over at five plus two, this week's theme is science and i chose to portray oenology, the science and study of wine and wine making.
what's your favourite science? in high school, i loved biology except for the part where we had to dissect a frog. a live frog. with scalpels. but without gloves. i threw up just looking at the frog and the thought of actually touching it. so i gave up being leader of the group and a less smarter student cut it up. i was reduced to drawing the frog once it's body was dissected, with its heart still throbbing. needless to say, my overall grades in biology was not perfect. 95% twas all. my saving grace was my perfect explanation of how a spinach leaf gets digested, from the enzyme that's secreted in our mouth down to wherever the dregs of that one leaf ends up. imagine all those enzymes in our body with their unique functions. and i don't remember a thing of it anymore. just the damned frog. uck!
never mind that. i was going to tell you a story about my professor in oenology back in '97. i asked him what can i do with the left over italian barolo that i was keeping in my fridge. he let out a loud "aaaaahhh!! his eyes bulged, mouth wide open, we thought he was having a heart attack. then he said, "you keep the italian barolo in the fridge?" like it was the end of the world the way he said it. so i told him that it's been there for two weeks now, whereupon again he shrieked with his mouth wide open and his eyes bulging. "what sacrilege! you don't keep barolos or any other wine in the fridge!" well of course i didn't want it to turn rancid. "what ignorance!" and then he launched into some diatribes in french which most of us didn't quite understand.
in the end he said you keep the wine in a cool, dry place. you cool white wine in a bucket of ice. red wine you don't let it cool, just a tad under room temps. you never ever put it in the fridge, except for one that is made especially for cooling wine.
see things like that the teacher gets to remember you. so i didn't tell him that i knew of someone who'd put ice cubes in the wine. i was afraid he'd actually have a real heart attack.
disclosure: the background is not my photo but was grabbed from the portals of the worldwide web.
OMG I loved - still love biology - I almost failed in uni because I refused to euthanise a frog for dissection - I had to sit next to someone who had done the deed and take notes while they dissected
As for the wine - I say drink it how you enjoy it - if you're so bloody uppity that you fuss about its temperature or what glass to use you can't really enjoy it in the first place hahaha
@annied - and that was why i knew i couldn't be a doctor! or even a nurse. as for the wine, straight from the bottle is good enough for me, just don't pass it around! we are renegades, aren't we?
Thankfully we did not have to kill the frog, but the formalgahide (or however you spell that!) made you gag. I was the only student out of 90 or so who refused to touch it with my bare hands. My mother had to get me surgical gloves so that I could complete the assignment. I hated touching it- it still makes me shudder! You are looking very sophisticated there Ms. Summerfield!
The science of what?? Oenology? I thought it was Wineology! or maybe Grapeology! You look very professional tasting the wine but I expect yo didn't spit it out!
@maggiemae - i was just smelling it. then i pour it into a plastic bottle so i can keep it in the fridge and use it for cooking on the weekend. ssssh! don't tell the professor! thank you, maggiemae.
@olivetreeann - in our class there was no formaldehyde or gloves. everything was au naturel. even though i didn't touch i couldn't eat for days! thank you, ann.
sort of the baroness inspecting her cellars! Scientifically, though, what does the refrigerator do (besides nothing us plebes can even notice...)? Did the good prof explain?
Very interesting story about your experiences at schol. I never had to dissect an animal, certainly not a living one. Horror!
From your gestures and facial expressions, I conclude that you are an expert in judging wines. However I have not discovered the wine culture. But I respect this.
Seems to be a montage from two pictures?
@jerome - you are so kind, jerome. i can determine if a bottle of wine is good by tasting it, especially when all the lessons were still fresh in my mind and i could identify what variety of grape it was made from, but i am far from being an expert, not at all. what i know is just a scintilla of what the average expert knows.
and yes, this is a composite of two photos. i had put a disclosure in my fiveplustwo posting, but i obviously forgot to put the same thing here. i have now added the disclosure. thank you, jerome.
December 16th, 2016
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As for the wine - I say drink it how you enjoy it - if you're so bloody uppity that you fuss about its temperature or what glass to use you can't really enjoy it in the first place hahaha
From your gestures and facial expressions, I conclude that you are an expert in judging wines. However I have not discovered the wine culture. But I respect this.
Seems to be a montage from two pictures?
and yes, this is a composite of two photos. i had put a disclosure in my fiveplustwo posting, but i obviously forgot to put the same thing here. i have now added the disclosure. thank you, jerome.