Like many bloggers or other new media junkies, I’m just a little obsessed with checking at my stats counter. Looking at the terms and phrases people use to navigate the internet can be enlightening, entertaining and, well, rather creepy. Below, a snapshot of yesterday’s and today’s (thus far) searches that brought people here.

Oh, internet. You’re so special.

>>

These are terms people used to find your blog.

Today

Yesterday

A friend forwarded me this email, which might just be the work of Nigerian email scammers. Evidently the turmoil in the financial world — and perhaps an increased awareness of both personal finances and email scams — has forced the scammers into a new game. Either that, or this whole wine fraud thing is really getting out of hand.

Wow, who knew the international wine trade could be so much fun?

And remember, kids: Be careful when playing with the internet. Watch those credit card numbers. And POS machines (for routing purposes?).

God bless him…

> From: Tim Mccarron
> Date: October 2, 2009 5:36:05 PM PDT
> Subject: Wine Booking.
> Reply-To:
>
> Hello,
>
> I want to make the reservation for 10 guests who are coming to your country for a meeting of private meeting.The group would need your wine services in your place,from 27th to 30th October of 2009.The Guests are 10 in number and we want to make a deposit of $3,000 USD in advance before their arrival. All the checks and balances will be made with you the 30th of October 2009.
>
> 1) you have a POS machine to charge credit cards?
>
> Contact me please back with your answer. God bless him.
>
> Regards,
>
> Mr. Tim McCarron.
>
> Mobile: xxxxxxx*

*Note: Phone number removed just to keep y’all from getting in trouble.

… The local art supply shop, Flax, is advertising mask-making andface painting tutorials — just in time for Halloween! And who doesn’t love spooky saturdays?

Apologies to Chicago, but the windiest city in this country has got to be San Francisco. Sure, our famous blankets of fog get all the glory, but it’s the wind doing all the work. Try riding a bike in the afternoon here and you’ll soon be cursing the headwind.

So via Alice Feiring comes this awesome almost-real-time wind monitoring service.

Here’s a screen shot:

You may or may not think this is useful, but I’m looking forward to testing it out before another ride. Sort of like using the internet to check the surf or something … Good times for weather and map geeks!

Via Burrito Justice*, easily one of the top local San Francisco blogs, comes Mother Mother, a rockin’ group from Vancouver. Infectious, poppy rock with solid songwriting. And did I mention harmonies? Harmonies! Sort of a New Pornographers meets the Pixies kind of thing.

Mother Mother has two albums out, and you can stream them both at the band’s website, here.

Here’s a video for “Oh My Heart”, the catchy title track of Mother Mother’s second and most recent album.

*Burrito Justice is also an excellent forum to indulge your inner map geek. Check out this post (and the subsequent ones too) about the new BART system map.

California syrah is in a strange place these days, and it’s no secret in the trade that the wine remains a difficult item to sell. With a few exceptions, this is generally true for both spicy, vibrant syrah from California’s cooler coastal climates, as it is for the jammy, sweeter versions grown in warmer spots.

Yet syrah has its partisans and admirers, people attracted to a wine that at its best is seductive, savage and fraught with tension. And what’s not to love about that?

So what gives? Some people point to an identity crisis in American syrah, which in turn has confused consumers (to say nothing of winemakers). I recently wrote a short overview of syrah (and some of the California Rhône movement) for the San Francisco Chronicle. It’s a light read but features pithy commentary from some of California’s most accomplished producers of Rhône varieties. Here’s a bit with comments from Bob Lindquist (Qupé) and Sashi Moorman (Stolpman and Piedrasassi, among others):

“Too many people jumped on the bandwagon,” says Syrah pioneer Bob Lindquist of Qupé in Santa Maria (Santa Barbara County). The wine industry’s initial enthusiasm for Syrah led to overplanting, whether that meant too much or just simply in the wrong place. But equally, Lindquist says, winemakers tended to ignore what wine lovers were buying. “There was too much coming on without the market being ready for it.”

That the market was unprepared seems almost like an understatement. Drinkers reached for Australian Shiraz but that enthusiasm stopped short of Syrah from these shores.

“As a domestic wine, you can’t really expect consumers to understand Syrah,” says Sashi Moorman of Stolpman Vineyards and Piedrasassi, both located in Santa Barbara County. “It will never be Chardonnay or Cabernet.”

Is it me, or was that kind of a nasty summer? I’ve been trying to keep a positive mind but then circumstances seem to conspire and throw everything out of whack – either personal or some wider social context. Between notable deaths, ongoing wars, economic anxiety, that tea-bagging/town hall silliness and a host of other issues, it’s enough to make you want to cocoon up and not leave the house.

I don’t know about you, but this kind of shit throws me way off-balance. It’s even affected the way I taste wine, which feels weird to say, but why not? It is my livelihood after all, therefore important.

This latest round of frustration comes via Italy, where two letter bombs were thrown at a crowd of young people gathered outside a gay bar just up from the Coliseum. There’s a report in English here. As Towleroad observes, there’s been a string of anti-gay/homophobic attacks in Italy recently; beyond the letter bombs, there was an arson attack on Rome’s popular gay club Muccassassina (the club was closed at the time), a stabbing outside of Rome’s summertime gay festival and an assault in Naples. Not that the US is a shining example, but Italy has a nasty case of homophobia and this news doesn’t help. A bright spot: The attacks have been widely condemned, and there have been public protests.

Here’s a report (in Italian) following the bomb attacks in Rome (via Towleroad):

I’m reminded of the terrible incident earlier this summer in Israel when a gunman attacked a gay and lesbian youth center in Tel Aviv, not far from where some friends of mine live. I didn’t see much coverage of the attack in the American news (why doesn’t that surprise me?) but the BBC has good coverage, including reports of subsequent protests, here.

I know, nothing to do with wine. But then again, we’re talking about being out of balance, and that has everything to do with wine.

Of course, it’s tempting to just say to hell with it all, turn to the bottle and drink up.

Grumble, grumble.

Onward into the Fall, may better times lie ahead.

Tasting a lot of wine can lead to a sense of being easily distrated. Earlier this week, between tasting Gavi, various Langhe rossi and Barolo, I popped into the back of the office to chat with our art department — all of whom were too busy to deal with me.

Poking around in their accumulated vinous ephemera however was quite rewarding. Among the treasure was this plastic bottle containing a soil sample from the Lytton Springs vineyard, a mixed plot of old vines (mostly zinfandel) planted at the southern end of Dry Creek Valley, not far from the town of Healdsburg. Check out these old river deposits/mixed rocky clay soils from the vineyard:

Cool, eh?

Said farewell to San Francisco, for this week at least, with a delicious al pastor flavored send off at El Castellito, which serves up some of the best spicy slow-cooked marinated pork in town. Pictured below.

Off to New York for a week of tasting new releases from Piedmont for Wine & Spirits. Maybe I’ll blog a little more after what’s been a relatively blog free summer.

The title could well refer to the fact that I haven’t posted anything new for nearly a month. My apologies but for some reason I’m feeling like a short break from blogging is in order. It’s summer and all that. Besides, I got a new bicycle to replace the one that was stolen in May, and I’d rather be out riding it than tapping on a computer. At least for now.

So you could amuse yourself by trolling through the archives, or better yet, head over Cory Cartwright’s blog Saignée, where he’s had a month long post(ing)-party called 31 Days of Natural Wine to celebrate the one year anniversary of his blog. Jon Bonné and I recently added two co-posts where among other things we considered the virtues (and challenges) of ambient yeasts through pizza dough and wine. Part I is here and Part II is here. And you can follow the progress of all 31 Days here.