Some people seem to imagine that blog postings like these can be knocked out in a few minutes, but the truth is that mostly it takes 90 – 120 minutes to write a regular posting, select the photographs and do whatever work is necessary on them. I need much longer still for more complex subjects. The reason that some people assume I can be instantaneous in this medium is the (almost) instant publishing that twitter (where you can find me @PigottRiesling) creates and the way some other bloggers very quickly dump a pile of words. Of course, there are some bloggers ho are very fast and write well, but I’m afraid that I don’t fall into that category. And that’s the reason that this story is about LA where I was from Feb 14th thru 17th.
LA is one of the places that I can’t imagine ever living, but always fascinates me. Sure, there are stores in LA there that I love like Silverlake Wine (2395 Glendale Boulevard, or see www.silverlakewine.com) and the grocery store Cookbook Los Angeles (1549 Echo Park Avenue, or see www.cookbookla.com), but what gets me most is the ugliness of the sprawl when seen as a panorama in that unpitying sunlight, and the beauty of so many of the streets when seen close up. That’s a paradox and that’s probably why LA always gets me however hard I try to resist.
Then there’s the ocean, which in LA often seems to be far away, then suddenly there it is right in front of my eyes and in my nostrils. I’m not a conventional beach person, but these are not normal beaches, at least they are beaches which are often used in an unconventional way. That’s also fascinating, and it was a great experience to stay at a hotel right on Venice Beach last time I was in LA back in June 2013. This time I was staying with my old friends Irene Virbila and Fred Seidmann in Silver Lake and I spent a lot of time looking at Gardens. By gardens I mean not only private gardens of all sizes and shapes, but also the grand formal gardens of The Huntington in San Marino, which I’d never even heard of and I was stunned by. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera and didn’t make a serious attempt at photography with my iPhone.
Again and again in LA everything revolves around the automobile. I’d never seen a sign quite like this before, but what else did I expect in Hollywood? There (almost) everyone drives to the wine store and the need for “Wine Parking” is actually rather obvious. However, this is something quintessentially LA and not to be found here in NYC. Of course, wine connects with automobiles in other ways as the license plate below demonstrated very clearly.
TBA refers to Trockenbeerenauslese and I promise you that the owner of this vehicle is not making any empty claims with this license plate. Thankfully Peter (thanks again) didn’t open any TBA for me when I was at his house, because that would have been too much mid-afternoon. However, he did generously open the 1995 Saarburger Rausch Spätlese from Zilliken and 1997 Scharzhofberger Auslese from Egon Müller-Scharzhof, both great Rieslings from the Saar in Germany. They greatly revived me during the day I spent promoting my book in the city together with Dade & Petra Thieriot from Dee Vine Wines of San Francisco. That was a great day, but also very intense day, during which there wasn’t a break long enough to put up this story. So, hoping that it hasn’t lost any of its appeal I present it now. Thanks everyone for your patience!
