Comments & Curiosities:

Sometimes you just gotta wait. Doesn’t matter how hard it is or how long it takes, you just have to be patient.

Well, you little foodie you, I have very exciting news. The wait is over, your ship has come in, say Hallelujah, come on get happy, the Newport Beach Food & Wine Festival at the Balboa Bay Club and Resort is back!

Are you excited? I knew you would be. Settle down, get hold of yourself, we have a lot to talk about.

Next weekend will be the BBC’s Sixth Annual Food & Wine Festival, Friday through May 24.

If you obsess about food and wine, if you take forever to decide whether you want to top your arugula salad with parmigiano reggiano or ricotta salata but having a glass of Opus One cabernet helps you think, you gotta be there.

This is important. If you have plans for next weekend, cancel them. If it’s your daughter’s graduation, tell her you love her and to make sure she sends you some pictures.

If your boss says you have to work, tell him thanks, wish him the best and turn in your swipe card. Seriously.

And this year, it all has a decidedly South American theme. Super chevere! (which means very cool.) A tango in Argentina, a samba in Brazil, a hot day on the Copacabana, and those, um, bathing suits, which is a stretch. Is there anything more sensual than South America?

For the sixth year running, BBC President and epicurean maestro Henry Schielein and his second-in-command, food and beverage master Dieter Hissin, have whipped up a tour de force of foods and wines that will make grown men cry and women sigh.

From 6:30 to 10 p.m. Friday, it all starts with a bang from way down south, and we’re not talking about Chattanooga.

“South America on the Bay” will dazzle you with South American regional delicacies and star performers from the finest South American wineries while a white-hot salsa band pounds the timbales and shakes their booties, not necessarily in that order.

Could there be a better way to kick off your Memorial Day weekend? I don’t see how.

Just before the “South America on the Bay” bash, if you want to learn how to look both very cool and as if you know what you’re doing, “Tasting with the Masters” at 6 p.m. is the ticket, as Master Sommeliers Ron Mumford and Ira Harmon show you how to get through a wine tasting like an old pro — old meaning experienced, of course.

Saturday is a big, big day but if you pace yourself, you’ll be just fine. At 11:30 a.m., South American Winery Ambassador Philip Di Belardino will guide his guests through the a dazzling luncheon that would make Eva Peron say, “Cry all you want, Argentina, I’m going to lunch.”

The luncheon features wine pairings from the prestigious Chilean winery Concha Y Toro, which is Spanish for “Ohmigod, that’s good.”

At 3 p.m., it’s “Chardonnays from Around the World,” as the BBC Master Sommeliers compare and contrast Old World and New World chardonnays. Oakey, buttery, fruity, whatever-ee — they got it and you’ll taste it.

At 4:30 p.m., Larry O’Brien, master sommelier with Beam Wine Estate, will lead you through “Red Wine Blending with Clos du Bois Marlstone.” Not only do you learn how to blend your own meritage, but you get to take it with you! Is this a great country or what?

From 7 to 10 p.m. Saturday , it’s the festival’s major rager in the Grand Ballroom, “The Grand Tasting: Wines from Around the World.”

Either the food or the wine at The Grand Tasting would be a show-stopper. Together, they are a religious experience. Executive Chef Josef Lageder and his culinary army will leave you thrilled and your cardiologist worried with a seemingly infinite array of carving stations, seafood delicacies, cheeses and desserts.

Ooh, the desserts. I should never have mentioned those. Now I can’t think. Add to that the best of the best from more than 60 wineries around the world, including estate and reserve wines typically only available at the wineries themselves.

There will even be live entertainment on stage, including me in drag as Betty Boop, doing “I Wanna Be Loved By You,” which is not something you see every day, thank God.

May 24? There is no rest I tell you. It starts with a sumptuous European breakfast buffet in the First Cabin restaurant from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and finishes at 4 p.m. with “Cigars, Cognacs and Cocktails” on the Terrace, the perfect closer.

Master Mixologist-Performer Livio Lauro will present the history of the martini, which requires careful study, followed by cocktails, fine cognacs and cigars hand-rolled by a local artisan.

Best of all, with May 25 being a holiday, you have a full day to fluff and fold before you go back to the mine or wherever it is you go, not that it’s any of my business. The perfect weekend? It just might be.

There you have it: the Sixth Annual Newport Beach Food & Wine Festival at the Balboa Bay Club and Resort. Call (949) 630-4146 for tickets or information or both.

“I wanna be loved by you, just you and nobody else but you. I wanna be loved by you alone…boop-boop-a-doop.” Sorry. Just practicing. I gotta go.

PETER BUFFA is a former Costa Mesa mayor. His column runs Sundays. He may be reached at ptrb4@aol.com .