When you get serious about wine, humorous elements popping up on the edges of its universe can seem absurd. By serious, I don’t mean snobby seriousness, but instead serious appreciation. Take this weekend for example. Sixteen of us blind tasted these 2008 Brovia Barolos.
They are all beautiful, significant, complex, educational, mysterious beings that make you sit up straight in your chair and take stock. It is not a stretch to imagine being “overcome” by a commanding elegance that handcuffs your focus; a bit like falling in rapturous love. That’s serious, right?
Several days later, this headline and lead appears in Wired (click the headline and read the full article, you will laugh) :
“Scottish health officials are banking on an Android app and the human tendency toward vanity to help reduce the incidence of alcohol-related illnesses and deaths among Scottish women. On Tuesday the office of the Scottish health secretary launched a free Android app, called Drinking Mirror, which shows women just how much older they’ll look in 10 years if they toss back 10 glasses of wine per week“
Evidently, women are dying from wine in Scotland. Not men, women. The Scottish government has decided that men can tolerate larger doses of wine and still sidestep early death or premature aging. The app that the government has backed asks women how much wine they drink, and then adjusts a picture of their faces to unveil a rapid and ugly transformation if wine consumption levels remain steady. Men are fine, but women will get ugly and then die from drinking an extra glass of wine.
Maybe if I, a man, bathed daily in Brovia Barolo, the app could detect some potential for rapid aging and early death? It would make for a very serious death, and free me forever from the absurd edges of a wine universe. Not a bad way to go out, for sure.