I can’t believe it’s that time of year again! No, I don’t mean the 4th of July or even the 6th of July, it’s primary election season. That time honored tradition of non stop “vote for me” commercials. Since Trixie and I travel so much, we never know if we will be home for the big event so once again we sent away for absentee ballots. After looking over all of the candidates and issues we both stare at the ballot and wonder where do we select None of the above? This year seems to be more confusing than ever. Do we want the bad candidate or the worse candidate?
Not knowing who to vote for we decide to visit our local wine store! You might ask how does a wine store help you decide which candidate to select? I have no idea but it seems like a good place to start. We stroll down the aisles and think, OK we have hundreds of wine choices here and we never have a problem selecting a good bottle. Yes sometimes we screw up and select a bad bottle but that is how we learn. And sometimes a bottle we did not select just falls into our cart.
Although we are still confused about who to vote for, we see a clue located down the aisle to the left. A bottle of Rock, Paper, Scissors! This 2004 Merlot from Roshambo Winery just gave us an idea. We’ll use the time honored tradition of making a fist for the rock, holding our hand and fingers straight out for paper and making a peace sign with our fingers to represent scissors. Trixie and I will each pick a candidate and use this highly scientific process to narrow the field down to that one lucky person that we vote for. This could actually work!
We realize other people use the more traditional methods of voting such as paper ballots, secret ballots, electronic ballots and….. caucuses - which no one understands! I think Rock, Paper, Scissors is a perfect solution for a flawless election process. It is easy to understand, uses simple rules and there are no hanging or dimpled chads - who is Chad anyway?
Before we try this new voting process, we needed to test it first and make sure it is fair. For our first test, we played Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who gets to pop the cork of our new bottle and pour the first glass. By making a rock with my fist, I broke Trixie’s scissors that she made with her fingers! Victory! I won this contest fair and square so I get to pop the cork! (Trixie says she let me win) The excitement of my victory in this first Rock, Paper, Scissors election was almost overwhelming. I eagerly picked up the bottle and was ready for my victory cork popping but then I saw it was corkless. It has a screw cap instead. Oh no, we had a fair contest and I won but due to the technicality of a screw cap, I am going to be denied my victory cork popping.
Oh well, after conceding defeat, one quick twist of the cap and our bottle of 2004 Merlot was easily opened. I still got to pour the first glass - a small moral victory! Naomi Brilliant and Co. at Roshambo Winery of Healdsburg, CA have a great philosophy about their wine. On the back label of the bottle are the following instructions:
Wine for the people! Don’t over intellectualize it. Enjoy! Pour, drink, repeat!
Sounds like good advice for election night. This gang seems to have the same quirky attitude that Trixie and I have with Vintage Tuesday. A quote from their website says:
“Fine wine was too stuffy and needed to be slapped off its pedestal”
The 2004 Merlot had a wonderful color and had a great aroma (”nose” for the wine snobs) of fruit and berries. It is a wine that has good character - a requirement during an election. If you are looking for a reasonably priced wine with an attitude, we elect this one as the winner. After several rounds of Rock, Paper, Scissors (both the wine and our candidate selection process) we felt we had honorably performed our civic duty. Our absentee ballots are now ready to go. We can’t wait until November when we can do this again!
Cheers and Vote for Me!
Angus
