LMNOPinot.

I ain’t what you might call “high-class.” I didn’t go to the right schools. I don’t hobnob with the cultural elites. I don’t dress in the finest clothes, or vacation in exclusive retreats, or go through more than a bar and a half of soap in a year.

So maybe I don’t fit in at the ballet. Maybe I’m a little too loud for the country club. Maybe the only time anyone uses the term “upper crust” in a conversation about me, it’s an uncomplimentary reference to the infrequency with which I launder my shirts.

Still, ain’t I a man? Ain’t I got taste buds? Don’t this schnozz take in a wine’s bouquet? Can’t my palate discriminate? You bet your dimpled booty I am, I do, it does and it can.

Fate made me who I am, though, and filled my pockets more with grit and lint than fat wads of green. So I have to keep an eye out for opportunities to appreciate those few finer things that’re within my reach. Economically, I mean. (And also physically, as I sustained a philanderin’ injury in my youth that left me unable to lift my arms above my head ever since.) My low-cash-flow situation has made me a connoisseur of life’s lower-cost delights. I know when the discount days are at the local museums, what hillsides offer a free view of the drive-in movie screen, and which rest stop men’s rooms are best-stocked with T.P.

But the most special treat for me is also the rarest: Seein’ a fair price on a top shelf Pinot. As long as it’s not literally on the top shelf, or I need someone to help me get it down.

Ah, Tudor wines! Steeped in tradition! Winner of awards and accolades! I love your Nacina Santa Lucia Highlands Pinot, rich with dense, expressive dark berry, spice, toasty oak and cinnamon notes.

It’s not every day wines of this quality drift by me in the drainage ditch of life. When it happens, I grab them fast, like a cobra would. Or like a cobra would if it had hands. And liked wine. Man, when I think of what rich men sometimes pay for lesser wines than these, it makes me want to laugh, loud and hearty at the capriciousness of circumstance!

And then to burglarize their homes.

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