Special thanks to the Serego Alighieri, Masi, and Frescobaldi families
for the hospitality, food, and incredible VINO!
By Eric Bochner
June 16th, 2010
There is a tradition in Siena, an annual event held in la Piazza Il Palio, the name of the event derived from the name of the piazza, or vice versa. Il Palio is a contest, the 17 contratae (districts of Siena) competing with a single horse and a single rider. They ride bareback around the outer ring of the piazza, a large imperfect circle that looks to be about a quarter of a mile around. The sidewalk café at which we sat is in this ring, and during the competition the tables are cleared away and dirt is poured and packed over the cobblestones. Thousands of people pack into the center of the piazza for the races and the vendors all around sell photographs of the intensely popular event. It will be something to plan for on the next visit over.
This installment of SIT at the BAR was going to be our first video blog. I wasn’t just going to SIT at the BAR, but rather, I was going to hang out at “Tales of the Cocktail” in New Orleans with bartenders from all over the country and talk philosophy and passion, and make it all into a slick video, with the help of my creative partner, Brent Herrmann. However, the day before I left town, I found out that Brent passed away suddenly the night before. Brent was a very special person; everyone at Twin Liquors respected, appreciated and knew him well. He was I.T. so he went around fixing everyone’s problems. That’s who he was, a problem solver. What started out as I.T. led to web developing, and eventually, he became part of our creative marketing team. He was responsible for the “Sandra & Jessica” videos, the “Dan Aykroyd, Crystal Head Tour” video and so much more. He always had a plan and was ready to execute.
I originally started writing this blog because I was encouraged to do so by a few people. One of those people was Brent Herrmann. Brent was one of our IT guys here at Twin; he passed away on Sunday, July 18, very suddenly, and very young.