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Health Updates

I am taking megadoses of ritalin to try to find some energy.

Back on steroids to stabilize the brain.

Only two more scheduled treatments of Avastin, which is causing me great fatigue. Then an MRI and maybe I can get off Avastin.

Still stuck at home, although working through e-mail and the phone.

Walked my dog Zaggy today. Fell on a curb on 56th Street, went sprawling and badly hurt myself. Four guys on the street helped me recover and get up. I then fell in my apartment. Zaggy came up to me on the floor and started licking me.

Changed my distributor in Washington State today. Very hard to do.

All this leads me to the obvious question: who appointed Alice Feiring to be the spokesperson for natural wine? She is being very hostile.

Which leads me to the next obvious question: why do Jenny & Francois make believe they own the idea of natural wine? I respect them as honest competitors when they act honestly. I do not respect them when they pretend they own natural wine as a category. If they want to have a Jenny & Francois Natural Wine Tasting Week, I'm all for it. If they want to have seven years of The Natural Wine Week as if it is something they own and exclusively represent than they are being disrespectful of their colleagues and the scores of natural winemakers they do not represent.

We just had 38 vignerons in America with us. In the past we called this annual tour something like The Louis/Dressner Real Wine Assault. This year we called it:

From Cairo thru the Middle East thru LA to San Francisco Thru North Carolina Thru New York and then Chicago!

Freedom Wines and Freedom Vignerons Advancing Against Industrial Tyrants

Zaggy agrees with me about this even if Alice Feiring does not.

The wines and winemakers speak for themselves. They don't need fake posturing.

- Joe Dressner 4-6-2011 11:46pm

Ambition and impatience can blind the well meaning.

posted by nedhoey 4-12-2011 1:19am

yes

''The wines and winemakers speak for themselves. They don't need fake posturing.''
True
Thank you

posted by La mystérieuse 6-6-2011 12:16am

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Joe Dressner - Captain Tumor Man!

Hi, I'm Joe Dressner the famous wine importer and I have brain cancer!

I already have a wine blog and frankly wine is such a luxury business that I hate to mix my cancer problems with my wine observations. I think it would be a general downer for the lifestyle crowd out there.

Furthermore, we in the wine trade always claim there are tremendous health benefits to drinking wine. I've already had cardiovascular bypass surgery over eight years ago and now I got a tumor aggressively rattling in my brain. My colleagues in the glamorous wine industry want me to keep it quiet.

So, I've started this wonderful new blog to discuss wine, brain tumors, my life and to give you hot tips on handling the cancer stricken around you. There will also be practical wine/radiation pairings when I start radiation therapy and chemotherapy next week.

Having brain cancer means I might both physically and intellectually decline. So, I will be using this blog as a venue to pursue petty vendettas against relatives, acquaintances and people in the wine trade.

I might also lose touch with reality and say things that are not true or are only half true. The important thing is to have fun and enjoy this rare and precious time in my life.

One of my pet vendettas is my cousin Dr. Barbara Hirsch. Dr. Barbara Hirsch is a very important Great Neck Endocrinologist, who was raised and nurtured by my parents. Dr. Hirsch waited until my father was near death and my mother was suffering from a rare neuromuscular disorder, to write them a seven page letter denouncing them for being horrible to her for the entirety of her life! Despite my concerns, Dr. Hirsch still refuses to apologize.

Last night, I drank a beautiful bottle of Bourgueil Clos Sénéchal 2005 from Pierre Breton. It was sublime and reminded me that I used to be healthy. Not only that, the vineyard used to be there before I existed. It exists independently of my having cancer and will continue to exist. You ought to buy some.

August 2009 Postscript: Not only does it exist independently of my cancer, it also exists independently of Louis/Dressner Selections. After 18 years, they have dumped us for Kermit Lynch. Oh well. At least I'm alive!