Milwaukee native and 1987 UW-Madison graduate Chris Flood was pretty happy in the insurance business down in Dallas when one day a few years ago fate decided that he and his golf buddies should visit an establishment devoted to quenching their thirst.

One thing led to another, and Flood found himself standing at the bar next to an attractive woman who spoke with enough of an accent for Flood to inquire about it.

"I'm from Mexico," she said. Her name was Lourdes and her father was Spanish, her mother Mexican.

They began talking. Flood's golf buddies went home. They kept talking.

"I guess we never really stopped talking," Flood was saying Thursday.

I guess not. They were married about a year later, on June 18, 2005, in Mexico.

And that is why, this week, Flood is back in Wisconsin, bringing his considerable charm and enthusiasm to introducing a new tequila to a state that might prefer brandy but has rarely turned aside spirits of any variety.

"Probably too early for a taste," Flood said. It was 8 a.m., and he was sitting in the Panera Bread on Mineral Point Road.

"Probably."

"But you have to smell this," he said. Flood opened a bottle of clear liquid labeled Manik Blanco. It is a premium tequila, made entirely from the blue agave plant.

"It smells good," Flood said. "Even in the morning."

It did smell good. So did the two other Manik premiums -- even more premium, since they were aged -- that Flood uncapped.

They are the flagship offerings of the distillery in the Mexican state of Jalisco run by Flood's extended family. Lourdes' "uncle" -- actually her mother's cousin -- runs the distillery, which has a production capacity of 10,000 liters a day. The family also owns 3,000 acres on which agave is grown.

The Manik brand -- the name, chosen by Lourdes, is out of Mayan lore -- has been around for eight years and Flood has been the U.S. importer for about 18 months. He's kept his insurance business but when he fell for Lourdes he fell too for the romance and promise of her family's tequila. It's currently available in eight states, including California and Texas, and this week it debuts in Wisconsin.

Flood has high hopes for Manik here because of his deep roots in the state. He's a graduate of Whitefish Bay High School and got his economics degree from UW-Madison in 1987. "It was a fun time to be here," he said. "I ran around State Street but never got in too much trouble." He makes a point of coming back for a Badger football game every fall.

Flood's Wisconsin distributor for Manik is Purple Feet Wines out of Pewaukee. They visited retailers in the Milwaukee area earlier in the week and the reaction, Flood said, was gratifying. "When people try it, they love it," he said. They had Madison area visits scheduled Thursday.

I don't know where I was when tequila went from a "shoot as many as you can until you puke on your shoes" drink to something that can be sipped and savored. Last year in the Mail on Sunday newspaper, a London bar owner was quoted saying: "At its best, tequila is easily equal to the finest whisky or cognac."

Actually, I do know where I was. I was looking far and wide trying to find absinthe, the mysterious high-octane green spirit that Hemingway, Picasso and Oscar Wilde made famous in Paris early in the last century.

I have been a hopeless romantic on the subject since reading Barnaby Conrad's fine book, "Absinthe: History in a Bottle." I wanted to be at the next table in a cafe on the Left Bank while Hemingway was setting down the first draft of "The Sun Also Rises." Failing that, I wanted to try absinthe.

For years, absinthe was banned in the United States because one of the ingredients was a toxin that, some thought, made people act crazy. It is now believed the original absinthe contained far less of the toxin -- thujone -- than first believed, so real absinthe is slowly being introduced, legally, in the United States. I wonder if the romance can survive respectability.

But tequila? Tequila was blended with a bunch of stuff in a Jimmy Buffett song, or shot with salt and a lime.

Not any longer. Now it can be sipped, and Chris Flood is here to tell you how good the sipping can be. If it tastes as good as it smelled at 8 a.m., I'm sold.