If your holidays are still around the corner, all I can say is: lucky you - with an extra dart of envy if you're setting off for some wine-producing country whose vineyards will soon be a blaze of gold. For the rest of us, autumn stretches ahead, straight and workmanlike as the Special Bus Corridor. But at least we can adjust our drinking to hang on to the holiday mood. Warm up the first chilly evenings with the kind of bottles that will transport you back - in a great Proustian surge of remembered tastes - to dinner on a moonlit terrace. Ah, dreams.
Travel abroad has been a major factor in Ireland's growing fondness for the grape. And its impact seems set to continue, with signs that not two but three holidays a year are fast becoming the norm. We've turned all continental, with dinner instead of tea and shaved Parmesan instead of Dairylea. The best thing about this transmogrification, I trust you'll agree, is that no evening meal seems quite complete without a modest bottle of vino.
The anti-drink lobby will, no doubt, view this trend as just another manifestation of Ireland's weakness for alcohol in any form. But I don't think they should. What we've absorbed from holidays abroad is the worthwhile discovery that wine is something to enjoy slowly, with a meal - something to share with family and friends, along with tasty food and good conversation. It's civilised and life-enhancing - more than can be said for other foreign borrowings like tequila slammers and chewing gum.
Trips to wine-producing countries are also journeys of discovery in a more specific sense, introducing Irish travellers to exciting flavours they may not have come across at home. Jaunts abroad are a cheering reminder that a world of wine exists beyond the all-too-familiar landscape of Chardonnay and Cabernet. There's a natural tendency to prolong the holiday magic back at home, to judge from all the wine merchants who report sporadic (but increasing) interest in unusual grapes - like southern Italy's Negroamaro, France's Mourvedre, Portugal's Baga, Greece's Xynomavro or some of the other dark strangers listed below.
As few things are more depressing than trying to spot the charm in a sunshine wine like Vinho Verde some chilly evening in October, it's probably wise to stick mainly to reds while browsing around over the next month or two for wines to prolong the pleasure of the holidays - or help conjure it up if you haven't got away. These are the kind of bottles that will do the trick:
France
Chateau Gres Saint Paul, Coteaux du Languedoc, 1997 (Searsons Monkstown, Michael's Wines Mount Merrion, Wine Centre Kilkenny, O'Donovan's Cork, De Vine Wines Letterkenny, usually about £7.95. Choosing just one wine to encapsulate la belle France is crazy, but this does a brilliant job on behalf of all the character-packed wines that are now emerging from one of my favourite holiday regions in the south. See Bottle of the Week.
Spain
Palacio de la Vega Tempranillo Reserva, Navarra, 1994 (McCabe's Merrion, Vintry Rathgar, Cheers/Playwright Blackrock, Sweeney's Dorset St and Fairview, Kelly's Artane, Pettitt's in south-east, O'Donovan's Cork, usually about £9.99). A classic Spanish marriage of sweet, spicy fruit and ripe but meaty tannins: this is a nicely mature wine with a long, engaging finish. Its younger brother, the basic Tempranillo 1996, though more straightforward, is a good buy, too, for a couple of pounds less.
Portugal
Casa Cadaval Trincadeira Preta, Vinho Regional Ribatejo, 1996 (Molloy's Liquor Stores, £10.69). The grape may be confusing (Trinadeir a Preta is also known as Castelao Frances, Santarem, Joao de Santarem and Periquita - are you still with me?). But this fleshy, velvety, blackberryish wine is proof of how far Portugal has moved from the dusty, rather dried-up reds it's still unfairly associated with. It takes me straight back to a fine old estate among the bulls and horses of the Ribatejo.
Italy
Montepulciano d'Abruzzo, il vino dal Tralcetto, Cantina Zaccagnani, 1996 (Searson's Monkstown, On the Grapevine Dalkey, Wine Centre Kilkenny, usually about £8.75) You may not have got to the Abruzzi yet (I certainly haven't), but never mind: this wine is a reminder of all that is deliciously distinctive about Italian reds. One of two new Montepulcianos acquired by Searson's, it's nicknamed Twiggy because a bit of stick (vine, presumably), knotted in red ribbon, hangs rather dubiously around its neck. Fear not. Both of them are smashing - this one my favourite by an inch because livelier acidity makes it extra juicy. A twig-free bottle is also available.
Greece
Notios, Country Wine of the Peloponnese, Nemea, 1997 (Oddbins, £7.99). This has been my year for Greece - and this plummy, spicy red is the kind of wine I'll keep on drinking through the autumn to bring the dazzling white houses and aquamarine waters floating back.
USA
Pedroncelli Mother Clone Zinfandel, Dry Creek Valley, 1995 (Dunnes Stores selected outlets, £10.99). A wine-loving friend, recently back from holiday in California, still hasn't recovered from the shock of American wine prices. It's definitely getting difficult to sample worthwhile north American wines, there or here, without spending silly money. But here's an exception: Zinfandel, the local speciality, at an OK price, given the quality.