Dear Mr. Estate
Historical note: This was the second letter written on a particular Christmas evening while visiting my folks on the East Coast, and… well, three rules were born because of this letter.
- It was responded to by an actual human, and I felt bad about it. This was pretty much where the “only send mail to large corporations” rule was set. It’s nastier than it should have been, but the folks at Grigch Hills showed their professionalism and responded to me in a very friendly way. The nastiness was mostly me trying to make my mom laugh, when she was in a very foul mood because of how bad this expensive bottle of wine was.
- Complaint letters are only sent by mail. While I’m sure this was a good one to get by email, imagine how much more devastating it would have been in letter form.
- No writing complaint letters while drunk. In case it’s not obvious, I was very drunk when I wrote this.
Dear Mr Estate,
I am not the most qualified person to be sending you this missive. Until tasting your "fine” product, I assumed you knew more about wine than I did. Boy, was I wrong.
Mr Estate, I do not pretend to be an expert in wine. However, I hold both a merit badge and a coveted experience rank from the BJCP which I like to pretend gives me a momentary expertise in “what shit sucks.” Mr Estate, or if I may refer to you so familiarly as to call you Grigich, what in the utter fuck is going on with your Estate 2010 Napa Valley Chardonnay.
Dude. Look there were some beautiful high notes of honey and sugared peas. There are notes of oak to make the angels sing. Then there are these massively distracting primary flavors of “honeyed diapers left in a sunny dumpster in August with optional raccoons.”
I'm pretty sure the raccoons were added.
Look I get storage conditions matter, beer's like that too, but the shitty diaper precursors shouldn't exist and what in the utter fuck is up with those decomposed tannins? Dude, this [sic] shield cost $$$ And I'd rather go hang out with the homeless and drink an MD 20/20 - that shit sucks but at least ain't pretentious and good lord they can avoid butyric precursors. What in the utter fuck are you selling as an “estate” vintage?
I know your shit burned down this year and it's a gnarly time to be getting a nastygram but for fuck's sake, I'd get something reminiscent of this from my baby nephew for free. Please get your act together, I'd expect better from my normal wine supplier, Mr. Joe (Trader to his friends).
Yours, and please stop ruining Christmas,
Alex
[Originally Published 12/25/2017]
