for relaxing times: drink some custard out of a shoe

Here's a nice little advert for the excellent Whisky Shop, a couple of whose branches I have visited, in Fort William and Oban - regrettably the nearest one to Newport appears to be in Oxford, which isn't very convenient.



It's a nice illustration of the simultaneous ridiculousness and invaluableness of whisky tasting notes - even the ones you don't agree with at least provoke some discussion, which is the whole point. I'm not sure about the "custard" for the Dalmore, for instance, though I can see the "leather" bit. I think it's much more like an old Chippendale writing desk smeared in marmalade. And I stand by "blowtorched corned beef" for the Bowmore, however much they might try to persuade me it tastes of grassy peat and peaches. On the other hand, the flaming Christmas pudding and seaweed for the Old Pulteney is pretty good.

Here's a couple of one- and two-item brief summaries for a few previous ones from my list:

• Tormore: Lift lemon tea
• Aberlour: Battenburg cake thrown into a sherry trifle
• Oban: Rice pudding served in a tractor tyre
• Glenmorangie: custard creams
• Highland Park: the warm bicycle saddle of a disappointed spinster

Your other option whisky-ad-wise is to get some celeb in to whore himself out for a few shekels and a couple of free bottles of the vendor's product. If I were you I'd give Sean Connery a call, as he's got some previous with both Scottish blender Dewar's and, amusingly, Suntory in Japan, in a couple of ads very similar to the ones parodied by Lost In Translation.