unpleasant surprises

The thing about finding wine that has been forgotten for thirty years is you never know what you're going to get. Sure, according to the label and some internet research, it's worth $250, but that doesn't mean it hasn't been stored upright, drying out the cork and making it mostly undrinkable. The fun is in prying out the disintegrating cork, straining out the sediment with cheesecloth and pouring an expensive wine from a pyrex measuring glass.