I hate crowds, don't like enclosed spaces, but worse than either of those, I am terrified of... the flu.
So how I agreed to attend a wine tasting in a dark, windowless "salon" two floors underground with 1,499 potentially contagious other people at what I am now hoping was the height of hysteria a few weeks ago, is beyond me.
Hundreds of growers who had not only traveled from France potentially harboring their own strain of "le flu," but had intermingled just days, even hours before with thousands of others at preceding events, fatigued, and practicing risky greeting behavior, spreading germs with every handshake, hug, and god forbid, kisskiss. Improperly sanitized glassware in an enormous hotel hosting simultaneous events competing for resources. Glasses, water bottles, cheese, sitting out on tables inviting airborne germs to settle on their surfaces. Running into someone I sort of knew and, ohmigod, having to talk to them.
"I'm not really a 'Bordeaux girl' so maybe I'll just pass..."
I ended up going. I pulled a wine glass from the very back of a fresh rack of steaming glasses that had come out right when we signed in. I clutched it to my chest the whole time, and kept it covered with a cocktail napkin. I stood off to the side for a large part of the event, seemingly deep in thoughtful mental tasting notes with my nose in the glass, but really just using the glass as a surgical mask over my face. When running into people, or being introduced to them, I gripped the wine glass in one hand, and awkwardly-on-purpose held two water bottles in the other, smiling with the display and an apologetic "hands full, can't shake your hand."
Moulin de Tricot was not a grower who showed at the Bordeaux tasting. However, the label's perfect polish pairing with coppery OPI 'Clubbing til Sunrise' seems appropriate in light of this season's (i.e. "my") flumania.
If you cannot get out of a situation in which you might have to shake hands with strangers, do this beforehand: paint your nails in a very bright copper color with an ultra high-gloss "wet look" topcoat. When anyone reaches in for a handshake recoil in horror, start blowing on your nails, and scream "My nails aren't dry yet!"
thyme (sarah) says
Great fun to read this so early in the morning! I feel a strong urge to go and disinfect my keyboard...right now. Unfortunately, it got us here (TX). My BIL came in the door with a raging temperature and sneezing EVERYWHERE (day before Xmas). I was the host and was seething inside as I watched all of us fall in the next couple of days. Good for you...and your wonderful sense of humor! Oh, but, hey...did you hear about the next epidemic...the stomach virus going around. Shudders....we no longer accept guests at our house. rileymadel.blogspot.com
Jessica says
Love your post. I agree that wine can be the best medicine. Nice nails!
bombdiggity says
During the hellidays, I saw a Twilight Zone where a group of neighbors are having a convivial bday dinner party complete with a singing of "he's a jolly good fellow" when - ya huh - nuclear war is announced ike it should be, over coffee and cake. The dinner host is the only one who planned ahead and friggin built a damn bomb shelter for him, his wife and his kid. 3 person occupancy. What a selfish b.
Well, his neighbors are not about to let him enjoy continuing to live while they get incinerated so they pretty much go nuts and ram his bomb shelter door open, making it vulnerable to radiation intrusion and yeah, death by gamma ray. So imagine their shame and chagrin when the nuclear war announcement was in error. This is my way of saying a wine glass held over your schoz is no substitute for a thick application of vaseline in your nostrils & a bomb shelter that you shouldn't tell your neighbors about. Except me. Because I will keep everyone else out. Happy Halloween!