at lunch and walk away from it without cleaning it up.

The food is wearing us down.  Every morning, we get WinCo muffins.  Nearly every afternoon, we get cold cuts.  I can't remember the last time I had this much bread.  Some of the bread is moldy, and the token sushi platter is frozen.

Day 14:
We're all convinced the store will not be ready in 2 days, but we have no choice--the grand opening ad was in today's paper.  Several more rounds of price changes come down from the head office.  I print out signs for a section of chardonnay.  When I add more an hour later, some of the earlier prices have already changed.  It has basically wiped out all the progress we made yesterday, as we can't trust a single price to be accurate.  We are back to Square One, and we are royally pissed about it.

I can't take another day of cold-cuts, so I go to In-N-Out Burger for lunch.  I don't see why everyone raves about them--the burger's not that good and the fries suck.

Day 15:
The store is a shambles in the morning, but by late afternoon, it comes together.  We begin to think we might pull it off tomorrow, despite several more rounds of price changes.  It had better work, as we have been turning away over 100 customers every day.

Day 16:
Opening Day.  The assistant manager is a complete ass to the cashiers.  One of the registers is not accepting the price changes, and we have to hand out refunds.  Several of the newbies are seen walking away from customers.  Accustomed to lousy or non-existent service, most of the customers want no help.  I am assigned to the chardonnay aisle.  It's hell--everyone wants cheap, oaky butterbombs, everything I hate about chardonnay.  A woman holds up a bottle of Mondavi Special Select and asks for something even more buttery.  I am tempted to tell her to lick a stick of butter and drink some real fucking wine, but I manage to hold my tongue...barely.

A few of us pile in the Hummer and head up to see Paul Sobon after work.  His primitivo is incredible--he says it's the best wine he makes.  We hit up 2 bars.  The dude can put away some serious quantities of tequila.

Day 17:
The owner arrives.  I've never met him and manage to avoid speaking to him.  He is generally pleased, except with stupid shit we were directed (over our strenuous objections) to do by Dick, the most despised honcho in the company.  Yesterday's sales were good, and today seems even better.  We have about 10 tastings going on simultaneously.  Paul Sobon does not seem hungover.  Gary Mills of River Road and Harry Alhadeff of Apex/Bridgman are both here.  I taste Fat Tire for the first time in years.  Why everyone is clamouring for it at home is beyond me--it's absolute shit.

Day 18:
I am cornered by the owner first thing in the morning and quizzed on procedure.  I get all the answers right, and do so quickly.  Looks like I passed the test.

After work, the owner takes some of us, including me, Akky, Fuzzy and JJ, at Paul Martin's American Bistro.  My social anxiety kicks into overdrive, so I have 3 vodka tonics in the hotel to work up the courage to face dinner.  Despite being shit-faced by the end of the evening, I behave myself.  I will have one hell of a hangover for my flight home tomorrow.

Day 19:
There's no place like home.

I just flew in from Sacramento, and boy, are my arms tired!  I have craptacular cellphone pics and the usual snarky gossip for you, but you'll have to wait.  All in good time, my pretties, all in good time.

P.S.  For those of you too impatient to wait, or too ADD to read through my lengthy upcoming travel diary, here's the main highlight:  they finally promoted my bitchy ass to management.

I was supposed to leave for California tomorrow morning.  I needed to leave at 4 a.m. to get to the airport and check in.  I arranged my whole schedule this week so that I could have today off to get ready.  This scheduling resulted in fun times, like closing the store one night and being back at 6:30 the next morning to unload a truck in 15 degree weather.

I got an email from my district manager at 10:30 last night that everything has been pushed back a few days.  He thoughtfully suggested that I take a few days off to rest up for the grueling assignment.  I'm fairly certain he's more concerned with watching my OT go down than with my health and well-being, but I'm going to take him up on the offer.  Aside from a few hours Monday morning to do the triannual shelf review (checking to make sure everything has signs with the correct vintages), I'm going to be a homebody until Wednesday morning.

Actually, I'm looking forward to it.  The holiday season was as pain-inducing and exhausting as ever.  My backyard is a national park, but I haven't taken my dogs there in so long I can't even remember.  I've almost forgotten what my boyfriend looks like in daylight.  My laundry pile is about the size of my mini-SUV.  I keep screwing up my new lace knitting project because I'm too tired to pay attention.  And there's a bottle of tawny port that's been calling my name.

Tweedledum and I has closing shifts this evening.  It had been incredibly blustery all day.  He piled an immense load of broken-down boxes into a shopping cart and was heading for the dumpster when I told him the wind would probably scatter it all.  I suggested he tie it down with a bungee cord.  He grabbed the cord and tried to stretch it over the cart, staring intently at very close range.  *POW* It snapped back and popped him in the eye.

Me:  What happened?
Tweedledum:  Uhhh, it got me in the eye.  I had my face right down next to it.
Me [laughing]:  Dude, I swear, one of these days you'll get a Darwin Award.
TD:  Uhhh, that'd be kinda cool, I guess.
Me:  You do realise that you pretty much have to be dead to get a Darwin Award, don't you?
TD:  Uhhh, no, what's a Darwin Award?