dumb pérignon

Everyone says that the whole experience -- where you are, who you're with, etc. -- really influences whether or not you'll enjoy a wine. (Which is why when you're wine-tasting, you end up buying things that don't seem to taste as good when you open them at home vs. in a fancy tasting room with all of your friends and a winery employee who's doting on you and telling you all about every flavor and nuance in the wine.)

So let's take a look at last night, The Night of My First Dom Pérignon. I was hanging out at a typical Marina bar with the girls and our teacher from our pole-dancing class. We had just completed Level 5 and received our graduation G-strings. We were by far the most underdressed people at the bar -- we were in sweats/jeans and sweatshirts/hoodies, faces sans makeup. Meanwhile, all the other girls there looked like they had just gone shopping in L.A. and had gotten their hair professionally blown out an hour earlier. (Side note: Marina people boggle my mind. How do people look like this all the time?)

And in addition to this clothing disparity, I pulled my hamstring doing the splits in class last night, so I had an ice pack strapped to my leg with -- you guessed it -- the graduation G-string.

Hot.

So there we were: Seven ladies, not caring what we looked like, just happy to have some time to hang out and celebrate our ability to climb a pole, flip upside down and slide down it head-first. (Trust me, there is something truly empowering about knowing you have the upper-body strength to do this.) We were chattering away, when suddenly, a random guy from the table next to us announced that he thought we were intimidating but he wanted to buy us a bottle of Dom Pérignon.

How can you turn down a $400 bottle of wine? I don't think I've even been in the same room with this stuff before.

So he ordered it -- a 1995 Dom Rosé, which reminded me of French toast covered in berries. It was perfectly balanced and delicious.

But then we started talking to the guy, only to discover that he was from La Cañada, which is where I went to high school. And he actually went to the Catholic boys school that was our brother school -- I was on their homecoming court way back in the day in 1996. (And remember: I hated high school largely because of the people I went to school with. All rich and annoying, kind of like the Marina.)

And upon further discussion, we discovered he was the oldest son from "Home Improvement." And he made sure to tell us he now works in production for Ashton Kutcher's show "Punk'd." (The guy also kept flashing his credit cards and dropping names. Did I mention the word "annoying"?)

And then we found out that he and his friends thought we were some kind of lesbian feminist book club/discussion group.

(Side note: Are straight women not allowed to be smart and have heated discussions? Are we also not allowed out of the house unless we look like we are going to a photoshoot?)

So now, alas, I will forever associate the Dom Pérignon 1995 Rosé with stupid, stupid boys.

graduation

Best way to celebrate a secular holiday and the satisfaction of obtaining your Level 1 graduation g-string: A glass of Albariño paired with sea bass (topped with a sun-dried tomato tapenade and served over garbanzo beans).

Jenn and I went to Terzo last night after class to exchange gifts. We were the last table -- scurried in just after 10 p.m. (and giggling, of course, when our server asked us where we had just come from). All the tables had been cleared off, and the staff was already settling in at the bar and opening bottles of bubbly and other goodies (I assumed it was an educational tasting because they had flights going -- I love that drinking is "educational"). We tried to put in our order as fast as we could so the kitchen could close up. (I waited tables for two years, and there's nothing worse than the party that comes in at the very end of the night and lingers until midnight and totally ignores the fact that no one else is in the restaurant.)

The food was good. The wine was crisp and dry and reminded me of apples. And our server felt bad about rushing us, so he kept refilling our glasses, "on the house." Cheers to that!

a toast

Here's to Mz. Nancy for providing hope.

To the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld.

To Brian and Jessa for sharing some pizza and Merlot and not complaining about sitting on the floor of a very messy apartment with a hostess in smelly gym clothes and a cat that insisted on sprawling across the pizza box.

To the Monday night workout.

To the drivers on 121 who actually drive the speed limit instead of crawling along at 10 miles below while a huge line of cars piles up behind them.

To Jancis Robinson for being the anti-Parker.

To the whole wheat British muffins I eat every morning for breakfast with butter and Parmesan cheese.

To rediscovering raunchy Nine Inch Nails songs.

And to the news that yes, at last, he is finally coming home.

got any ones?

So my job has it perks: good wine, good food, good people who also love good wine and good food. But it definitely has its shortcomings: long commute spent sitting in the car, long hours spent sitting at a desk, very little physical activity. And as a result, over the past year, I've developed what I call a wine baby (a.k.a. pooch, pot belly, spare tire, etc.).

A few months ago, I decided the wine baby must go. Hence, much time spent at the gym (I love my spinning class) and the Pilates studio (addicted to the reformer), plus a little running and some yoga, too.

And tonight, I added stripping to my regimen. That's right: I'm learning how to pole-dance. So far, I feel extremely self-conscious and very un-sexy, but it's fun, and I'm going to be sore tomorrow. And I think the wine baby is in some serious trouble.

Which is good since I immediately came home and finished making the pumpkin ice cream I started preparing yesterday. And I plan to indulge in said pumpkin ice cream at a Halloween party tomorrow night. This girl isn't holding back -- if I'm going to be working out this damn much, I'm going to need some calories to burn off, right?