A friend asked me for advice about vodka the other day and I said I thought as far as new vodkas went, Titos from Texas (distilled in Austin) was quite good and tasted like water which is what you want from vodka, something smooth and perfect. You don't, he said in mock horror, drink alone, do you? My friends have never gotten along so hot; there will be no cult for me in this lifetime. The closest I can get to having them all in the same room is celebrating some good writing news and even in my fantasies, I see myself trying to keep them from setting each other on fire and stuff like that, shit that brings a party down. So they don't like to imagine that I'm sharing cocktails with other people; they'd rather think of me as a bottomed out lush, slugging straight from the bottle than with their enemies being social. No, of course I don't, I told my friend. He smiled until I said, The dead are always with me. I never know if you're kidding or not, he said. And why would he? I'm a fiction writer after all. Timing is everything.
Pictured here, I'm with Santa Nino de Atocha with whom I have an uneasy relationship. Once a beloved bought me a shrine to him, the kind you plug into a wall and it shocked me, and I never really forgave it. The irony being that the Nino's speciality is forgiving the unforgivable. There's so many things I have failed at and badly, so many ways I have let myself and others down at the worst possible times. I suppose this is how we all feel at times, full of regret and sorrow for what we have done and what we have failed to do as the Catholic mass says. I suppose this is why the Nino is so daunting, his little incarnation imbued with such power, the power to forgive, to cease with judgment, to take off the hair shirt. Of course, I see him everywhere and he's often portrayed near water, imploring us to drink the purest thing on earth, forgiveness. It's not Titos, but I can use a glass now and then with a friend in a strange brown cape who doesn't say much but never leaves.
Michelle's Spell of the Day
"He who is only just is cruel. Who on earth could live were all judged justly?" Lord Byron
Cocktail Hour
Drinking novel suggestion: Song of Solomon Toni Morrison
Benedictions and Maledictions
Happy Thursday! Excellent news from my dear friend Shawn -- I have been living oh so well and my fantasy has come true -- James Gandolfini is going to play the cult leader Jim Jones on an HBO mini-series! Oh happy day!
http://janetcharltonshollywood.com/gossip/jonestown/james_gandolfini_can_be_very_persuasive_20070911.php
14 comments:
I used to drink straight from a fifth of Jim Beam. But I always drank with my friends; which is why I ALWAYS drank alone. Smoke pot alone, trip alone, and when I am forced to be sociable, during the fucking festive season, I find a quiet corner to sit (unfortunately) sober alone.
So light up that goddamn shrine and I will forgive them that force me to go outside in the blistering cold to smoke a cigarette while they get drunk and hopefully light each other on fire.
mark
Forgiveness is a vodka best drunk warm.
(ok, what does that mean? I'm not really sure but it seems like it "should" mean something.)
I am with the walking man when I am getting blitzed I prefer to be alone or with a few select people.
Good pick on the Song of Solomon I enjoyed that much more then Beloved
Try Crater Lake.
I like it even better than Tito's.
I like drinking alone as well.
I also like drinking around other people... it makes them more interesting.*
*Lifted from barfly, the movie adaptation of a bukowski book
I loved Song of Solomon, probably one of my favorites of Toni Morrison.
Drinking alone... Hypothetically we always drink alone, no one shares in the taste, the swallow, the warmth and lessening of tensions in our body spreading. We share the moments that we drink. In effect everything we do we do alone, for ourselves only. Why should he have been so horrified at the thought?
In my history class I have quite the strange named people surrounding me- Art House (yes, I'm not lying), Heather Sarri (pronounced like sorry) and the inevitable Jim Jones. Society changes so drastically so quickly that even my peers didn't giggle when his name was called from the roster, but I looked him in the eye and knew that he knew the stigma that he'll carry for as long as someone remembers.
"No poem of great import was ever writen by a water drinker"
--Homer
Were you reading my post from last night?
Great job on the old psychic connection, if not.
"mmm, donuts"
--Homer S
Michelle,
I very seldom am asked whether I drink alone. I suspect it's because very few people have seen me pitching a few back. But if they were to ask me whether I drink alcoholic beverages, I'd answer, "Hell yeah." Unfortunately, too much alcohol clouds my memory and my words adding to the suckiness of my writing.
Gotta love da BOOZE, baby!
mebbe we share a bottle sometime, eh swingah??
PS- Gandolfini has micropenis.
Charles get a bottle of Stolychnoia and put it in the freezer for about three hours, when it is ice cold and thickened up some you may change your mind about that best drunk warm thing...but you have to do shots, not mix garbage in with it.
a plate of good large pitted olives works well as a chaser or ones stuffed with garlic or anchovies.
But in my humble very experienced drinking *sigh* past drinking experience extremely cold is better.
You needed to hang out with some catholic priests as an adult to really learn how to drink.
Frankly, Michelle, I didn't expect to be nominated for an Emmy. It's a mixed blessing. If I'd known Christopher Moltisanti was going to murder me, I never would've signed on to write his "Cleaver" movie. Like Rodney Dangerfield says, I don't get no respect. HA, HA, HA!
On the other hand, the Emmy nomination is equally exciting as working with such a brilliant group of show business pros, the cast and crew of the Sopranos.
I really don't expect to win. Regardless, Michelle, thanks for all your support.--J.T.
as you see, I had to get pretty liqoured up myself, to feel courage enough to come back to your page and make my silly little remarks that I consider to be far wittier than anything these silly students write.
After the drubbing I faced yeterday at the hands of the walking man, I've been scared poopless! And you always says to me, you says, "Ugis, you're full of shit".
Not anymore! Nagghaaghaaghaaa!
I'm fresh out of poop.
I think I'll go sexually harrass an undergrad who attends the school that I work for--even though tht's a stupid thing to do. She's a student, so naturally, she has more power over my job than I do. Cheri could get me fired for the remarks I made about her on her blog, July 24th, 2007. They were crude...
The scandle! John would really yuk it up if I joined him on a picket line. Even though he is well respected, and has to be framed up for his utterances.
What can I say? I'm just a doosh. A drunkard, a sexuall harrasing, state-employed doosh who uses the state's property to commit crimes against female employees and students alike. Jennifer Granholm is a dyke. Even she couldn't do a thing about me.
...shouldn't have called Jennifer Granholm a dyke.
She'll have my empty scrotum for that!
"Forgiveness is a vodka best drunk warm."
All it means is forgiving is about as enjoyable as drinking warm vodka.
To hate, is much more exhilirating my frien!
muhahaaahaa
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