Less than 30 minutes after the SBIG secretary launches an impassioned internet plea to Sauvignon Blanc Interest Groupies for support, a couple of copies of his email are kindly forwarded to me.

The whole thing is such a tissue of hysterical porkie pies, I hope he had enough smelling salts on hand when he typed it. He quotes so much out of context, thank heavens he’s not a legal secretary. For example:

He claims I said the “Sauvignon Blanc Interest Group are complaining to the Sunday Times about a recent blog pointing out the negative correlation between their FNB Top Ten and the Veritas results” and then comments

“This is not true and Neil Pendock knows it. I complained in my personal capacity to the Sunday Times about the libelous statements made against my character, implicating me in fraudulent behaviour of “match-fixing” – the only conclusion that can be drawn from reading the blog and the comments written by Neil Pendock.” How would I know what he told the Sunday Times?

I blogged “Twitter reports the Sauvignon Blanc Interest Group are complaining to the Sunday Times about a recent blog pointing out the negative correlation between their FNB Top Ten and the Veritas results. Oh dear, has SBIG now come to mean Sensor Blogs, Idees en Goed?” and stand by it. As to match fixing, “who the cap fit” as Bob Marley so memorably sang it. I never did.

Regarding “the accusation that [the secretary] inappropriately coached the judges of the 2013 FNB Top 10 Competition” I flatly deny making this accusation and suggest he goes back and reads my blog post again for he has clearly misread it. Not great for a secretary.

I would never attempt to cast a cloud of doubt on the character and integrity of FNB or any other banker as I find it inadvisable to irritate people far richer than I. What the secretary is trying to do is close down my Times Live blog and he shall shortly find out that legal remedies work both ways. Censorship is the last resort of those losing the argument.

What worries me most is his closing paragraph, for it sounds ominously like a goodbye. “I thank you all for the wonderful opportunities I have been granted as secretary of the Sauvignon Blanc Interest Group (SBIG) over the past eight years, and also the organiser of the FNB Top 10 Sauvignon Blanc Competition. It has been an honour and a privilege.”

I do hope not as there are so many more betrayals I’d like to blog about. Like the time he vouchsafed that WOSA CEO Su Birch told UK wine writers that Emile Joubert and I were the two biggest threats to SA wine. Luckily, I keep all my emails.

A belated apology to my many readers. Interest in this site has been so huge (well over 1000 page downloads and far larger even than my well-endowed Times Live blog) we’ve had to move to a larger server and this takes 24 hours as electrons travel particularly slowly in Cape Town. The New York Times calls it “cosmic molasses” and they’re not wrong.