Make sure you get some wine to take to the Gladstones’ party,” Sue told me as I went out the door to run a few errands. Oh, great. Dump all the wine decisions on me. It’s a lose-lose situation.

First, how much to spend? The Gladstones will spend a lot of money tossing this shindig, so I’ll have to pony up for at least a $25 bottle ”“ which tastes the same to me as a $6 bottle ”“ because the Gladstones know about wine. They even have different glasses for different kinds of wine. Puh-leeeze. Like that makes any difference in the taste. It’s like Sue always trying to make me drink milk out of a glass instead of the carton. What possible difference could it make? It’d be easier just to leave an envelope with $25 in it when we walk in the door.

What happened to those days when you could bring a bottle of cheap chianti to a party and everyone would swill it as if it were the finest champagne? Oh yeah: 35 years happened. We were 22 then. We could stay up till all hours having long discussions about how all the wrong people were running the world and how different things would be when our turn came. Yet 35 years later, all the wrong people are still running the world ”“ us! We are the people that earnest, 22-year-old college kids can’t wait to kick out of the way.

I don’t think college kids even touch wine anymore. The entire front section of the liquor store is devoted to alcoholic beverages that seem to have been invented by 13-year-olds. Bubble gum-flavored vodka. Carbonated gin. Maple syrup-flavored tequila, freeze-dried worm sold separately. Twelve-year-old scotch in chocolate milk. Peppermint anything.

Beyond that, the liquor store is bursting with wine. There is a red wine section, a white wine section, wines from California, wines from Chile, wines from Australia, wines from Germany, Spain and France. There’s a special on South African wine, a big display of wines from Argentina and cases of a new shipment of wine from New Zealand stacked on the floor. Is there anyplace on the planet that doesn’t make its own wine yet? North Korea, maybe.

There’s an entire wall of wine with ironic, funny names: “Cheap Red Wine.” “The Red Stain.” “Grape Squeezin’s.” Do I really want to show up at the Gladstones’ with a wine that’s funnier than I am?

It’s worse than buying clothes. Much, much worse. If I run into somebody at a clothing store, I don’t have to explain that I’m not an alcoholic and how I rarely come here and this isn’t even for me, it’s for those drunks, the Gladstones.

I know I’m not an alcoholic, but what about all these other people in the store? The place is packed. On a Thursday morning! What does it say about a person when they’ve got nothing better to do on a Thursday morning than to buy liquor? It just screams “drinking problem.” Look at that! Mr. Tompkins has a whole shopping cart full of liquor. If he’s giving a party, why didn’t he invite us? Isn’t that Mrs. Wilkins? My, my, my. She’s buying merlot in a box. That can’t be for her cats. And since that’s what I’m thinking about them, that’s probably what they’re thinking about me.

I finally settle on a California red zinfandel. Can’t go wrong with that, and the price is right. And maybe I’ll get a bottle of Grand Marnier while I’m here; I’m pretty sure we’re out. Look at that! Ouzo. It’s been a long time since I tasted that. Hmmm, that fancy anejo looks good, but $73 for a bottle of aged tequila? “Yeah, but you sip it,” they say. “It will last for a long time.”

Unless some of my friends from 35 years ago show up.

— Jim Mullen takes a wry, witty look at the curiosities of American life in his weekly column. Almost everything is fair game ”“ from the price of a cup of coffee, to shopping at big-box stores, to the perplexing lifestyles of the rich and famous. Contact Jim Mullen at JimMullenBooks.com.