I'd Need to Drop the Matter

The local Italian restaurant sells good wine from Italy at half the price of the menu if you order it to go.  Antonio takes pride in what he does and makes you feel welcome.  I asked or his help for a bone dry white and a red with lots of tannic.  He obliged and off I went on my bicycle.   

When I got home the cork on the bottle of red slid straight into the bottle with suspicious ease.  I sipped the wine just to be sure and it had gone off.  We drank the white.

Tonight we were all at a loss for where to go and ended up going to back to the restaurant to dine.  “Antonio here’s what had happened . . .”  Antonio smiled and gave me a bit of a lecture on how to properly uncork the bottle.  “You see, sometimes-a if you come right down-a this way, the top can just-a break.  You need to come at it-a from an angle.”

I nodded and tried to be pleasant about the instruction.  Yes.  But the cork didn’t break.  It just popped right in.” This was silly.  I didn’t think there was anything wrong with how I’d tried to open the bottle.  “Right and I’m sure that this is important.  But this particular bottle I think there was a problem because it slid right down in and the taste was immediately . . .”  “Exactly.  This is-a what happens when you don’t create a little angel when you start-a to screw.”

I tried to steer away from his buoyancy.  Yes, this all may be true but I think that was a bad bottle.” He’d seated us with a smile and motioned that he had to step off suggesting he hadn’t heard or cogitated what I’d just said.  I had been hoping he’d comp us a bottle this evening.  When the cork first went “plop” I’d been sure he would.  But now, short of demanding it with someone who was otherwise being rather friendly, it would appear I’d need drop the matter. 

He came back with a bottle or two.  “These are really nice.  I forget which one you ordered.  You should really try them again.”  I held the bottle in my hand.  It was the same one I’d bought the other day.  I considered the place name that was meaningless to me.  Should I break the mood and insist that it should be on the house?   I looked up at Antonio one last time.  Was he well-aware and just steering the conversation this way or was he truly clueless as to what my agenda was? 

“Sure.  Let’s try it.  I’m curious to know what it tastes like.”

Monday, 10/09/17