I bought this mug for the wife way back in September, when he was still just “the child” or Baby Yoda, set adrift among the stars with the Mandalorian. I had planned on making a drink in it for her birthday, but things change as they so often do. This little fella languished in a box for a while, not forgotten, but not getting any love either, even after he revealed himself as Grogu. Last week, during the Snowpocalypse my son and I built new shelves to showcase our cocktail glass collection, with a special area for the tiki mugs and this guy took center stage. Even since, he will not stop subtly reminding us that he still has not had his moment in the twin suns and that he sort of needs that. He’s got abandonment issues. So, in honor of late bloomers everywhere, won’t you please join me now as we stand and make The Castaway.
They say that the best place to start is at the beginning, so I am going to make an effort to take us all the way back to where it all began, allegedly. They also say that today is National Margarita Day, a holiday clearly needed by the masses and the “frozen or rocks” lobby. The answer is rocks, by the way. They don’t tell you that, they just roll their eyes and laugh as they walk away if you get it wrong. I hope to answer the bigger question of how did we get here, but that may be a little too ambitious? For now, let’s just delve a little deeper and look for prime causes as we stand and make the Brandy Daisy.
We still have snow, but the temp is in the 50’s and the thaw is on in earnest. It looks like the biggest danger is going snowblind, but I have shades, so no worries. They have already called off school for tomorrow, but hopefully by then the last of the ice pack will be gone. I am not taking any chances though, so I am sticking with a pseudo tropical theme. Won’t you join me now as we stand and make Three Milks.
Today the sun is shining…on the snow. The good news is, it is slightly above freezing and the road is looking better so maybe tomorrow we can sneak out and let someone else make the coffee. Before I was even out of bed, Laura suggested a new drink and it sounded terrible, but we could do a cool and timely presentation. Today we are going with form over function as we spend yet another day on the farm waiting for life to restart. So, in honor of those who quietly go stir crazy as they wait for the defrost cycle to begin, won’t you join me as we stand and make the Frozen Ice-olation.
A little more snow, a lot more ice, another quiet day at home with hours to fill. I could have been productive and cleaned off the desk in the office or organized the rums or dusted my trophy case, but we skipped all that in favor of blueberry pancakes, introducing the boy to The Munsters, watching YouTube cooking videos, finally finishing Ace Combat, oh and day drinking. So, in the spirit of making the most of forced confinement, won’t you please join me now as we stand and make the classic Pearl Diver.
We awoke to a winter, ummm, what’s the opposite of wonderland? Our snow storm turned out to be a glazing of ice, covered with sleet pellets. No chance for a snowman and making ice and slush angels is way less fun than it sounds. So we spent the day mostly indoors. Sure, I’d venture out from time to time to go for a walk around the property or down to the end of the driveway to check out the ice on the roads, look and see if anyone had run off the curve lately, write my name in the sleet, you know the important stuff. Now that the sun has set, I figure it is time for a drink, so in the hopes that something from more temperate climes will warm our hearts, won’t you please join me as we stand and make the Port Royal.
It is Valentine’s Day, which seems like the perfect opportunity to make a nice sweet drink with some depth and complexity then follow it up with an even sweeter story of incredible depth and levels of complex beauty only dreamt of by mortal man. I could do that. Sondheim would have us believe the “opportunity is not a lengthy visitor” that can be missed before you even realize it has arrived. Of course, he would take at least an hour and a half before revealing that wisdom just after intermission. So, in the spirit of cutting to the chase and not beating around the bush, won’t you please join me now as we stand and make the P.S. I Love You.
Once upon a time, that’s how you are supposed to begin a tale, right? I am pretty sure so many stories start with that one sentence because just staring at the blank page is one of the hardest parts of writing. The getting started is daunting. In some ways it is even worse in the computer age, instead of a patient piece of paper waiting for ink, you have a little cursor winking on and off, sort of tapping its imaginary foot as you try to figure out how to begin. It reminds me of the old side scroller game “Captain Goodnight” whose title character would take out a yo-you and stand there in all his 8-bit glory playing if you weren’t giving input. I want to talk about a terrifying evening in college but it is really more than we should get into in the intro and I have already taken up a good bit of space talking about how it is hard to start, which means, we have in effect, already started, so I’ll get to the opening catchphrase and pick up the storytelling after the break. That is, if you will please join me as we stand and make, the Red Light.
I haven’t been properly drunk in a while. Which is a shame. I should be drunk or otherwise lubricated to write this missive, but I am not and I am not inclined to fix that. It’s gonna make it hard to really dig into the stream of way too conscious ramblings, but I going to try, for America and other interested parties. Though I make a drink everyday to share, I rarely drink it all. The wife and I split it and go on with our evening. Proper drinking is a thing to be done in crowds, shared with friends, even if you just met them. In this year without contact, I just haven’t had much impetus to drink more than a couple of sips at a time. I need for people to come along, for me to really enjoy the ride. And today is all about the ride, so I need to be out there looking for the edge, but I am doing it sober and it is hard to get there on your own, well, hard to get there on your own without a handful of pills or other chemical assistance. The thing is, I never really liked drugs. Maybe I just did the wrong ones. If I’d have had some sort of shaman or spirit guide to lead me along that particular path of enlightenment, may be I would feel differently. But I didn’t, so I don’t. Sure I experimented with the light stuff, but I never found a really good fit, so, beyond social stuff other people offered, I left them alone and never got to experience the truly mind-altering things. Drinking was different, that one was easy for me. It was accessible and I am open minded. It worked for both of us. But you don’t really get those mind and consciousness expanding revelations from a bottle. You get a penchant for story telling, laughing too loudly and embarrassing your more sedate friends with your antics, but if there are any true and deep lessons to be learned they mostly get lost somewhere between the hangover and that first cup of coffee. So, in the spirt of a certain laissez-faire attitude toward the truth and self aggrandizement, let us gather at the river as we stand and make the Gonzo.
One of the things I have learned being a parent is just how much of our communication is based in shared experiences and references. This is why it is so easy to chat with folks you have known a long time and why meeting new people from different cultures often has a stumbling period as you learn how to better understand one another. Last year, I instituted a Film History 101 course for the kid to help fill in an empty space in his daily virtual school schedule. Obviously, my intent was to help keep him occupied, but I also wanted to give the boy a better understanding of how films are made and why all those small details from the screenplay to the set design to the editing and more, all really matter. Just how much work it takes from so many people to tell a story well. Being able to choose the curriculum has also helped me to fill in some of the gaps in his popular culture education. I am happy to report that he now, not only understands what the filmmaker is trying to say when they choose a low camera angle or high contrast film or choppy editing, but he also understands why dad says “bright light” whenever the curtains are opened unexpectedly, why sleds are Rosebuds in our household and why anytime he claims to not be afraid, I respond with “you will be”. So many times in the middle of a screening he will stop me to ask if he just got a reference or not. It has been gratifying. So in the spirit of shared experiences, please join me now as we stand and make the Queen’s Park Swizzle.
