Thursday, December 28, 2017

Cheers Linda & All My Customers at @ClevelandParkWineAndSpirits At 3423 Connecticut Avenue NW DC 20008 : Cleveland Park A Happening Place Yes So True - Keeping Our Dreams & Futures , Passions, Vitality, Truth, Community - ALL Alive One Day, One Bit At A Time! Happy New Year 2018 - We Are Ready Here To Meet Any-All Your Needs


Cleveland Park WineCleveland Park Beer, Liquor & Wine
Featuring a wide, international selection of fine wines, micro-brews and spirits
 
 
 

IT'S STILL THE HOLIDAYS THAT STARTED BACK ON THURSDAY, DECEMBER 2ND, 2010 AND WE ARE STILL GOING STRONG!

     IT'S BEEN A GREAT TURBULENT YEAR FILLED WITH INCREDULOUSNESS AND NUMBNESS AND JOY...

NOW WE NEED some humbleness, equality for women, respect for women, equal pay for women, all lives matter, all equal here, celebrate much of what we have and need to share more in common, live and let live, provide for everyone, have the rich give back what they do not need that will help others have an existence worth living and filled with enough hope for all that depression and suicide is not the answer!

 

WE just sent from you all our second money order from the post office across the street for $155 to planned parenthood, Washington DC, NE - the first monet order we sent in march and so the total for both comes to $345!!! Thank you for your generosity in giving, makes me feel very proud and pleased, and brings a smile to my face, too! Mailed today. We will keep our tin bucket here into next year, it is above our computer bu out tasting table.

 

the part two big theme bubbly tasting last night was a huge success once again, as we had six fabulous people pouring 25 or more sparkling wines including fine french champagnes, too for you all to taste. we continued our them of supporting women and were thrilled to have christina caswell , tatiana gladny and diana richer pouring their fine selections of various bubblies here for you all to enjoy, as well as klaus wittauer, andrew stover, francois hurtel and craig maura pouring as well! thank you six, you did a great job and helped to make our celebration and holiday cheer so exciting, memorable and cherished.

 

happy new year to everyone.

 
you are the very best, we are here for you, always let us know what we may do better for you to help you with your needs, wants, and help with any events you are hosting and need our guidance.
 
this is just a short email to thank you all!
 
to let you know we are here with many choices? in all the spirits, liqueurs, liquors, wines, ciders, beers, non-alcoholic wines and beers, too -
 
choices galore!
 
we can better assist you now with your sparkling wine needs, too, as yesterday 25 were tasted here and so they all are fresh on our minds!
 
Al Volo Trattoria opened and that is great news, i did a seafood take-out that was so tasty! my whole family enjoyed it the other night, Matteo recommended it to me, and Danielli and Matteo were on hand to get it to me all ready to rush home to the family. I had a chance to introduce again a number of our fine customers to both of them, something I did on the previous Friday their first night open.
 
the Uptown Art DC House across the street ( in the old Four Provinces Irish Pub location will be open through April 2018! If you have not been there yet go by and introduce yourselves to the fine artists there ( always say to them that - Tony sent you! ) : Marc, Maps, Parker, Maya, Jamal, Sebi, ... they are all instrumental in making this an alive, active, happening space for movies, art shows, fashion shoots, fashion clothing for sale, art classes, drawing classes, wine-tastings by me, Dan, Nik, Manuel Rojas, Narayan Campbell, Robert Kennedy, Craid Maura, Reid Harper -  and more. And the work is all for sale, so if you need some local art please inquire and support the local arts. My work is now on display there, too as I am an artist as well.

 

try and buy what you need for New Year's eve early so that you have more choices. We have fresh stocks of -
 
- sparkling wines , champagnes, proseccos -
 
- pinot noirs from around the world
 
- malbecs from Argentina and France
 
- pinot grigios from Italy
 
- cans of sparkling and non-sparkling wines from Westminster Winery, - a sparkling Chardonnay, a dry red Cabernet Franc that pops and sizzles, and a dry and complex Pinot Grigio, too : a can that is a half-bottle in quantity + 375ml - all at $10.99 - limited quantities, tasty, flavorful, cute, fun, exciting, great gifts still - limited quantities!
 
- 187ml bottles -splits of many sparkling wines from -   
 
1) Prosecco 3-packs of VILLA JOLANDA  to
 
2) French MOET rose Brut Imperial French champagne, and
 
3) French sparkling rose from JP Chenet, and
 
4) HILLINGER Pinot Noir Austrian dry rose, and
 
5) Le Grand COURTAGE French Brut sparkling, too
 
 
AND in 375ml bottle size ( half bottles ) :
 
1) ADAMI Prosecco SuperioreValdobbiadene Bosco di  Gica , Veneto Italy - the best growing region for grapes to make the finest Proseccos!
 
2) Champagne LALLIER Grand Reserve from Ay, Champagne
 
3) Michel TURGY Reserve Selection from Mesnil sur Oger, Blanc de Blancs, Grand Cru RM - the best available, all family-owned, produced, marketed, all -
 
4) TWO From JEAN VESSELLE -
 
     A) Brut Oeil de Perdrix a Bouzy, Pinot Noir, dry blush of color rose, lovely, Recoltant-Manipulant
 
B) Brut Reserve a Bouzy the town famous for Pinot Noir champagne, Recoltant Manipulant, dry Brut -
 
AND -
 
1) Brut Tradition a Colombe le Sec - oui oui oui oui oui!
 
WE ALSO HAVE astounding values in MAGNUMS - 1.5ml bottles of sparkling wine -
 Veneto, Italy -
 
     A) Lugana Italiano 100% , On Special for $54.99, 2010 -  and  -
     B) Chardonnay 100% yeasty, bread and dough accents, 2008, On Special for $59.99!
 
WE HAVE in Sparkling Wines from around the world :
 
- Croatia,Trapan

- Georgia, Bagrationi

- New Zealand, Sophora and Elstree

- Armenia - Karas

- Austria, Steininger and LHillinger

-Argentina, Malma Pategonia, Santa Julia,organic and sustainable agriculture

- Italy,-
Vale D'Oasta Pinot Noir 100% w/ jalepeno -cilantro overtones -4478 -
 
Prosecco, Lambruscos of Alberto Paltrinieri Tenuta Pederzana, and Cantina della Volta  ,-
Veneto - Perla Del Garda, -
Emilia Tenuta Cassali, -
Piemonte - Lemon Moscato and Mango Moscato Piemonte Brachetto, Moscato of Canelli

- Spain, Trepat dry rose Josep Foraster , Rossignol & Bohigas

- USA :
 
     - Missouri 2013 dry rose STONE HILL
     - Texas-CA McPherson Cellars
     -California Etoile Brut & Brut rose CHANDON
     - Virginia - Thibaut-Janisson
     - New York Chateau Frank 2008 Brut
     - Hawaii dry Pineapple , Hula o Maui

- Germany, Fitz Sekt, and Schloss Sarstein Riesling'Franken VAUX and Christian Stahl,

- Uruguay,  Bodegas Carrau

- Greece, Matamis and Domaine Glinavos, and Karanika
 
YOU GET THE IDEA - we represent the world available to us - come by, experience all your choices - possibilities!
 
TASTINGS -
 
Friday - will have see if anyone is available to taste here?
 
Saturday - we have ...
1) Andrew Shapiro the inventor of his own Ginger Brew non-alcoholic 12 ounce bottles, $2.49 a 12 ounce bottle, 11am-3pm pouring and talking about mixed cocktails, etc ... get bottles signed as last-minute gifts !    
 
AND -
 
2) Andy ( 2-6PM )  coming to pour some great wines from Australia ZONTE'S FOOTSTEP Sauvignon Blanc, and New York - some sparkling Pinot Blanc from LIEB CELLARS Long Island, yes! and more!
 
THANKS AGAIN for everything! You are the very best! Cheers, TONY 12/28/2017
 
COME SEE US ASAP - yes, si, oui, venga aqui, viens ici, prosit, sante, gracias, obregado, ... tim tim!


     AND BITS OF SO MUCH MORE FOR US TO deal on so many levels with as we all plod along and try and make sense of so many conflicting events, so many emotions on our part and in all this for me there has always been a constant thread of things positive even though some people i know tell me this is unrealistic and naive even ...
 
    TO USE A POPULAR LINE : " the Grinch puzzled until his puzzler was sore " in the great animated movie : " The Grinch That Stole Christmas " : I think that many of our puzzlers are sore from so much puzzling ... but that's no reason to give up and not smile and not try and do something about it  ...
     My wife shared this line with me this morning. We were all sitting at our dining room table this morning before I headed off for a teeth-cleaning and then into work here. Love the sparkle and shine of my teeth this morning, nice ...
 
    THIS EMAIL WILL BE LIKE LAST WEEK'S : I will tell stories all day long here. IT'S MY BIRTHDAY, too so come by and help me celebrate with lots of wine, good cheer and mirth-a-runneth-over! Like so many things I do they today will be serendipitous and spur-of-the-moment. I expect that many of you are off for the week and I am thrilled for you all that are. Enjoy this precious time of yours as you never know when you might have it again : and then, you will never have this exact moment again and so it's always best to live it fully just in case ....      I AM GLAD THAT WE WERE SPARED THE SNOWFALL THAT HAS ENGULFED MUCH OF THE EAST COAST and other parts of our country. We can still get out, we can still move and navigate  the day besides the intense bluster of the wind that rattles and shakes one and one's car to it's very foundations.
     I love the sunshine of this morning's drive into work and I kept noticing the fallen leaves all being swept-gushed in intense fits of wind and energy hither and thither and right past my car's windshield.
 
AMAZING GUSTS OF  seemingly fitful raw energy and perhaps ennui and perhaps rage and perhaps defeat?!? Hard to say, but on the backdrop of swept baby blue skies with bands of wispy white clouds and everything drenched and flooded with a rather intense brightness of sunshine ... it all looked so fruitful and promising and bright and I was feeling no pain until it seemed that the wind would ever so slightly, jerkily and unexpectedly pick the car up and shake it just ever so noticeably to make me quiver some myself... unsettling, really and yet it did add a true sense of adventure to my otherwise pretty routing drive from Virginia into the inner folds of our nation's capitol.
 
 
     IT'S RATHER QUIET HERE THIS MONDAY MORNING as we clean up from the onslaught of customers last week ending with a strong week of sales and trying as best we can here to meet our varied customers many needs. We never know quite what we will encounter and hear from you all : but we do enjoy the challenge of your demands and your desires, wants, whims, fancies and fantasies . Sometimes we can help you to fuel those latent urges and dormant impulses that have been silenced so often that they must be awakened, shaken and dusted off and brought to the center of your stage right there in the spotlight by you to catch your full attention.
 
     WE HAVE BUBBLY, I was just over there straightening things out and we will receive more today of some excellent inexpensive French sparkling wine. It will be fun to have it and I am sure that I will open at least one or more bottles today to help celebrate the advent of the New Year and today my birthday of course! This idea is naturally near and dear to me and never far away as the minutes wind on. There are still all the prices, styles and colors from the driest dries to the sweetest most sublime sweetnesses - undescribable, you really have to be there, you really have to taste to know the full impact, the full taste, the full range, the full story ...
 
 
     WE STILL HAVE A REALLY WIDE, BROAD SELECTION here to cheer and to toast you all with. THERE ARE TOO MANY TO LIST HERE and that's okay : it simply means that with this nice day and the clear streets and sidewalks that you will all be able to venture forth and here to our store in our wonderful Cleveland Park neighborhood. You may thus see with your own eyes and perhaps taste with your own palates what we have to offer you all that is unique, original, truly representative of the various parts of the world and the indigenous grapes and what they are able to yield lovingly from those very specific micro-climes and soils, too.
 
 
     SO WHILE IT IS WINDY and BEAUTIFUL come by the store and get whatever it is that you ran out of over this weekend. Come check out the " new " selections here at Cleveland Park. It's fun for me to walk the whole rows here of beers and liquors and you will see that both Ravi and Santos are always including " new : items for me to write about each week here. It's exciting for me really.
 
 
     WITH THE BEER THE COLORS, the packaging is so very bright and vivid and alive : speaks to me of celebrations, carnivals and basic colors and stark with  forms, figures and images that are exciting and taunting, a bit savage and rustic, sometimes primordial and scary and yet they draw our eyes to them making us have to hold the bottles, turn them around 360 degrees to read and learn and be further stimulated and stymied by them : what are they?!? What do they hold?!? What voodoo, charms. spells, chants, etcetera do they hold inside? Will we live, will we survive/thrive/arrive?!? They are so much fun to look at and simply imagine the various joys that they hold. And now they are also organic and gluten-free, too.

     LAST WEEK WE HAD SO MANY BEER REQUESTS : it's always a treat when people come from small towns around the country and ask for their hometown beers to help them feel more comfortable and at home here in a large city where they may not yet know many people. I like this, especially when we in fact do have their beers - and fifty percent of the time we do have them.
 
 
     THE LIQUOR and LIQUEURS ARE NOT QUITE as vibrant in colors - those stark, primary colors : they are more subtle and reserved and yet still quite as exciting as you cut through to the actual product held safely, securely inside.
     We get the same amount of liquor requests as we get for the beer. There's just so much more being produced today than ever before!!!! In every category, in every field, there's simply so much more marketing of products than ever before, too.
     It's still all really good and exciting and we have almost as many " new " liquors and liqueurs as we do beers. I think that Ravi simply wishes that he had more space for them. The vodkas alone are appearing almost every single week and that is exciting, especially when the distillers themselves come with them from as close to us as West Virginia and as far away as Maine. It's all good. We had the distiller Lisa here from Maine a weekend ago tasting her vodka with our customers and we sold-out before she left! Thanks Lisa.
 
     THE TREND WILL CONTINUE as more and more individuals decide to try their luck at realizing their dreams : families come together and pool their resources and try their luck. We are here to help support this kind of initiative as you know as we are small enterprises and we very much exist on this level ourselves ans we select and offer our wares much in the same way as it was done years ago before the advent of the internet and so much became available in the palm of one's own hand, left or right depending of course.

   
     EXPECT TO SEE MORE VARIETY as these enterprising individuals pick up many of the pieces that have fallen here and there as the economy has suffered along with so many. It will be fascinating from our point-of-view to see where things realign themselves and resurface. We will continue to search for the small properties and small ventures, the moms and the pops out there as well as the grapes that are possibly going to all but disappear if someone does not champion their cause and suggest them now and then they will languish ans shrivel up and die a death of neglect and abject loneliness that I would not even wish for my least of least favorite people that I could conceivably ever hate and that's rare indeed ....
 
     WE HAVE TASTINGS THIS WEEK ON BOTH WEDNESDAY With sommelier of Oya restaurant Andrew Stover ( both sparkling Spanish cava and  Italian prosecco along with the Hawaiian pineapple sparkling and still off-dry pinapple still wine, the Michigan " new " vintage Pinot Noir blend of " Shindig " that Andrew blends himself I believe ? It will be fun to be able to talk with Andrew that can discuss wine enjoyment on so many levels and with so many food-wine-food-pairing combinations as well.
 
WOULDN'T IT SIMPLY BE GRAND  to be around wine and food all night long as Andrew is? What a great occasion to first-hand put so many things together and to make so many on the spot observations. I love it and am a bit-a wee- a tad jealous of Andrew for this. However, Andrew is nice enough to come and share some of all of this experience with anyone able to join us this Wednesday evening, December 29th from 5-8PM here in the store. Join us, never any charge, everyone is welcome. Bring your visiting family and friends with you.
 
     FRIDAY, December 31st, 2010 ( 3-7PM ) : We have Chris Bartha here of Cobblestone Cellars to taste his sparkling wines ( 4 in all ) : Chris will taste a sparkling Spanish cava called GRAN GESTA brut ( $14.99 ) from Penedes, Spain , two sparkling Burgundy Cremants from VITTEAUT-ALBERTI - a clear brut and a dry rose, too ( $24.99 ) ; as well as a Sparkling German Kir Royale with cassis already in the sparkling sekt wine : already blended for all of us to enjoy - nothing for us to do but to open the bottle, pour it and lift it to our awaiting lips. It will be grand, really grand.
     WE HAVE THE TWO CREMANTS OPEN HERE NOW in the store and so come by and have a taste with us while they last. Come today and help me celebrate my birthday and then come again on Friday to try and buy and get ready to celebrate your New Year's later with family and friends .... JOIN US, NEVER any charge.
 
 
     ALL IS WELL HERE ON MONDAY. It's relatively quiet now and deceiving as it will surely start to get a whole lot more lively and active as many of you start to plan this last week of yours. Let us help - give us something meaningful to do and to give us the satisfaction of assisting you all in bringing both a sense of closure to this year and a true excitement and raw energy to be channeled and ridden in the New Year of 2011!
 
     THERE ARE SO MANY FUN STORIES, so many people that have passed through our doors this year, so many relatives that have been brought to us, so many people that we have gotten to know better, so many people discovering us for the first time and so many " new and exciting " connections that have been made as a result.
     I love when someone comes and they say that they have lived here a long time and are just now discovering us and the extensive offerings that we have here. So many of you have inquired about the health of the store ( it's strong because of your continued patronage ), and about whether Peter Wygandt's store a block away has hurt us?
     It's nice, there's so much open conversation between us here and that makes everything so much more relaxed and enjoyable. Lots of kisses and hugs, smiles, laughs and bond after bond after bond that is established, strengthened and reaffirmed daily as well as throughout the year.
     It's also so gratifying that many of you that used to live here still make it a pilgrimage with us as the destination to return to, say " hello ", chat and buy whatever it is that you may be in need or search of.   
       I WISH THAT I COULD RECALL  all the wonderful events that we have held here : all the wine-makers and wine owners that have passed through our doors this year as well as wine reps and sales managers, brew-masters, distillers,all the great Big-Theme wine-tastings;  Mike Martin's leaving at the end of last year and the bringing of Chris Barker here from Dean & DeLuca, the events that we have supported from the individual to the large corporation, the local school charities, the theater fundraisers, ... the list goes on and on and on. That's one reason that we have the web page, calendar of events, the various blogs from chatwine.blogspot.com and chatpoetry.blogspot.com, our new Facebook page at : cleveland park wines & Spirits as well.
    IN TODAY'S DAY and age we have to be connected to one another . That link has to be made, the memory jogged, the bond begun, strengthened, reminded ... we have to be there for one another.
    IT'S BEEN FUN and challenging to grow with this neighborhood : to see the changes, the empty store fronts filled and then again emptied,
     the Palena expansion as well as that of the new Ripple and the consolidation of both Ardeo and Bardeo into one,
     the Tackle Box that will finally go into the old MacDonald's space after eight or nine years,
     the businesses here in this two block period grouping together to make this a more vibrant and energized, cleaner and more beautiful place to be and to both eat and shop in,
     the closing of both Yanni's and Ivy's restaurants - both are already missed by many of us...
     all this transformation, all this change :
     the first in years of a Cleveland Park Day and boy was it successful!
     We loved it, it sure was grand to be a part of that and we could not have any of us asked for a more beautiful day for that to have happened!
     We've seen the passing of some of our favorite customers and that's always sad for those that survive.
     We've seen people get jobs in a tough economy and lose jobs, too.
     We've seen so much on a political level, home foreclosures, public officials prosecuted and convicted of crimes and so many others get off Scott-free ...
      we have done our dinners in the local restaurants around here, too.
     WE HAVE BEEN THIS YEAR AS MANY AN INTEGRAL PART OF THIS COMMUNITY and for that I am very proud. It may be in only small ways but it does count for something and it all does add up and make a difference for some ; better some than none at all.
 
 
     IT'S ALL SO MUCH THAT IT MAKES MY HEAD SPIN ON THIS MY BIRTHDAY and I will now proof this and send it along as the last email of the year. IT'S TIME TO CELEBRATE and get all revved-up to finish this last week of 2010. Let's do it together.
 
     RUSH ON OVER EACH AND EVERY DAY THIS WEEK to help us celebrate what we do have and what we are fortunate to be a part of. It will be a bit of a dynamic party here for the rest of this week. We can be talked into a lot of things. Come and check us out and have a taste or two on us through Friday and New Year's Eve!  
     Cheers and thanks a million guys and gals, you are the best, you are the creme de la creme.  
     Ravi, Ved, Sofredo, Nelson, Santos, Chris and Tony ...

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