Here’s a nice quick sensible weeknight Pynchon-in-Public happy-birthday-Thomas drink!

Watered Moselle pops up towards the end of Gravity’s Rainbow, a wind-down drink as the wheels fly off and Slothrop dissipates into the polluted aether, or a last optimistic sip to lend us a little courage for the fight ahead.

We find ourselves, between these rocket emblazoned covers, in a moment of defiant hope. Ensign Morituri, Carroll Eventyr, Thomas Gwenhidwy, and good old Roger Mexico are gathered at an inn called Der Grob Säugling, plotting a Counterforce:

The sun makes the water sparkle. The housetops are red, the steeples are white. Everything is miniature, neat, gently pastoral, locked into the rise and fall of seasons. […] A cow sez moo. The milkmaid farts at the milk pail, which echoes with a very slight clang, and the geese honk or hiss. The four envoys drink watered Moselle and talk mandalas.

Gravity’s Rainbow, p. 706.

The Moselle is watered (down) presumably so that they can keep their wits about them and puzzle out this rocket mandala to its end. (We know Gwenhidwy’s tastes usually run a touch stronger—things must be serious). Watered suits me here too; it’s Thursday night, and my tennis team is battling later this evening to keep off the bottom of the ladder.

Moselle wine is that grown along the slopes of the Moselle river. Mostly, its German riesling. I’ve got a bottle of Dr Loosen Bernkasteler Lay Riesling Kabinett. It’s peachy and somewhat sweet, with a nice acid zing. Watering it down steps that sweetness back a little, but lets through a lot more juice ripe peach, plus a little minerality. I don’t know that I’ve ever deliberately diluted wine (excepting Gallo with ice here many years ago), but this really works okay. The flavours definitely still pop, just with a more guzzleable lightweight poise.

I hope everyone, most especially the man himself, has had a glorious 88th annual Pynchon in Public day. (I choose to believe the holiday was inaugurated with Mr Pynchon’s birth, however much later it may have come to widespread public knowledge). Let’s raise a glass, watered or otherwise, in honour of the king of the Counterforce, prophet of the preterite multitudes, Thomas Pynchon. Long may we gather in inns tucked away globewide to mark the holiday and plot the undoing of Their death-plots.