Drink Locally

I was reminded the other day, quite by happenstance, of the value of shopping locally. Parking at the local large grocery store chain on a Saturday, dreading having to go fight the madding crowd just to buy a bottle of wine for a party that evening, I happened to look across the street at the little corner store in the next shopping center. "John's* Beer & Wine," it beckoned (names have been changed to protect the innocent). Hm. Well, it could be a nice little neighborhood joint, or a totally creepy old man's haunt, but it's that or go inside Big Grocery Store with 3,000 other people and have to wait in line because I can't self-checkout alcohol (well, you can, but then you have to wait for them to come check your ID anyway, so you may as well have waited in the regular line). John's it is.

Quaint little store--and not at all creepy--with a modest but interesting selection of wines and beers. I found a respectable label I recognized and that was in my price range, and grabbed two bottles (one for the party, one for me). At the checkout, I was offered a taste of one of the samples they had available - my choice of red or white (I thought I'd heard them offer a stout beer to someone else, so I wondered why I'd been given only the wine options, but beggars can't be choosers). I opted for red, and took a sip from the plastic shot glass. Hm. Interesting. I took another sip. This is...different. Almost...bubbly. Except not. At least, not as outrightly so as, say, soda or even champagne. But still...a little bubbly. I finished it off, took my purchases, and left, pondering my taste test.

I decided to meander to video store - while I was there, I might as well see if the person sitting on the Lost, Season 6, disc 5 that I've been waiting on had returned it yet (they had not) - and the whole way there and the whole time in the store, I could not stop thinking about that wine. I was intrigued! And I was hooked. So, back to John's I went. "Um...what exactly was that stuff you gave me?" The proprietor explained that one of his smaller distributors sometimes brings in stuff he stumbles across in his travels, and this was today's featured selection. Isn't it great? Yes, actually. It's so...different. And definitely unforgettable - in a good way. I'll take a bottle! Oh, and now that I see your sign for Route 11 chips, can I have a bag of the crab-flavored ones? Awesome. No more driving 20 minutes to the other grocery store just for a bag of my favorite, awesomely-addictive chips.

I'd love to share with you what the stuff was so you could go get some for yourself, but honestly, it had a ridiculous lot of information on the bottle, and what I can only assume was the name of it was pretty long, and nothing I'd ever heard of (like a standard type of grape, for example - cabernet, shiraz, etc.). I would literally have to go get the bottle and write the whole thing down for you...and I'm just too lazy. Plus, I get the sense it might be only regionally available, which wouldn't help you. And the point of this post anyway wasn't the wine itself. It was to say, "Shop locally, at least once in awhile. You may be surprised at what you get for the extra dollar."