After years of toiling in the bowels of the software industry, I began to hear the siren’s song of wine, at first faint and then gradually louder. I started to bring wine books to work and study them clandestinely behind my closed and locked office door. For years before I contemplated working with wine I found myself visiting places as-yet-unknown to me (e.g., the dark route between Toulouse and Auch, alone one winter night to eat cassoulet and drink Gaillac wine) to learn more about the wines of the region. I knew that I had to try to find my way in the wine world. I had visited old school bars au vin such as Jacques Mélac in Paris and realizing that there was nothing quite like that in Los Angeles, got the notion that opening something similar here might be a sensible pathway to begin working with wine. After completing my WSET level 3, beginning the WSET diploma program and continuing to travel to wine regions that interested me, I opened Lou Wine Bar in Hollywood in 2005. I operated for seven years and sold my business in 2012 (nightmare landlord), opening my wine shop in Los Feliz in 2014. We just celebrated our fifth anniversary.