Ep. 569 Alder Yarrow | Get US Market Ready with Italian Wine People

Thanks for tuning into my new show. Get US Market Ready with Italian wine people. I'm Steve Ray, author of the book how to get US Market Ready. And in my previous podcast, I shared some of the lessons I've learned from thirty years in the wine and spirits business helping brands enter and grow in the US market. This series will be dedicated to the personalities who have been working in the Italian wine sector in the US, their experiences, challenges, and personal stories. I'll uncover the roads that they walked shedding light on current trends, business strategies, and their unique brands. So thanks for listening in. And let's get to the interview. Hi. This is Steve Ray, and welcome to this week's edition of Get US Market Ready with Italian Wine People. This week, I'm really pleased to have as a guest, Alder Yaro, who's one of, the oldsters in the logging industry, Alderer. I can't say he practically invented the concept of a blog, but he was one of the first and longest lasting. Wine bloggers in the industry. So instead of me going on about how wonderful you are, Aldor, why don't you give us a short background of what you do that you have a life outside of wine in the real world? Sure. Well, in some ways, that life outside of wine was responsible for the wine blog itself. I got into internet design very early on in the early nineties while I was still in college and, while getting a photography degree in a documentary film studies degree, and I sort of had this choice when I graduated, you know, did I wanna continue being a starving student and go get a an MFA or something like that in in photography or or cinematography, or did I wanna go out and actually earn some money? And and the internet boom was just starting in ninety six when I graduated. And so I thought, well, you know, I'm sort of tired of being a starving student. I'm gonna go out and get a real job. And so I went and helped a guy start a web design And that was really the beginning of a of a long career in doing digital design, digital marketing, experience design. And I eventually ended up specializing in in user experience and starting my own agency, which I ran for for seventeen years or so. Up until quite recently. And so in the early two thousands, had clients coming to me and saying, Hey, we hear about these things called blogs, you know, should we have one? And I didn't really know much about them. I knew they were a kind of website and at that point, everybody had heard of the drudge report, which was making big news in in the space of, you know, politics and independent publishing. And so I thought, oh, geez, I I better figure this out. So I can answer these questions that clients are asking me. And so I thought, well, the best way to do that is to start a blog myself What kind of blog should I start? And I only had to think for about two seconds before I knew that I needed to start a wine blog because for the previous ten years, I had sort of gradually slipped fallen, you know, dove deep into the pit of becoming a serious wine geek after tasting some wines while I was in college and realizing, wow, these are these are really cool. These are really interesting. They all taste different. I wonder why. I don't know why. And not being a beer drinker, that ended up being my my tipple of choice as a college student and then after college. So, you know, I had the skills required to figure out what blogs were all about. I had clients asking me, and then I had this passion for for wine that, you know, was just sort of being exercised in buying bottles, you know, to, to drink with dinner up until that point and, and reading as much as I could about it. So That was the genesis of phonography January of two thousand four, set up a a blog and movable type and sort of started. After about three weeks, I found myself writing almost every day about wine, and you could sort of say I haven't quit for seventeen years. Yeah. So, first question I have is also being a writer and and doing a blog on the side. I'm not as prolific or productive as you are on the blog. Is how do you keep up the discipline of writing every day? I'm publishing every day. I'm sorry. Writing every day is easy. Publishing every day is not because that means you have to polish. It's incredibly hard. And I think there are several answers to that question. I think one has to do with that word polish that you just used, which is that in some ways, you have to train yourself to be okay. K with it not being published. You know, I think one of the things that really prevent people from publishing regularly is this idea of like they have to get it right. They have to get it perfect. And I think the blog medium, you know, certainly in its most professional forms you know, run by corporations that have paid employees who blog. Certainly, there's a standard of perfection that they need to get to because, you know, you know, they have big name advertisers and sometimes people paying for that content and nobody to see a spelling mistake or a slightly run on sentence or whatever. But as an individual private citizen blogger who's just putting your thoughts out on the internet for free, I think one of the largest barriers to productivity is that perfectionism. And so one of the things I had to do early on was train myself to just, you know, just do it. Just get it out there. You know, the the famous writer, novelist, and writing coach Annie Lamont has the concept of shitty first drafts. And and in and in blogging world, I think really what we're talking about is shitty final drafts. In a lot of ways. But, so that's a that's a big barrier for a lot of people. And then it is a discipline. You use the right word. It is, it is just like, you know, getting out and going for a run every day if that's one of your disciplines, which is a particularly tough one for me, I have to say. You just have to do it. You have to sort of steal yourself and develop the habits. However, your body and brain develop habits to do it. And in my case, it really helps that, like, I don't watch television. And so there aren't a lot of other media things competing for my attention other than, you know, my family, my my daughter, my my dog, and and all the, you know, normal aspects of life. But, you know, in the evenings, when a lot of people would just plop themselves down in front of the the TV and and watch two hours of of media, I don't have that habit. And it's pretty natural for me to sit down and say, you know, what what do I wanna write about? Or what do I wanna read about in the world of wine? Okay. I'm I'm reminded that I had a partner whose philosophy was done is better than perfect, and my response is good enough, isn't. I think kinda cap capsulizes what you just said. Why I I don't do what you do. Well, there's a tension between those things that everybody has to negotiate for themselves. Right? Yeah. It's it's I think it's similar to the idea. I get asked a lot of I've always worked in a home office, except for about ten years when I owned a larger agency. And question is not how do you get yourself to do it. It's how do you get yourself to stop because you go down first thing in the morning with a cup of coffee and the next thing you know, it's lunchtime and the dogs haven't been walked, and you gotta go back to work. And you haven't showered and you're still in your pajamas. I get it. Yeah. I I wasn't gonna go there, but yeah. Okay. Alright. So seventeen years, long, long time. What was in it for you seventeen years ago and what's in it for you now? What is the motivation or the the reward you get back? Certainly not money. I remember asking you about maybe fifteen years ago. How do you monetize that? And you laughed and and said, you didn't. You know, the the net total that you might have earned was not much. Yeah. It's, it's it's pretty tough. So that's question. What's what what's in it today and what was in it before? Yeah. It's I mean, certainly, it is no more you know, sort of revenue generating that it was back then, really, other than the degree to which, you know, my success as a blogger, if you can call it, that has been parlayed into paid writing gig elsewhere, you know, Janis starting to work with Janis as a columnist you know, getting asked by various magazines to write articles, etcetera. So, you know, that has that has generated some income, but it's it's a it's a laughable amount of income, as most wine writers would would tell you, what is in it for me is what has always been in it for me, which is a creative outlet that exercises a passion. I love wine. I love drinking it. I love tasting it. I love learning about it. I love writing about it. And, you know, people always snigger when I say, you know, some people knit. I write about wine, but it's quite an apt analogy Right? When I wanna do something creative just for myself relaxing, I write about wine. And other people, you know, sit down on the couch with their knitting needles and and they knit. And, you know, unlike knitting, I can't write about wine and watch television at the same time or have a conversation with somebody at the same time. So it's not a perfect analogy. It definitely is a sort of a personal creative pursuit that that brings me great, great fulfillment and enjoy. You know, I think one of the reasons I continue to do it though is out side of that now or beyond that now, which is that I have built up an audience. I have built up a following, and those people have a set of expectations on me that I try not to internalize too much or use to put too much pressure on myself, but there's also there's definitely an awareness that like, oh, people wanna, people wanna hear what I have to say next. People wanna know, you know, every week which articles I think are worth reading about wine on the internet. People wanna hear what I have to say about the latest vintage from from Napa Valley or whatever. And so there's that external expectation that also is a motivating factor for me to to keep writing. And, and I love it. I I I like, you know, putting stuff out there and having people say, oh my god, I tried that wine. It was amazing. You were talking about the reasons why you do this. I think a one of the things that separates VINography, which I don't know if I introduced it, but that's the name of Alder's blog. From many, if not most, if not all, other blogs is you're very opinionated. I don't agree with you probably Half the time. It's fine. Everybody's entitled to their own opinion. But you express that information well and put it in perspective. And one example of that, I think, is a recent post you did on the history of blogging. You you look back and said, okay. Here's my blog roll from seventeen years ago. Of all the other bloggers people might be interested in listening. You still have a blog role, which is kind of archaic, but it's cool. I'm not on it, by the way. Just saying. Okay. But there are a bunch of people call them the old guard. Guys like, Joe Roberts, And, of course, my mind just went blank, but you're still there in doing it. You made some comments on how blogging has evolved. Do you wanna just comment on that post that you had done? Sure. And there are plenty of people that have, you know, said, well, wait a minute. You know, blogging's not dead. And, you know, I definitely think that is one way to interpret that blog post. I don't I didn't mean to say it quite that way, but, you know, the fact of the matter is for a long time, I was tracking hundreds and hundreds of blog, on the internet. And when I went back recently and pruned that list and went literally clicked on every link to see which ones were still there and still active, you know, my number of people blogging in the English language dropped from, you know, six hundred down to about a hundred and fourteen people who had put up a post in the last six months even, you know, that was the sort of the the loose criteria for, quote, unquote, still active. And so, and in in some of those cases, people had put up one or two. And so, that was a huge drop. Right? You know, and as I analyzed, you know, when most of these people stopped publishing, you know, it looked like two thousand twelve, two thousand thirteen was sort of the peak. A lot of these bloggers just stopped writing at that point. And certainly, many of them have transitioned to other media. Right? So, you know, in was, you know, the rise of Twitter, the rise of Instagram, around those that time. I'm many people have transitioned to those platforms as a way of communicating about wine, and a lot of people are sort of, I think, over reading into the piece that, you know, wine communication is dead and, you know, they're saying, well, you know, what about the Instagramers? What about the tweeters? And, absolutely, that's that's true. There are plenty of, you know, back, you know, when I started, there wasn't Twitter, there wasn't Instagram. And so, you know, blogging was the only channel for sort of that self self publication, you know, wine communication. And so, it it definitely was shocking to me how many of those hundreds of blogs sort of had been abandoned, and that was the primary thrust of my piece. And, yeah, I I will admit there was a certain amount of sadness to see that sort of groundswell of sort of purely community based communication and and discussion about wine going away, but it hasn't gone away entirely. As some of the critics of that piece have pointed out, it has shifted and more. And then that's absolutely a hundred true, but I do miss the days when there were hundreds of people, you know, writing articles about wine for free on the internet. And it's it's too bad. Some of those folks who were very talented didn't continue that work. Yeah. I think that the big challenge for everybody who's trying to make a living as a writer in the wine industry is you you're probably not. I mean, it's just there's not enough outlets for it nor outlets that pay sufficient for it. Speaking of which though, let's talk about Jansis. You were my understanding of how this all came about is you were writing Jansis was pretty impressed with what you were doing, and she reached out and called you and said, I'd like you to to work with me and contribute to the purple pages. We're talking about Chances Robinson now, the author and, line rider. Yeah. We were both actually, this happened in person. We both found ourselves at the International Pinanoa celebration in Mcminville in Oregon. And, we ended up saying hello and seated at the same table at one point and she, you know, said, Hey, Alder. You're doing great work. I'd like to find a way to collaborate. And that was the beginning of a conversation. And we continued it, you know, after the event via email, and eventually we settled on me doing a a monthly column for her, which I've been doing now for, a little over ten years. Yeah. But it's almost, to use the the British metaphor that you you got knighted. So you're one of the more significant people because I want to I was gonna use the word legitimate, not that you have a legitimate, but you have a revenue generated model that you are writing for. And I think that's kind of the the the goal for a lot of people who are writing on this. Yes. Chances will tell you that it doesn't generate a lot of revenue and and I as a writer don't get a pay in a lot to to write there. But, but, yeah, no, it's I am I am now writing for the most trusted line critic in Europe surveys or any indication. And, the largest, sort of, why, traffic red wine publication in in Europe online. Okay. Let's, talk a little bit about Italian wine. I would point out that I when I first started, talking with Alder, we ended up going on two trips within a couple of years. Once to Santrini and another one to, Austria. What interests you today in the world of wine? And how have you evolved in what your interests are? What interests me about wine today is still the thing that interested me about wine when I first got into it, which is just the sheer variety of experiences that wine can convey. And I mean that in every sense of the word experience, in that, you know, wine is food, wine is culture, wine is geography, wine is geology. Right? The there's so much in every glass and every wine and every story be behind it. It's a very rich domain of knowledge and of experience. But as a there's a there's a more primal variety that one experiences, especially when you're first getting into wine, which is just good god. There are so many flavors and aromas, and there are so many different types of wine. And that variety is endlessly fascinating and sustaining and satisfying for me. In part, that is one of the reasons why. And I know this may sound slightly slavish to say on the Italian wine podcast here, but, you know, people are constantly asking me as a wine writer and wine critic, you know, Well, what what's your favorite wine? Which is, ridiculous and impossible question to answer, but my typical answer as well, you know, that's that's pretty difficult. That's like asking a film critic. What's the best film ever? It's not not something you can say, but What I can say is that if I had to drink the wines of one country for the rest of my life, it would be Italy without a question. And one of the reasons for that for me is just the incredible variety of grapes that and types of wine that Italy grows. And as a wine lover, in the beginning of my journey in wine and as a wine lover now, life is too short to keep drinking the seven noble grape varieties, you know, from France that seem to get planted all over the world. Like, come on. There's timorasso and Carricante and Pierroso and pecorino, and I just had my first taste of Nachetta the other day, you know, it was sort of rare white wine from the Piamante region. And so it's like, why would you just settle for Merlo? It's seven nights a week. Like, there's just so much more out there. And so when in my writing, in my own personal exploration, I really try to cultivate curiosity as sort of one of the chief virtues of a of a wine lover. And and in my book about flavors and aromas that I wrote called the essence of wine. I have an essay about sort of the virtues of of a wine lover and curiosity is, you know, it's chief among them. And so for me, that's what's interesting about the world of wine, just its variety and what has been happening over the last ten years, which I'm incredibly excited about is this resurgence of interest in all the native grape varieties, the, to use the, you know, the super fancy term, or indigenous, so a word people are a little more familiar with grape varieties in each of these regions. Where, you know, sure there's, you know, there's plenty of merlot planted in Italy, but people are like, well, you know, the world doesn't need another merlot. You know, I'm going to focus on this obscure, you know, grape, Ruce that has been growing in this one little area of of Piamonte for a while. We're gonna try and and make that come back. Team Rosso is a great example of that, right, where, you know, for at one point, it was down to, like, I think a few rows of that grape variety and, it took a couple dedicated winemakers to come and say, look, we're not gonna let this die out, and they took cuttings, and they planted, and now it's become this incredible success story of a white wine in in the Piedmont region. So people all over the world are are doing that. You know, countries are sort of recognizing and beginning to celebrate and realizing there's a there's a market, especially internationally, for their native grape varieties. I mean, just look at Turkish planted its share of Cabernet and chardonnay and Merlo. But, you know, now, you know, people are pushing, and and all these grapes that are indigenous and native to the to the country of Turkey. Oh, I was gonna pronounce those oxide. You're a kusskazoo. Yes. They're also fun to say. In addition to fun to drink. Yeah. Right. I think you and I are the for may maybe the only two people in America who know that. And the wines are spectacular can be, like like anything else. I do wanna make one comment just to jump in. I get asked that a lot. Oh, you're a wine guy. What's what's the best bottle of wine? And a reminder of the story a friend of mine once told me. He said he used to be a bus boy at the Bookerathon Hotel and Country Club way back in the day when some O'ez were rare in this very eight foot tall Austrian guy named Hans, you know, with the whole penguin suit and everything. And my friend asked him, you kind of sheepishly. Hans, what what's the best bottle of wine? And Han said, one I just sold So I take around a relative commercial view on this, and I I agree in terms of the, you know, I talk to them as indigenous varietals. But from a commercial point of view, it's kinda hard to sell those things. I mean, we've talked about Greek wines, you ago and, Zeno Mavro and some of those. Part of it is the pronunciation, but we learned how to say, which is kinda hard for us. Right? And, look, if if if people can learn how to pronounce Daenerys Targarian, right, from Game of Thrones, they can pronounce Fatay Esca Negra, you know, or recateli. Like, it ain't that hard. Yeah. But, you know, I think for people who are really interested in wines, it's not that hard. For everybody else, there's this whole embarrassment factor, you don't want to be wrong. Like, wine has been kind of put onto this pedestal of saying you either know everything about it or you know nothing and people therefore are hesitant to try these things. And I think one of the biggest things I'm seeing in a lot of platforms apps tools is trying to democratize wine and that your enjoyment is what you like, not what a critic says. We're kind of gotten beyond the point where the critics control the conversation. Well, that's great. I mean, I'm all for people making their own decisions about about wine. And, I think it's one of the great cultural tragedies of our country. And I think this is quite specific to America that people believe they need to know something about wine to enjoy it. And, you know, Eric Asimov in New York Times has written about this extensively, both in his his memoir, how to love wine, and then just in his columns as well. It really is a a tragedy that somehow wine became associated with the educated upper class, of America, and, and now there's this fake made up but still a very powerful barrier for a lot of people to enjoying wine as as part of, you know, daily meal and daily life. Well, and I think one of the contributors to that is the vocabulary that is used. You know, there was a publication that basically created, the concept of descriptors, and it has gotten to the point. Now from my perspective, I, you know, I don't know what a sauteed gooseberry tastes like, but those are some of the words that are being used and people feel that if they're not familiar with those words or can't sense Sate Goosebury, they're somehow not adequate. I think that is a symptom, not a cause. Right? I mean, think about other areas of American cultural life that are rife with jargon. Baseball. It's completely Greek to me. There's incredible number of terms and things like that that don't understand. I have no idea what they're talking about, but yet, you know, eleven year old boys across the country, speak this different language. Right? That doesn't keep me from going to a baseball game with some friends and enjoying myself and having a dog and a beer and watching the game. I think the same is same is true of wine. Certainly there's a language about it. Certainly, there's an incredible amount of, you know, depth that you can get to in learning and and knowing about it. But I think people's reticence to do that is not because of that language or that jargon. It's because of those deeper cultural issues, the the cultural history of wine in America rather than the the domain or the language of wine itself. That's my opinion. Yeah. I don't think we're gonna resolve it here or maybe ever. So let's talk more about organic sustainable and biodynamic. I I saw some research recently, which talked about sustainable, the word sustainable, being more powerful, more resonant with consumers in the word organic, which does have a definitive it has a definition in the US regulated by the USDA, probably misunderstood by old world and even new world wineries who wanna come to the US. I'm organic in Europe. Why can't I be organic in the US? And then, of course, there's the the biodynamics. You wanna talk about those three words and what they mean and how you feel about them? Yeah. Well, they're all great words that I wish appeared on more wine bottles regularly. You know, we are saddled with the unfortunate history of a really mis misdefined term when it comes to organic and the USDA and and wine. It specifies a number of things about a wine production, in particular, the use of sulfur, to, to call a wine organic as opposed to a, a wine made from organic grapes, which are two different things. And that history of forcing producers to a particular sulfur use regimen, a very low sulfur use regimen, in order to get the organic certification meant that in the early days of organic wine, most of them were utter crap. They tasted awful, many of them were spoiled. And so organic wine when it first hit the market created an incredibly bad impression on consumers, and that compression has not gone away, unfortunately. And so there's a great, nor have the regulations gone away, which are completely outdated and out of step with the rest of the world when it comes to what organic wine actually means. And so as a result, you will see very little organic wine in the United States. You will see plenty of wine made with organic grapes, which is different. And, And so I think, sustainable has become a way of sort of short circuiting or or stepping around that unfortunate past in history with organic wine. It's also a word that has gotten currency in plenty of other domains, right, whether it be, you know, sustainably harvested and farmed cotton for our t shirts or coffee for our, you know, Espresso's or or other things. It's a word that consumers are are used to seeing and starting to look for the, you know, as they establish their own personal ethical and moral stands about how they wanna guide their their shopping. And so, sustainable has become, certainly a buzzword in the world of wine. Unfortunately, it is a not particularly well defined one. Or maybe a better way of saying that it is a it is a word that has been defined in many different ways by many different people and groups. And so it's unfortunately not clear what you're gonna get when you're when you buy a bottle that someone on the back label has written. We grow our grapes sustainably that there's no way of guaranteeing exactly what that means. Whereas with Biodynamic, that is a a wholly different regimen that, especially if somebody is biodynamically certified through an organization like Demeter or or some organization in Europe, you can be pretty sure of what, at least, what is not done to that wine and to those grapes as they are grown in a way that you can't when a wine is called sustainable. Having said all that, however, I think all of them are great. You know, anybody that wants to farm organically, anybody that wants to to to make organic wine, anybody that wants to take steps towards sustainability, even if they might not be quite as sustainable as I think they are. Anybody that wants to go biodynamic, I think all of that is really good for the planet. It's good for consumers and good for the wine industry. One of my colleagues on this, podcast is Monty Walden, who is has written a couple of books on on Biodynamic wine, British lives in Italy, and really passionate about that. And I have been ambivalent. I'm you and I have had a couple of conversations over the years about this. But I was on one trip, we were for a short time importing a wine, Moisella, from the Veneto area, and Madelina, Pasquois de Bischeli, if I pronounced that correctly, took me out to her vineyard, and she said, here, just dig into the soil with your hand. And I was able to put my hand in, like, up to the wrist. And she said, that's what my dynamic is. So I had nothing. You know, it wasn't all about the cow horns and the preparations and all that kind of stuff. The net net was clearly a a a palpable, a tactile difference in the soil that the the vines are growing. And and now I can make that connection that was more academic before and maybe mystical. Absolutely. I think one of the great frontiers of human knowledge to be discovered is an understanding of the microbiome in all of its different forms and incarnations. And I think, that's true, you know, within our own bodies, the microbiome of our of our guts, and how that affects and relates to the rest of our our our constitution and health as human beings. And increasingly, it's looking like the microbiome of the soil plays an incredibly crucial role in the health, the flavor, the taste, the performance, the everything to do with with with everything that we grow in the soil, but in particular with with grapes. And so I think as research continues, we are going to start to learn some of the things that I think Biodynamics doesn't explain correctly, but Biodynamics does get right in its emphasis on building, you know, a self contained ecosystem that really supports the health of that soil and its microbiome? Well, speaking about soils and microbiomes, you had said when we were talking earlier about your interest in volcanic wines. And let's turn our attention now to Italian volcanic wines, and maybe you can talk a little bit about the category and what you see happening and what's of interest? I yeah. I don't know what it is. I mean, you know, John Sabo, master Sollier, wrote a whole book on this, which I think is is brilliant. I don't think I've ever been as jealous as a of a fellow writer as I have when he he came out with that book because, you know, that's a book I would have loved to have written. It's, at some point, some day, but he had the idea first and and he knows more about it way more than than than I do. So it's a it's a it's a book that I treasure and and refer to frequently because I am I I am drawn to volcanic based wines. You know, John identifies several characteristics that he says are sort of endemic to to volcanic wines, grit saltiness and power. And, while I might not always use those words or, or, you, you know, always think that those are exactly correct. There is something different about about volcanic lines, and the salt in particular is a word that I that I on to because there's a salinity that you can get sometimes with volcanic wines that, it's just really compelling and and a really interesting dimension to to to the wines. And I tend to be kind of an acid freak when it comes to wines. I like wines with high acidity and wines that sort of, you know, sort of drive the the the salivary glands, you know, nuts, you know, mouth watering wine. More often than not, volcanic wines do that for me. They just have this incredible mouthwater quality where, you know, you don't wanna just take a sip, you wanna take a gulp, you don't wanna just take a gulp, you wanna drink a glass, and you don't wanna just drink a glass, you wanna drink a half a bottle. And so I I I I find them amazingly compelling. I also find the sort of primal nature of the struggle of the grapevine in the volcanic sort of terroir to be compelling. I mean, you and I were on Santorini, right, and you remember sort of seeing, you know, those soils, you know, you know, the six twelve twenty feet of of ash, you know, and Tufa, and these, you know, scraggly vines, you know, it's sort of digging their roots down into the soil, you know, hugging the ground tightly so that the, you know, the winds don't, don't, you know, don't blow them over. And that's really compelling. Like, that's not the nicely manicured, you know, green flat lawns of bordeaux. It's just a fundamentally different landscape, and it's hard not to. And I think this is our this is the human condition speaking here, not the reality, but it's hard not to see those vines on volcanic soils, you know, in the pits, you know, on the Canary Islands or hun, the slopes of Mount Aetna, the world's, you know, a huge active volcano and think, wow, you know, These vines are really working a lot harder than than those ones that are sort of lazing around on the lawns of Bordeaux, and and maybe something about that working harder comes through, you know, in the in the wines. So when we're talking about volcanic wines, what of the Italian varietal volcanic wines, have you been most interested in lately? Well, I left my heart on, on Edna. So I'm a just a massive fan of, of, a Norella Maschalazia, Norello Capucho, and Katicante, and and, you know, and all those, those, those grapes and the wines that are made on on the slopes of Mount Aetna, you know, I also really appreciate a really well made swave, you know, and the the the volcanic lines from from that region of, of the Veneto. You know, there's there's some primary, you know, granitic rock in, in Sardinia, that, that also produces some pretty amazing amazing wines. And then, you know, there's there's some odd little oddball ones you brought up Zubibbo, you know, in Pantaleria, the other day when we were talking. And, and so there's, there's some some great ones there as as well. Okay. Well, we're coming to the end. It's a very interesting, interview of Alder Yarrow, author of Venography. I'd like to end the conversations with, asking my guests what what the big takeaway is of this. Is there something that someone listening to this show can take away and put to use some practical way immediately. I hope this conversation was at the very least entertaining. You know, and if I think back on my role as a wine communicator, part of what I want to do is to get people excited about about wine. And so, you know, I would hope that people would sort of hang on to that notion of curiosity, that I think is so important for anybody in every stage of their of their wine, enjoyment and and journey to to and with wine in their lives. And so, you know, push yourselves a little bit to be more curious to try new things to explore more of the world of wine because, you know, it's it's impossible for that to be unfulfilling. It's impossible for that not to you know, increase your enjoyment of of what wine has to has to offer. Cool. Well, as I think about it, you know, I ask the question. I'll answer it myself too. The concept of keep on tasting just because those are the only wines that are sold in the store. Doesn't mean that those are the only wines that are out there. So as your journey, as you learn or engage with wine, there is no beginning there as well. I guess there's a beginning, but there really isn't an end until you're dead. Because it's always going to be something, you know, to enjoy. So anytime you have an opportunity to go to a tasting and if it's from a country, you might not have thought of whether it's Romania or Bulgaria or Bolivia for that matter to all. Take it. You know, it's like, what Yolgi used to say? Right? If when you come to a fork in the road, take it. Whenever you get a chance to taste wine, taste it. Anyway, sorry to jump in on that. So we're gonna wrap up, this week's edition. I wanna a special thank you to to Aldur. You've been a good friend over the years, and I've been pleased and proud to be able to say that of you, and I look forward to reading and enjoying your opinions in the ensuing few years. So this is Steve racing. Thank you to Aldur. Thank you. And, to all of my listeners, we'll see you next week on get US market ready with Italian wine people. So Chincin and Chow Chow. Thank you again, Aldur. That was fun. This is Steve Ray saying thanks again for listening on behalf of the Italian wine podcast.