3 minute read
Cooking
Grape Expectations by Max Crus
Nailing it with tradies
It is unclear why tradies hate me. Perhaps it was that incident years ago when a builder was putting the fnishing touches to some new back steps at a friend’s place, and I nearly died descending them to admire his handy work because the treads were too close together or narrow even for my (rather short) boots. “Ooh, are these steps a bit close together”? I politely opined. “What does ‘opined’ mean, and did I ask for your opinion? How long have you been a builder?”, he responded with a tone not dissimilar to my boots. Or perhaps it was “How many steps have you built”, but you get the idea. He was questioning my ability to make something when of course he should have been asking “How many steps have you descended?”, a suggestion which went down about as well as I did his steps. Luckily my friend’s mother also almost died that day on those steps and suddenly, “perhaps they are a bit close together…yeah, I was going to change them”, he was heard to remark. Co-incidentally, every encounter with tradesmen ever since has followed a similar pattern.
But how do they know?
Is it because they are already having smoko when I stroll past with the dog at 7am? Which begs the question “why do tradies always start stupidly early”? It’s not as if they do any work then. They stand around yacking about footy or Australia’s level of migrant intake while John Laws blathers on in the background, occasionally starting up their loudest power tool on the tick of 7am, just for effect.
Is it my soft hands when greeting tradies, revealing, quite correctly, that I haven’t lifted anything heavier than a pen for 30 years, and ask, again politely, why can’t we do without cornices? Is it because whenever I wear steel-capped boots I get blisters?
Or that the only hi-viz colour that suits me is fouropink? Does it stem from that time that I innocently asked the builder why the owners hadn’t used an architect. How was I to know he was an owner builder? How can you tell. Maybe it was that time I was having Friday night drinks with friends right next to a bunch of tradies and ordered moscato instead instead of Tooheys New, and upon sensing the sneers said, “same as you, it’s what we order when we want something cold, frothy and completely uninspiring but unlike Tooheys New, has some favour?”
Criminal Minds SA Semillon Sauvignon Blanc (“partners in crime”) 2019, $18.
What is it with the Aussie wine industry and crooks? Nice wine over which to ponder your next heist or fraud or speeding fine. 9/10.
Criminal Minds Riverland Chardonnay (“that’s refreshingly honest”) 2020, $18.
Refreshingly honest putting Riverland on the label too, good on ya Byrne Vineyards. Honesty is the best policy in life and chardonnay. 9.1/10
Meerea Park Hunter Valley Alexander Munro (Individual Vineyard) Shiraz 2019, $115.
Like a lot of tradies on a Friday night I am not a super fan of Hunter reds but I had to eat my words, and my dinner, with yet another exception to the rule. Body and depth of a brickie, why can’t they all be like this? 9.6/10.
Again, maybe not a go-to for tradie mates, but ignoring the gender stereo type debate and the vocational stereo type debate, tradies’ wives will likely love this, as did we, specially those called Fiona. Again astonishingly good value. 9.2/10.
Rewild Murray Darling Prosecco (Sustainably Made)
2022, $10. It’s no soft and fluffy moscato, but as a Friday arvo tipple, you are still best advised to not order this with your tradie mates. Nevertheless, amazingly good value and not out of place at an art gallery front bar. 9.1/10.
Meerea Park Hunter Valley Individual Vineyard ‘The Aunts’ Shiraz, 2021, $40.
Sounds like the hole I dig myself when in the company of tradies, but I reckon I could win a few over with this, steer them away from the Tooheys for day, for the same price as a round on a Friday night.
