Rick's Wines and Whines

		Wines and Whines
		Rick's Web Site

A collection of wine information, humor, opinion, and technology.

What you'll find here now:

Information related to wines. Mainly California wines, but with some slight mixture of French, Australian, and occasionally German. Sorry to say that the wine information is old. We don't drink much anymore, sorry. The stories are still good, though. I'll try to update the el-cheapo-but-tasty list, at least.
Some information about our new hometown, Cambridge, Massachusetts. And some about our previous town, Austin, Texas.
Stories about peculiar observations of Boston/Cambridge (now) and Austin (then).
Rants and raves on a number of topics. Some technology, some language, some free speech, some politics. Some of the rants are complete, some just titles. Check the list below for examples. Content soon.

Here are the sorts of things that will be here in the (near, I hope) future. All it takes is some free time.

Discussions of under-appreciated and under-utilized technology, such as fuzzy logic and neural networks.

Pointers to other interesting places in the Web. Jokes, e-zines, satellite pictures, a mixed bag.

Contents: Wines

(Sorry that the wine section is so out of date. We just don't drink enough anymore, I guess.)

		Rick's Picks Our ratings of many recent, and some old, wines. Stress on moderately priced wines affordable by mere mortal wage slaves like us. No Chateau Margaux, but no Ripple, either. Personal tastes, to be sure, but you won't have to put up with The Wine Spectator.
		Ratings from trips Our latest trip to Napa and Sonoma in June 1996; story and ratings of more than 100 new current wines from the wineries and local stores in 1997 and 1998.
¢		Good Stuff Cheap Rick's picks of recently-tasted wines. Ones you might actually want to try, especially if you're on a modest budget. All of them somewhere between Margaux and Ripple. Updated July 2003.
		Stories of Wine Tasting. Come with us as we visit some of the wine-producing areas of this country and Europe. Thrill to tales of travels to such exotic places as the Phillips 66 gas station in Vallejo, California.

Contents: Whines

			Whines: Free Speech A local hot button. The network you are on right now is part of it the solution and part of the problem. Censorship, from "politically correct speech" to book-burning, is a bad, bad, bad idea.

			Whines: Our New Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts We retired in 2011 and moved back to New England, which had been home for twenty-five years before our dozen-year experiment with Texas. We are really enjoying it. But why didn't someone warn us that being retired full-time is as busy as working full-time? There is, at least, a list of recent restaurant visits in the area here.
			Whines: Stories from A Land Without Rs We moved back here after a dozen years in Austin, Texas. In that time, things changed. Or at least our memories of things changed. Some things that used to look familiar don't anymore. Let's look at these observations before they become familiar again. Why the title? They make fun of the way we talk up heah. No one actually pahks his cah in Hahvahd Yahd, of course, but, still, things up here are not quite the same as what passes for normal in Texas. A few essays on what is surprisingly different. Like The Tales of Texas (see below), but for a different locale.

			Whines: Our Old Location, Austin, Texas We moved to Austin in 2000 and lived there for almost a dozen years. We went there originally to have a little adventure with a new environment. Austin is certainly the only place in Texas that is the least bit survivable. The results: nice place, but not for us.

			Whines: The Tales of Texas Moving here was a bit of a culture shock. Some things were really unfamiliar and might be interesting to others who have not yet suffered this culture shock. There are more than fifty (very short) chapters so far in this trek.

			Whines: Travels Occasionally we get out of the house and even out of town. Some pix from several recent travels are here. Take a look.

			Whines: Movies, Movies, Movies! You like movies? I do. We do. And we've seen a lot of them. And movies are always fun to pontificate about. Well, here's my list of movies that one really ought to see to understand the breadth of the movie experience. Classics and moderns, comedies and dramas, crimes, spies, blow-em-ups, all are welcome here. There are several hundred listed here, lots to choose from on a rainy day. They're broken up into categories: really good, good, fun to see, and really terrible. Search the movie database See the whole movie database

			Whines: Space Pictures and Pointers Satellite images of earth, and other space pictures. Some here, collected from JPL, NASA, SPOT, Landsat, SIR, et al. Pointers to places in the Web where such pictures live.

			Whines: Technology Pointers to, and some local versions of, information about some technologies that Rick finds useful and underutilized, particularly Neural Networks and Fuzzy Logic

			Whines: Spellos, not Typos A guide to common spelling errors that aren't unintentional slips of the finger but misunderstandings of usage. You see them everywhere, from the grocery store to the newspaper. For technical and non-technical readers alike.

			Whines: My Brother's Cool Book! (And why aren't you reading it?) Living with Wild Orchids in Sumatra ! My brother Dave has written a book, Living with Wild Orchids in Sumatra, about his experiences in the lowland and mountain jungles in the tropics, when he was an oil geologist there some years ago. Fascinating reading. If you are interested in orchids at all, you at least have to read the web page here.

			Whines: Contrarian Reconsiderations of Alternative Proposals (C.R.A.P.) Tired, old ideas turned on their heads and evaluated from Rick's typically twisted perspective.

	$WTF?		Whines: What Happened to Our Money in 2008? A short paper on many of the things that went wrong in the economy to cause the financial meltdown of 2008. There was not a single cause, nor even a small number of them. And, oh, by the way, most of the problems are still with us and are still dangerous.

			Whines: The Doctor's Best Definition of "Cure:" Whatever Kills You Won't Be This. Journal of a time spent with cancer, oops. A hopeful story. Many of us survive these days, millions. If we are unlucky enough to fall into this pit, may we all be so lucky to come out of it healthy.

Comments and flames to the author. "Why use rational argument when there's a flame-thrower handy?" Hey, go ahead. I didn't exactly leave the gloves on when I wrote this. webmaster@ricksoft.com

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Wines and Whines

Rick's Web Site

Contents: Wines

Rick's Picks

Ratings from trips

Good Stuff Cheap

Stories of Wine Tasting.

Contents: Whines

Whines: Free Speech

Whines: Our New Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts

Whines: Stories from A Land Without Rs

Whines: Our Old Location, Austin, Texas

Whines: The Tales of Texas

Whines: Travels

Whines: Movies, Movies, Movies!

Whines: Space Pictures and Pointers

Whines: Technology

Whines: Spellos, not Typos

Whines: My Brother's Cool Book! (And why aren't you reading it?) Living with Wild Orchids in Sumatra !

Whines: Contrarian Reconsiderations of Alternative Proposals (C.R.A.P.)

Whines: What Happened to Our Money in 2008?

Whines: The Doctor's Best Definition of "Cure:" Whatever Kills You Won't Be This.

Whines: My Brother's Cool Book! (And why aren't you reading it?)
Living with Wild Orchids in Sumatra !