I think I'm the most unorganized one here...

I can't tell you how very impressed I am with the incredible organization of the posters here. Seemingly, you all have extensive notes on every wine you have ever imbibed. You have your cellars organized and listed on a real time basis. I am simply not worthy.

Me.... I buy wine and I drink it. If it was really good I usually remember it.... that is, unless I drank too much of it. Wine is an everyday pleasure for me but honestly I'm not taking notes and don't really plan to begin. The subtle distinctions between various kinds of berries is lost on me. I usually buy a mixed case every 2-3 weeks or so. I do make an effort to try to mix the case with 6-8 bottles of stuff I have enjoyed before and plan on drinking in the short term, 1 or 2 bottles of stuff I want to age awhile, and a couple of bottles of new stuff I want to try. Over time, probably 10 years or so, I have built up a collection of about 150 bottles on hand and I try now to maintain at about that level. But a list or computer program of exactly what I have... I don't think so. Every once in awhile I actually look around and usually find something cool I had forgotten I had.

In any event, I am in awe of you folks. Keep it up. I have only been here a few months but I have already picked up a number of good suggestions of wines to include in the new stuff I want to try department. I will admit though that some of the discussions go right over my head. But, even at my advanced age, I'm still learning.

Anyway, Thank You!!!
Glenn

Nah. You would not believe how disorganized my collection is Let's see. I have a few bottles in the refrigerator, a small 30 bottle wine fridge (a Haider), a wine locker in Napa with about 8-10 case capacity, several cases in the garage, two or three cases in the library upstairs, two or three cases in the closet, and some bottles on the kitchen counter top.

At this point in my year long financially insane collecting obsessiveness mania, I have no real idea which bottle is where, although I do enter every bottle onto a spreadsheet (http://www.bottlecount.com)

Luckily, it's winter, and I hate overheated interiors so I at most run my heat an hour a day (and most days none), so the stuff is all keeping cool for the next few months.

[Jenise]

Brian, I have friend who long ago out grew their Eurocave and extra large foyer coat closet. The masterbedroom walk-in closet is now 80% wine (they're not clothes horses), and the last time I visited, I was amused to find that the living room and masterbedroom fire places were now long term storage for champagne. Next thing to go: the first floor powder room. Behold your future.

Ahhhhhhh Noooooooo.

Luckily,??? MY addiction means that I have far outstripped my budgetary constraints (for a variety of things), so we are talking Ramen noodles and soup for the next couple of years. But, at least I will be drinking very good wine with the Ramen.

No your're not. I used to have a catalog of what was in my cellar, but it was lost 4 years ago when my hard drive crashed without a backup.

Tonight I stumbled on six bottles of '94 Carneros Creek Reserve Pinot Noir. I'd forgotten I had cellared those. Twelve years was a bit longer than I'd planned on keeping them. I'm curious to see how they've turned out.

So you're not really unorganized until you start losing things in your cellar and then finding them again years later.

-Paul W.

I can't tell you how very impressed I am with the incredible organization of the posters here.

We lie a lot....

Organized? I make about 80 gallons (400 bottles) every year, usually 5-8 types. I don't label them, but put the same ones in like bottles and store them in bins. I know whats in the bins until the bin gets almost empty and I need the space for a new batch. Then the few bottles that are left get moved to a large wine rack. Now I have a large wine rack full of mystery wines - no lables, unknown wine, vintage, etc. I think I should try some of them soon.

VEry amusing post...the important thing is that you are enjoying your new hobby...an expensive hobby at times... but loads of fun. And I like it you can laugh at yourself and.. at the rest of us `more organized' fools.

Organized? I make about 80 gallons (400 bottles) every year, usually 5-8 types. I don't label them, but put the same ones in like bottles and store them in bins. I know whats in the bins until the bin gets almost empty and I need the space for a new batch. Then the few bottles that are left get moved to a large wine rack. Now I have a large wine rack full of mystery wines - no lables, unknown wine, vintage, etc. I think I should try some of them soon.

The true sign of the home winemaker - a bunch of mystery bottles with no labels!! I have more than a few of those rolling around in my basement...


Mike

Enough of this disingenuousness.

I read some of the voluminous and detailed notes that people post here, and don't know what to think. I oscillate between feelings of awe and complete personal inadequacy.

I do know that one of the ways we express our devotion to the things we love is hyper-organization. There is a lot of love for wine on this BBS, is all I gotta say!

So keep up the good work (as though you need any encouragement); we the Great Disorganized salute you, and learn from you, and are grateful for your skills.

Enough of this disingenuousness.

I will admit that I have my wines recorded in two databases. And yes, my albums are stored alphabetically.

[Robin Garr]

I can't tell you how very impressed I am with the incredible organization of the posters here. Seemingly, you all have extensive notes on every wine you have ever imbibed.

Coming a little late to this topic, I'll jump in with a halfway serious answer: Anyone who's ever seen my office or my car knows that I am far from organized.

But here's a serious point: Anyone who enjoys wine enough to take it up as a hobby - which in my mind is really what being a wine "geek" is all about - is well advised to adopt early the habit of keeping a TN notebook. Make it a practice to jot down some kind of a note - it doesn't have to be fancy, but put down at least the name of the wine and a comment ("Great juice!" may be sufficient). At the end of a year, you'll have a book full of notes, and it can be very helpful to go back and jog your memory - when you try a new wine from the same region, or of the same grape variety, or the next year's vintage - it helps you build a "palate memory" that will strengthen your tasting skills.

Once you've got a notebook, you look organized, even if you're not.

For years I kept my notes on paper. Eventually I went over to a PDA. But there's nothing fancy or, well, "organized" about the way I do it. On paper or on silicon, they're just plain text files.

Well, I hope this isn't improper (if so please go ahead and delete it) but I have to mention that my husband and I recently launched a wine tasting notes application at http://www.vinorati.com. A big part of the reason for creating the site was a response to my frustation with my written notes. I have kept tasting notes for years but I just ended up with pieces of paper jammed into looseleaf notebooks. The notes were great for helping me to focus in the moment but not for referring back to later.

Electronic notes can be a much better tool because they are sortable and searchable, making them a useful reference. The advantage of an online tasting journal, such as Vinorati or WLDG, is that you have access to it anywhere you have internet access so you don't have to worry about stuffing papers into a notebook, or lugging your laptop on a trip. Plus, of course, a Vinorati tasting journal has some other wine-specific features that you would never find in an Excel spreadsheet.

Lisa

My tasting notes reside here and on the old WLDG...for however long that site stays up.

As for cellar organization, I just try to keep a meager 40 bottle unit full with reds at the top and whites / roses' at the bottom.

Richard

[Robin Garr]

My tasting notes reside here and on the old WLDG...for however long that site stays up.

Richard, because of that valuable content, I have no intention of removing the old WLDG posts as long as WineLoversPage.com exists, and I figure that'll be until they carry me out feet-first.