More Dollars Than Sense

So much rain this winter in San Francisco! My meeting had run late, and there was no way I felt like firing up the stove at home to cook for my wet and solo self. Two blocks away, the answer to this dilemma just reached out to me: “Come In,” whispered the canopy above the sideway entrance to The Big Four Bar at the Huntington Hotel on California Street where it meets the steep part of Taylor.


Actually, that canopy has seen me a lot. It was my “local” for the months that I’d spent living on Nob Hill. Ty, the bartender of some renown, has been hospitable to clients for 18 years. Jeffrey, his younger counterpart, was behind the bar that fortunate night that Opus One and I made acquaintance.

Comfort food ordered – don’t chide me, diet coach, I really needed that chicken pot pie! – and a glass of decent wine en route, I settled in for the collegial conversation for which the Big Four bar denizens are noted.

Hmmm. The fellow next to me, a business type in his mid-forties, was busily punching at his iPad screen. I’ve been thinking about getting a reader to pull in the multitude of ebooks, so I asked him to tell me what he likes about the iPad.

Fred was very obliging.

My food arrived, and at the same time, so did two bleached blond twenty-something girls. Two seats on Fred’s right were open, and down they plunked, talking about their shopping expedition of the day. Not surprisingly (like I haven’t seen this before!), the man from Miami turned in their direction.

“Oh,” said those Valley Girl Voices, “what wine will go with a hamburger?” They fluttered their eyelashes at Jeffrey – he IS a cutie – but Fred picked up the cue.

“Opus One,” Fred said. “Bring me a bottle of Opus One, and give those young ladies some glasses.”

Oh my heart! Life is just so unfair! Admittedly, if you added their ages together, you’d have to put on a few years more to get to my Certain Age. Still, what about ME?

My mother, born Mary Elizabeth Taylor to a family of style but no wealth in English Canada, taught me an important lesson early on: “Even a cat can look at a King.”  Certainly this is one of the great Mary Elizabeth adages … and handy tonight.

Without hesitation, I gently tapped the back of Fred’s hand and asked, “Oh, do you mind if I have a taste?” Jeffrey sat a glass in front of me before the girls could flutter another time.

It was divine. It was also $250 a bottle. Not in my budget so late in the month…

Four glasses poured equal an almost-empty bottle. Fred ordered another. Jeffrey apologized; they had no more Opus One 2003 at hand, would be 2004 be okay? “Put it on my tab,” Fred said.

I noticed the difference in color as the 2004 was poured; more purple, but still a clear and lovely wine. I was interested to note that between the 2003 and 2004, the cabernet had decreased from 92 to 86% of the blend, and the merlot went up. A good lesson in taste and texture for an always-learning wine lover.

The girls didn’t care. They slurped it down like soda pop as Fred leaned ever closer, hoping for some small physical sign of gratitude.

I didn’t wait to see that play out. I thanked Fred profusely, put on my raincoat, and said goodbye to the whispering canopy. As I told this story to a wine-envious friend, the lesson became apparent. If you are young, pretty and somewhat giddy, always sit next to the midforties-something-by-himself guy at the bar. He’s likely to have more dollars than sense.

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