“It is intriguing that there should be a fight over the name vampire that, I would suppose, has long been in the public domain,” writes wine columnist RICHARD CALVER. 

I recommend that you don’t use a knife to remove the pit from an avocado. 

The technique for removing an avocado pit involves banging a knife into the exposed pit of one cut half, which is nestled in the hand or is resting on a chopping board. 

Alas I didn’t use a heavy chef’s knife but instead used a light knife that didn’t sufficiently penetrate the pit and slid off, cutting my right index finger slightly. 

No stitches needed but a quantity of spray skin after a dousing with disinfectant was the fix. 

Blood flow now stopped, I cut the avocado for salad and while waiting for the chicken to cook in the air fryer, I decided to look at the first Daily Wine News received since my return from a Christmas/New Year sojourn in NZ. 

Blow me down, coincidence, here was an article that centred around blood, well, a bloodsucker anyway: “Treasury Wine Estates Sued Over Dracula Wine”.

Talk about connection, this had it all: I’d just cut myself and thoughts of blood were in my head, the article centred on a legal dispute about wine and it invoked the myth of Dracula, something I’d been researching for my second book of fiction. 

In looking at vampiric constructions I stumbled across the fact that porphyria, a blood disorder, may cause severe blisters on skin exposed to sunlight, and it was this disease that was linked to one interesting facet of the vampire myth; that vampires must hide from destructive light. But to the nub of the story. 

In the US, Treasury Wine Estates released a 19 Crimes Dracula Red Blend, in October. 

Halloween was on October 31 in the US and the wine seems to have been marketed to coincide with that festival, replete with a glow-in-the-dark label. 

The release of this wine caused the owner of US-based Vampire Wines to issue suit, alleging that the release of the 19 Crimes wine was likely to cause confusion and to deceive the public at large. 

In other words, the Vampire Winery is saying that the public thought they were buying its wine and this unjustly enriched Treasury Estates. 

It sounds quite like an allegation in Australia of misleading and deceptive conduct under the Australian Consumer Law. But, of course, this is a distinct Californian piece of litigation. 

Whether or not the action will have cut-through is something that is awaited. But it is intriguing that there should be a fight over the name vampire that, I would suppose, has long been in the public domain. 

After all, the Bram Stoker novel was published in the late 19th century. That is one piece of the puzzle. I asked Treasury Wine Estates to comment, but inside of driving a stake through the debate with a blistering comment, they wanted to kill controversy with a statement that frankly sucks: “Treasury Wine Estates treats the intellectual property rights of others with the utmost respect. We stand by the integrity of our brands but we cannot make any further comments regarding this case while it remains pending.”

It’s terrible that they wouldn’t stick their neck out. 

So, back to avocados: why do avocados make terrible friends? Because they are the pits. And my positive new year’s resolution: always de-pit avocados with a spoon. 

What do vampires drink at happy hour? B positive.