Category: Personal

Now picking up speed on the way to the grave…

😉

Back in the fall, my work buddy Brian and I enrolled in the Intermediate course offered by the Wine and Spirits Education Trust, a UK-based organization that offers certificate and diploma programmes on the way to the prestigious Master of Wine designation.

Each week, for eight weeks, we swirled, sniffed, and sipped wines, taking copious (or not so copious) tasting notes. We learned about each of the major wine regions of the world, and learned a methodical process of tasting and describing what we’d tasted. At the end of the eight weeks, we wrote an exam.

Though the course is offered through the local Independent Wine Education Guild, here in Toronto, the tests had to be sent back to Jolly Old England to see if we tipsy colonists had passed muster. Today, I was proud to receive in the mail my very first wine certification, the “WSET Level 2 Intermediate Certificate in Wines, Spirits and Other Alcoholic Beverages.” The best part? Since I scored 96%, they printed “Pass with Distinction” on my certificate.

The next level, the Advanced certificate, is being offered in January, but I know it will be much tougher. It’s 14 weeks long, and the exam contains a tasting component. Though my head is now chock-full of wine knowledge, I still consider myself the owner of a wobbly set of tastebuds. I have much more tasting (and spitting, if I know what’s good for me!) ahead, so I think I’ll wait until next fall to take the next level.

Brent and Nelson, Neurotic Bachelors, January 1991

Nelson is no more. In the fall of 1990, two neurotic bachelors bought a cat to chase the bugs out of their apartment. Nelson became much like the two of us: slovenly, loyal, cranky, desperate to be loved. Yesterday, Brent told me that Nelson hadn’t been eating much in the last few days and that he was taking him to the vet. Nelson has never been to the vet, not once, so I knew this was serious. It turned out that there was some fluid and possibly tumours bloating his body, and so the decision was pretty easy. I only regret that I wasn’t there with him. His passing is more than just the loss of a friend. It feels like the passing of a whole era in my life. At my wedding two years ago, Brent even based his riotously funny speech on the concept of Nelson as our love child. The child is gone, but the love remains.

By the way, did I tell you that I’m not a “cat person”?

Congratulations to my friend Jay Kerr, whose short film “I Hung My Head” was chosen as a finalist in the 3rd Annual Stockstock Film Festival. The idea behind Stockstock is for each filmmaker to construct a short film from a common reel of stock footage. Sound and titles are the only things that can be added. It’s an exercise in creative film editing more than anything else.

Jay’s film, along with 23 others, will be screened on August 1st at the Seattle Art Museum. Bravo!