ELV note: Fine wine times in restaurants are easier than you think. Just follow these easy rules and tasty tips:

1. In a French restaurant, always ask the sommelier about the brix at harvest of any wine you’re considering. In a German restaurant, always inquire about indigenous yeasts, and in an Italian restaurant, always ask when the pasta is being served.
2. If you’re tasting with a bunch of Riesling lovers, always mumble from the first sip that you prefer chardonnay. If you’re with some chard bards, always mention that you’re a Riesling fan. This will allow you to enjoy your glass in peace.
3. Never order wine from a Southern Hemisphere country. Wines from these countries are made by dark-skinned, fun-loving, unreliable folks. Avoid northern hemisphere wines as well — especially when made by tall, surly, efficient, pasty-faced persons. The best wines are made by slightly swarthy, temperate-complected people. NO ONE DENIES THIS!
4. When swirling your wine in your glass, never swirl in a counter-clockwise direction. Doing this will fool your wine into thinking it was made in Australia.
5. Beware of any wine steward with a funny name or accent. 90% of the time these are phony affectations used to intimidate you into ordering something you can’t afford…or to get you to sleep with them.
6. Always ask a female sommelier why she isn’t home raising children. This will immediately win her trust and might result in her letting you have a sip from her spit bucket.
7. Las Vegas wine lists are notoriously expensive. The best way to find a bargain on a Las Vegas wine list is to start weeping uncontrollably as you look at it.
8. When some pretentious asshat starts insisting upon ordering all the wine at your table, always be sure and ask him what law or medical school he attended.
9. Always be sure, when tasting a sauvignon blanc, to mention that it smells like cat pee. Then reach into your pocket and produce a clump of your kitty’s litter to prove it.
10. When on a first date, always order the second cheapest wine in the house. If she starts to rub your crotch after that bottle, keep moving down the list until she’s under the table.
11. Never forget that the quality of the wine is inversely proportional to the ferocity of the animal on the label.
12. Distinctly fruity overtones with an overbearing nose are the marks of a good sommelier.’
13.  Proper stemware is essential; always rinse that Bud Lite foam off the insides of your glass before filling it with a classified growth Bordeaux.
14. When in doubt, always say something negative after your first sip. “Sassy yet impertinent” is a phrase that has always worked for me.
15. When perusing a wine list, always hand it to the guy at the table who makes more money than you and exclaim (while pointing to a name), “I had the ‘o4 but found it a bit sassy yet impertinent. Why don’t you decide?” Then, always be in the bathroom when the bill comes.
16. Complaining loudly about the obscene markups on restaurant wine lists always works. Try it sometime.
17. Cheap pinot grigio is a wine to be embraced in all its forms. Without pinot grigio, how would secretaries and housewives get drunk?
18. Sommeliers love to cross swords with customers about wine knowledge, especially on Saturday night when their restaurant is full. Regaling them with a fifteen minute story about the time you got hammered after hitting four tasting rooms in two hours in Los Olivos — while they uncork that $30 bottle of pinot noir you just ordered —  usually makes their night. Try it sometime.
19. The next time someone at your table can’t stop talking about what private wine mailing lists he is on, always be sure and ask him what law or medical school he went to.
20. Women don’t know much about wine and love having it mansplained to them. Nothing gets a girl’s panties wetter than listening to you talk about the brix at harvest, indigenous yeasts, and how that sassy-yet-impertinent ‘o4 didn’t quite measure up to the ’97.
21. Based upon medical evidence that’s yet to be discovered, scientists know it is impossible to become an alcoholic on expensive wine. Have you ever seen a bum nursing a bottle of ’47 Cheval Blanc?  A ’90 Domaine de la Romanée-Conti? CASE RESTED.

You’re welcome.