Sangria

My parents told me that they recently bought a bottle of already made sangria, but that it was not good. That trivial bit of conversation reminded me that a few years ago, I was a fairly regular drinker of sangria. It was back when I was a uni student: at our kitchen parties, or simply at our gatherings, we often made sangria. Ironically, my friends then were mostly Italian. We bought some cheap wine, some fizzy soft drink, fresh fruits, fruit juice and a bottle of spirit, either tequila, gin or vodka. And we mixed it in the biggest bowl we could find. That's how our evenings started, usually. My Spaniard friend would say: "All right guys, we're gonna make sangria." And we did. I don't remember it tasting nice, but we drank plenty of it. I don't remember getting drunk from it, but one of my Italian friends got sick on sangria at the end of the infamous Saint Paddy's kitchen party of 2,000. Infamous in our circle of friends at the time anyway. Shehad decided to finish the bowl when everybody but three people were gone, after my other friend and I were downing beers. I still tease her about it. But yeah, after my uni years, I don't think I ever drank sangria again.