Friggin' Wine in a Box...

Aka, Ya get What Ya Pay For. I can't believe I did it, but.......I bought friggin' wine in a box today:

Friggin_wine_ina_box

I had an Australian Shiraz 2004 in my hand, and a nicer California cabernet in the other....and then I remembered all the bills due this week, put the bottles (with their cute bottom dimples) back on the shelf and grabbed the flat-bottomed BOX of Merlot...for $11.99. It was going to be a cholesterol healthy endeavor -- a couple of glasses of red wine in the evening instead of the vessel-constricting, mind-numbing staple, Jim Beam. As you can see, it nudged the whiskey to the side, and the real health drink, the unopened jar of tomato, juice to the back. (After this box of wine, a bottle of Stolie might bring that tomato juice back to the front.)

The whole thing started with the fact that I hate the bitch who happens to be my new supervisor, and who wrote me up today "just cuz she could." (story for another time) Did I happen to mention I hate her lousy-ass, no-people-skills-havin', first-time-in-management-and-it-shows, everything-bothers-her-delicate-little-asthmatic-allergic-to-air, forever-prattling, never-STFU-sounds-like-she-sucked-in-a-tank-of-helium-assed self? I loathe her. Why is it that the dog with the most grating voice in the kennel is the compulsive barker? It just seems to be the law of nature. Those with the least to say whose voices mimic a car desperately in need of steering fluid, are the ones who never STFU? I want to tell her that she doesn't HAVE ASTHMA....she just needs to SHUT THE FUCK UP AND BREATHE once in a while. Our Marketing Manager gets up and shuts his office door each day when he hears the clack-clack-clack of her heels on the tile, knowing what follows... "Well, I'm HEEEEEEERE, everybody." He says it's like fingernails on a chalkboard. He's dead-on.

Back to the other reason I bought wine in a box for the first time since I was eighteen and hangin' out in Earth Shoes, bell-bottoms and tie-dyeds. I'm thinking, "If I'm gonna drown my sorrows, why not choose something cholesterol-fighting?" That, and a certain man-friend of mine in Canada once said in a flippant, fliratious manner, "Is there such thing as a bad Merlot?" 

*snorts* I've got news for him.

This stuff is red, it has alcohol in it (because I'm half-baked as I write this) and if you shut one eye and snuff it in slowly, it smells vaguely of wine. The most amusing part of the friggin'-wine-ina-box story, however, is the public's reaction when I bought it.

I frequent the local supermarket on my lunch hour, and will often select a couple of nice red Aussie or New Zealand dinner wines, pulling the front bottles out and looking behind for my favorite year (2004). Sometimes I score. Proud with my purchases, nobody ever says anything about my 2 choices (of several hundred on the shelf) when I put them on the check-out belt. No big deal. I work 20 miles outside the big city in sort of a "growing rural community"....okay, a redneck town, so I wouldn't expect it. I'm surprised the store carries anything other than my friggin'-wine-ina-box. Anyway, I had my taxes filed over my lunch hour, was running over on time (which is why the heifer wrote me up) so I made a quick salad at the deli-bar, grabbed my boxed wine, and headed for the checkout. Salad in one hand, box of wine in the other. I was stopped FOUR (4) times by women wanting to talk wines. I had set the box of wine up on the salad bar long enough to walk around and make my salad and it began. "Is this your wine?" (I was ready to hide under the salad bar sooner than admit it.)  "Yes, it's mine." And then the questions started.

In line at the checkout, the cashier and the lady behind me grilled me with questions about wine..."do you think a red wine is too dry...and what's the best to serve with spaghetti...did you buy that to have with your salad?" Like I'm some kind of wine connoisseur today... To their wide-eyed, taken back expression I said,

"Beats the shit out of me; I'm a whiskey person myself, but I hear there's no such thing as a bad merlot."