Spilled at the Wine Bar #1
Every week I send a free post of what I’ve seen, heard, and overheard at a little boutique wine bar in Southern California. For this first post, I pulled together some highlights from the year to date. In future, I’ll recap the best of the week, each week.
Hat tip to two others who inspired me to start Spilled at the Wine Bar:
and her Receipt from the Bookshop, and to Harrison Candeleria Fletcher. Katie is documenting a day a week in her UK bookshop. Harrison stitches together found moments and conversations to offer collages of ideas, insights.
Come along for the ride.
☕️ Keep these stories free: Click here to tip me a cup of coffee.
Spilled at the Wine Bar #1
K, a regular, sits at the head of the bar, her preferred seat, and unlike most nights, on this night she decides to talk. Haven’t seen you in awhile, I offer. I’ve been … out, she replies. Oh, anything good? No, some trouble with my work. Ah, I realize I don’t remember what you do? I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned, she says, leaving it. So I do as well. Until it’s time to settle up, two - three - Malbecs in. So, she says, I’m in the pleasure business. I get paid to make people happy. She stands, not very happy at all, bracing herself. I’m off to make people very happy, she says, trying to convince herself. I haven’t seen her since.
Speaking of the pleasure business, on a recent Monday night, a fairly anonymous looking fellow comes in. Mid-fifties, not particularly dressed for a night out. He chooses a one-sided booth, and orders … a beer. In the wine bar. (To be fair, we have craft drafts on offer for just this occasion.) My friends will be joining me soon, he says. How many? Two more. Soon enough, two twenty-five-ish girls in short, tight black cocktail dresses saunter in, holding hands. They slide into the booth, one on either side of him, and ask, What’s the most expensive wine you have? Is it the best? An hour later, after a lot of touching, and rubbing, and ooohing, and cooing, he slides out to go the bathroom, and one of the girls beckons me over. Refill? No, she says, can you tell me, where are we? Like, what city? We’re in California, right?
Something about wine plus bar equals not too many belligerent drunks. On another Monday night, a very drunk man staggers in. Only two others are at the bar, peaceful. What the fuck are they drinking, he bellows. Wine, I say. Yeah? Why the fuck aren’t they drinking beer? I want a fucking beer. Do you have any Mexy-cain beer, he sloshes out, trying to affect a cheesy Frito-Lay accent. Mexy-cain beer! I want a Mexy-cain beer, god dammit. Not tonight, I tell him. You’re not getting anything in here tonight. Move on while you can.
Nine months of the year, all but summer, we start hopping at 2:30pm on Friday afternoons. They come in groups of three, four, six, or eight. Teachers. Vice-principals. Coaches. Clerks. Once, even, a school district superintendent and his admin, working on the district wide budget. They are cheerful, relieved, but they are teachers, no question. They are precise, orderly, strictly business, even when the business is putting a couple on to wash away the wilds of another school week. They always split the check. And I always give them the Industry Discount.
1-2-6-7
I promise will start an official counter, and will post it here weekly. But for now, let me just say: In the course of a week, we must see 100 people who pop in one of our doors, looking for a bathroom. We don’t have one, thankfully – no thanks to cleaning a bar bathroom. But the funky little center we’re in has two communal unisex bathrooms shared by the customers of a half-dozen small restaurants … and people just wandering around, trying to find a bathroom. They pick our doors, because we’re open. So all afternoon, every afternoon, they poke their heads in the door, they walk in and right up to the bar, interrupting conversations and paying customers. They are, of course, in urgent need. Once more restaurants open for dinner service, they stop coming in, and we don’t miss them. I suppose these bathrooms might make George Castenza’s list, if he ever ventured West (or, South from the LA soundstages). Oh, and there’s a code to get in: 1-2-6-7.
Cute story: A young couple settles at the bar mid-day Tuesday. We sat right here, these same to seats, they say to each other, hoping I’ll hear. I do. I bite. When was it that you sat right there? Eight years ago, to the day. Our first date. And now we’re married. Bubbly on the house! Hope to see you again, but don’t wait eight years.
Wednesdays are trade-tasting days. Wine reps come in all afternoon, on 30-minute appointments, sampling us on five, six, 10 wines each. We’re looking for great values, unusual appellations, unknown grapes, family producers, surprises. But they have to taste good, not just right, but good. Sadly, in the last three weeks, we’re hearing from the reps just what we’re seeing at the bar, and at bars and restaurants all around town: Business is down, down, down. The worst of it: some wine distributors are down 20 percent in sales compared to last year.
What’s your favorite wine? I get asked at least twice a shift. Because we rotate through all of our wines in two or three weeks, I’m always good for a new answer. And of course, I have to taste everything to know what to suggest. Right now: A crisp, dry rose of Txakolina from Spain tops my list. It’s hot here – it’s hot everywhere in the Northern Hemisphere, no? – and this is a perfect cold, crisp drinker. On the red side, we have a Cru Beaujolais from Chenas that’s part of our wine club distribution for July, and it’s delightful.
Game night date night is alive! Uno. Chess. Checkers. Battleship. Two or three games with action figures I don’t recognize, but then, I’m aged out of the demographic. Wine and games, you bet. In the last week, at least one couple a night comes packing.
You can count on it, when a big group comes in, at least one of them is going to be so baked they can’t even order. I’m used to it. Their friends laugh at them, order them sparkling water, try to keep them propped upright while they enjoy their wine.
But, the business of marijuana is booming, and mj biz folks like their wine, too. One regular co-owns dispensaries and is in three days a week, downing four or five pinot noirs while jamming through calls and emails from a corner table.
One night, three women come in and announce, We’re celebrating, our friend just started her tenth business! Bubbly on the house! The business? ATM machines in the lobbies of pot dispensaries. Big business. Big. Madame Entrepreneur was so happy, and so happy with the bottle of dry Riesling I recommended for her, that she scurried behind the bar and gave me a long, tight, hello-girls-and-boys hug. Three hundred dollars later, she left a standard tip and a brown paper bag, filled with $150 pre-rolled joints … and her phone number.
Happy Daze!
Spill you next week.