Spam Samples and Clarification

I’m new to this writing thing, but as I’ve developed this blog I’ve tried to be more conscious of the fact someone might actually read this and that my opinions and the information I base them on might need to be checked by someone else.  This is particularly true when I interview someone directly or quote something someone said or wrote.  In those cases I’ve usually tried to give the subject the opportunity to review a draft of my blog before publishing it here.

For my recent blog on Paul Gregutt’s new book, Washington Wine and Wineries, Second Edition, I e-mailed a draft of the blog article to the folks at UC Press who had provided me with the book for review.  I didn’t think I had recieved a response from anyone and after a week published the blog as written.  Last week Sean Sullivan of Washington Wine Report published a review of the same book, and during some chatter in the comments, I learned that Mr. Gregutt himself had tried to contact me about my draft.  The folks at UC Press had forwarded my draft to Paul, and he had taken time to read it and e-mail me directly about some of the information contained in my review.

This is where the spam comes in.  Due to the wonders and vagaries of the internet, Paul’s e-mail to me had been filtered as spam by my e-mail provider, so I didn’t see the message until he pointed it out to me through his comments on Sean’s blog.   I apologize to Paul for this missed communication.

Paul and I subsequently had a nice dialogue off line about a few things in my review.  In particular, Paul clarified his methods of sampling wines and wineries and pointed me to the introduction of the book where this is explained.   After a re-read, it is clear that Mr. Gregutt does seek out wineries throughout Washington through his travels, at events, and through various avenues.   He also takes great care in how he tastes and reviews the wines he writes about.   The introduction to the book explains this is detail and I admit I either skimmed over most of this or forgot about it when I was dissecting the lists of wineries that appear later in the meat of the book.

The issue of samples, whether submitted by wineries or their representatives or obtained by Mr. Gregutt by request or through his travels, is clearer to me now.   I have my own opinions about wine samples in general, and think it’s really a topic that deserves a separate write up because, as I said in my original post about Mr. Gregutt’s book, I don’t have a problem with his sampling methods.

That said, I’ll close with a quote from Mr. Gregutt’s introduction regarding sampling and selection of wineries for his book that he pointed me to as the clearest he can be on the topic…

“If you already have your own list of favorite Washington wineries, you may find one or two missing from my own selections. Please do not take offense. Some are simply too new to evaluate. Some do not choose to take advantage of the many opportunities to submit their wines for review. Some simply do not suit my personal tastes.”