Oddbins, Odd Name and Odd Commentary

On Friday I was searching for a couple of bottles of wine to bring to a friend's party.  Given that I was feeling a little bit lazy (and it looked like it was going to pour), I decided to browse nearby wine stores' websites to get an idea of their inventory / what I wanted before going out.  This turned into the best idea ever.  I learned that on Oddbins' website, can you browse by food and wine pairings including but not limited to:

• Offal (Perhaps if I drank enough wine first I would consider serving this?  Who am I kidding, I would never serve offal.) 
• Lentils (Are there really people out there concerned with what wine pairs well with lentils?) 
• Venison and game (Glad we're not limiting the category to venison.)
• Pork and bacon (Happy to see that bacon is important enough to get its own classification, albeit within the pork category.)
• Eggs (Why yes, I always worry what wine I should serve with eggs.  Oh wait, strike that, it would be champagne for mimosas.)

If you can't decide / don't know precisely the food that's being served, no worries, Oddbins also offers the choice of browsing/buying wines by occasion.  I definitely understand the dinner party wines, celebration wines, and party wines categories.  But then they branch out to weekending wines, discovery wines and contemplation wines.  Really???

Dear Oddbins,

Please advise what wine to drink while sitting reflectively by a stream, watching the clouds float by when it's precisely nine degrees Celcius outside and the sun is partially shining but I keep getting distracted from my 'contemplation' by checking Facebook on my iPhone.  In case it matters, it's an iPhone 4, not 5.  And let's just say it's for a Tuesday early afternoon.

Thanks,
Anonymous Expat

The fun doesn't stop there though as once you actually click through to a specific wine, in addition to the J. Peterman type review, you get a four bullet synopsis under the following four categories:


 
 


Each wine has its own unique categorization and they're all hilarious.  Favorites include:

You need your funny bone tickled

House of Fun by Madness

Wa-hey, that's the spirit!

Between laughter

and

You like who you are

"Independent Women" by Destiny's Child

Nobody's going to change me

Local produce

and

After a near miss

Stayin Alive

About insurance

Spicy Thai

and

You're having a strange dream

"Everybody's Happy Nowadays" by Buzzcocks

Is this real?

Ripe brie, before bed.

I could copy and paste indefinitely or you can go check it out yourselves.  It's time for me to crack open one of the bottles that corresponds with one of the above 'reviews.'