Coming out to say hi! I must admit, the man with the NY Times ad stuck to the cactus, heâ??s my father. He was kind enough to send us a case and a half of wine and hook us in Wine Library TV!

Favorite Teacher of All TIME!!!

Gary,

I had this prof. in college. When he was lecturing, you could hear him from across the building. He was so animated and excited about what he was teaching that he would just draw you in and every time he came to a conclusion and told us the punch line of 45 minutes of lecturing he would scream and just ask us if we thought it was as incredible a thing as he thought it was. I took every class he offered and studied under him for my PhD. He was by far my favorite and most influential teacher of all time and the reason behind me one day becoming a teacher. I want to do to children what he did for me, make me want to learn more.

Oh, his name was Prof. Richard Bopp at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and I studied Aqueous Geochemistry with him.

Great, great show. Being a member of the Oregon Pinot Noir Club (OPNC) I can appreciate these wines and your scores. And yes, the Willamette Valley is a great place to visit.

Tried Domaine Serene?

QOD: sorry I’m late on this one. My favorite teacher of all time is my high school Japenese teacher Mrs. Watlington, because she was so elegant and profound in influecing a strong passion for the japanese language and culture into me at a young age, and made me so excited to learn, do homework, speak and write this wonderful language I have always admired. She had a way of speaking and communicating that got through to me more than any other teacher and she helpmed to want to achieve the greatest things. I had her from fall 1996 to spring 1998 and then again fall 1999 to spring 2000, so it was a lot of time with one teacher. My 2nd favorite and its a close 2nd is my Renaissance to Modern Art (history) Professor from my senior year of college just a year and a half ago, I think she was Russian or Chech, but we shared the same passion for the wonders and beauty of the greatest paintings and sculpture of the last 700 years that made each class so pleasurable and a delight. She was so enthusiastic and had the greatest descriptions and ideas about each work of art we studied that excited me so much and influenced the way I think and admire. Talking about all this wants me to go back and study some Japanese and Art History, great question Gary.

Don’t have a favorite teacher per se, but I have to consider my mother and father as my personal favorites since they taught me much about how to live, and besided both were teachers by trade!

Just did a local double blind pinot tasting with 4 wines in each of 3 flights.

2 Burgs Mortet and Dujac of different vintages and vineyards
2 Calif Dehlinger and Dain different vintages and vineyards.

People should try this, it really helps a person get to know what they really like.

Yo GV,

Favorite teacher: Hands down, Mr. Atlas, 10th grade geometry, 12th grade calculus and all four years musical director at Concord-Carlisle HS in Mass.

BTW, love the new sign-off you’ve incorporated the last couple of shows. I think you’ve finally got one that sums up you & your Vaniacs raison d’être!

Gary-

Tonight was the first night I caught your program. I loved it! My wife and I moved from Salt Lake City to Portland last year mostly because of Oregon’s amazing Pinot Noir. I was disapointed that you didn’t have Sokol Blosser or DDO–Domaine Drouhin Oregon (one of my favorites…marijunia, or packing tape, nose). Anyhow, the show was great. If you ever make it to Portland, make sure to visit Oregon Wines on Broadway. They have the best selection of Oregon wines in the world…and the gals are amazing!

QOD: My favorite teacher? That’s a tough one. There were so many. I guess I would have to go with Mr, Jack Bruening at Lake Catholic High School in Mentor, OH. He taught me in 10th and 11th grade and I took Latin I and II from him. (I know, Latin – ugh!) He was very cool in a weird way. Besides just teaching, he had these extra credit games he would do. In Latin I, we had “wrestling matches” where he gave everyone a wrestling name (I was “Yanos Vlatok, the Vampire”). Each day there would be several matches where he would announce who was in the match, and the two “wrestlers” would get a Latin question, and whoever answered it first would win the wrestling match. Whoever had the most points at the end of the quarter got an automatic “A” regardless of how he or she did on the tests. Also, he collected comic books and invented his own language. He was a really neat guy.

If you’ve been a fan of Oregon Pinot Noir for so many years, you should know by now how to properly pronounce the name of the state. It’s not “ora-gone”, it’s “ory-gun”. And you never used the name of the Willamette Valley, so I don’t know whether you know that it is pronounced “will-LAM-it” rather than “willa-MET”.
As a native Oregonian transplanted to central New Jersey many years ago, I’ve become kind of on a one-man campaign for proper pronunciations of Oregon place names.

My Best teacher well I have two Mrs. Faulkner my third grade math teacher who told although I had some trouble with the language because of my skills I would do all right, and my high school social sciences teacher Dr. Ernesto Travieso Jesuit priest who taught me all the REALLY important things about life. That being said my next best teacher has been YOU since when I first joined WLTV I knew nearly nothing about wines and now when at parties I don’t sound like a total nerd when people talk about wines. Thank you Gary.

Gary just saw this episode, in fact just found your website and am bitten big time by your show! Especially when you passed on the ’05 Rex Hill. I live 15 miles form the winery and love Oregon Pinot and the ’04 Rex Hill was great. The ’05 Willamette Vally was a huge disappointment to me and when I saw you go to taste it I was hooked on your opinion when you hated it!

NOw I’m going through all the old episodes and you crack me up! Funny but serious as a heart attack when giving your opinion. YOu are going to be huge!

Oregon Jim

willamette valley and santa lucia pinot noir are the goods.

QOTD1:Dusty, like when I was hiking in the desert as a youngster and started down a big sand dune and fell and rolled down the hill and got a mouth full of dirt. A 97 M. Chapoutier Hermitage. Weird eh?

QOTD2:Coen Dexter, High School chemistry teacher that i now get to sell wine to every once in a while. He was the teacher that everyone would listen to because he was captivating, intelligent and a good teacher.

Had to comment just to give him acknowledgement.
Catching up is getting tougher now that I am watching the new episodes and am in the forum. Catching up is like eating a steak that tastes so good that even if you are full, you keep eating.
It takes a while but is worth every bite!

Is this the first big ass glass episode?

QOTD: My favorite teacher of all is Mr. Brad Martin. He officially taught me in 5th grade, but he’s never stopped teaching me. Now retired, he lives on a beautiful farm in a house he designed with his wife (incidentally my 3rd and 6th-grade teacher), in El Dorado, CA. Every time I go to visit him, life slows down, and I learn something new.

Thank you so much for your honest and, ultimately to me anyway, solicitous review of the Evesham Wood Seven Springs. I had the pleasure of working with Russ Raney during the 2008 vintage, and it was eye opening. He’s like a mad scientist with a deep respect for the fruit. And he’s not afraid to let the vintage rule his decisions, scores be damned. And, in my humble opinion, he is one of the only winemakers in the US to let terroir, not only come through, but to define each vintage. Also, his qpr is almost unbelievable. Again, thank you. This guy, to me, is one of the few grand cru wines of the US.

Steven Tweddell

qotd: Mr. Fleming 11th grade english. Always kept things fun. Only teacher I ever saw climb up inside the ceiling tiles to the adjacent classroom and squirt another teacher with a water gun. This was while that teacher was in the middle of teaching class.
Gary, good episode, glad to hear you want comments because I want to see a vin jaune episode. Watching you do a tasting on the different charbono’s out there would be fun also.

I havec to mention two two teachers. First Miss Komitsky who took me from not being able to read to a voracious reader and Mr. Mossberg 5th grade who showed me learning could be fun. Love your show keep it up. I’m sure you wont’ read this entry but still.

Gery!!
I can't believe you are drinking these fruit bomb Pinots in this epp. Eyrie Vineyards as you know founded in 1966 is the Chateauneaf du Pape drinkers pino. I know you are aware of them but suprised you have not reviewed them. I am drinking one now for the forst time and its not the old vine AND its the crappy '07 vintage but it still rocks.
Duuuuuuuuude!!
You must amend this SERIOUS lapse in Pino Noir reviews.

Have had the King Estate and Evesham (good stuff) before. QOTD-have had some great teachers during my 200+ college credits..but too many years ago to remember names. http://www.winelx.com

Had a 2005 chante-perdrix, Cornas from Delas and it tasted exactly like olive juice, now I love a hint of black olives in my northern rhone reds but this was way over the top