Many thanks to the members here

Thanks to being persuaded by helpful posts from various members of this forum, I have gone back to the "5-point" scoring of 0-4 that I used long ago. For red Bdx. under 88 from me gets 0: 88-90 gets 1: 90.5 to 92 gets 2; 92.5 to 95 gets 3; and 95.5 and up gets 4. I made a rough calculation of our average red Bdx. score and came up with slightly under 3.4, when I would like it to be a little over 3.5. Then I realized that if we live a bit longer things will happen automatically.

Our 2012 wines (very good and good/enjoyable) will be drunk next with some giving away/sharing, followed by 2011 (many very good). We have no 2013 Bdx. Our 2014 wines are generally very good and will probably be drunk after the 2009/10.

Our 2009 and 2010 wines (as the French did, I often preferred the latter year) are "good/enjoyable" or "very good" and it will be no hardship to drink them, or to give away/share some of the "very good." As nearly all our 2015/6 wines are counted by me as "great" (95.5-96.5) they will mostly be drunk last, if we last long enough. I see more sharing than giving for those. At least I do not think we overpaid for any left bank red Bdx. Many thanks to the members and moderators here who have made things much easier for us.

[Jenise]

Then you're still scoring the wines, you're just converting the numbers to a different system, albeit within a range.

My thoughts: although I believe they've dropped it now, a zillion years ago the Speck equated 80-84 with Good, 85-89 with Very Good, 90-94 Excellent and 95 Up Oustanding/Classic. It goes without saying that 50-79 are equally worthless. Best system ever, and it's still how I 'score' wines in the rare event I find it helpful to do so. So if you read a tasting note of mine? (Actually, I don't think you read other people's tasting notes, or you'd have been moved to comment on the Santa Rita Hills pinots I posted about.) Anyway, my notes often end with those very words, like Very Good or Excellent--and from me, that IS a score. Where I find the difference between 91 and 92 points meaningless, the difference between Very Good and Excellent is anything but.

I am afraid that it has become second nature for me to score red Bordeaux and Bordeaux blends from elsewhere more or less automatically. I do not buy a case or more of anything I score below 90.5 and not much of anything below 92.5. I try to find 95.5 and over wines at a reasonable price, but at our ages I doubt that my wife and I will buy much more red Bdx.

David's praise of a Riesling induced me to buy one, though I mistakenly ordered Wehlener Sonnenuhr instead. I do not score white wines or reds that are not Bdx./Bdx. blends.

As for the Sta. Rita Hills PNs I have mentioned them from time to time. A friend of ours, now sadly departed, used to give fabulous dinners to her friends with great wines, including Sea Smoke Pinot Noir. She and I used to drink lesser Sta. Rita Hills PNs when my wife and I took her to dinner in restaurants, and she and I agreed that we had never had a PN from the area that we did not like, no matter how low the price.