Awful Cheap Awful Wines

When I was in high school there were two wines we drank: Annie Green Springs and Boone’s Farm. Both cost 98 cents a bottle, which is why we drank them. They were terrible wines.

We once tried MD 20/20, which was weird colors like orange and blue and tasted like mouthwash and was lots worse than Annie and Boone’s. Other horrible wines, such as Thunderbird (“What’s the word? THUNDERBIRD!”) we never saw since they were sold in places we did not frequent.

We also once ran across some Everclear, which we heard would burn, so we poured some out and lit it. It burned with a blue flame. When I drank a swallow, I found out exactly where my esophagus and stomach were, because they were outlined with a distinct burning sensation.

I never drank any good wine until I was 26, when I woman I was dating introduced me to some good German white wine. The difference between it and my high school escapades shocked me – just as I was shocked when I realized my mother’s percolated boiled cheap stale Folgers was not how all coffee tasted.

Annie Green Springs is no longer made, which is too bad, since it was a great name. I wish I had at least kept a bottle, although I’m sure I can find an empty bottle with a tattered label on the internet, probably for an outrageous price.

Boone’s Farm is still made, since I saw some bottles at the grocery store, on the bottom shelf, where the cheap stuff is put, because the store wants you to buy the expensive stuff they place at eye level.

The bottles I saw were $2.70 a bottle. I thought, good Lord, when you factor in inflation, if I was still in high school, this junk would probably be selling for about a quarter a bottle!

Wine a quarter a bottle!

I still can’t stand cheap wine. I couldn’t stand it in high school, although once you started drinking it, it didn’t taste so bad. These days, I still drink German white wine, which is about $8, and also mead, which is pretty expensive at $16, but mead is what the Vikings drank out of the skulls of their enemies, which is what I do. Which I why I no longer have any enemies!

Don’t get me started on cigars.