recommended reading

That library isn't going to wait forever. In recognition of that fact, I kicked out the jams and finished Andrew George's translation of The Epic of Gilgamesh. There is little I can say about this work in typical book review fashion, for two reasons. First, it isn't really a novel. It's an epic. A mythological epic, no less. These stories reside in a genre of their own, somewhere between fiction and nonfiction. They employ characters who may perhaps have been real, placed in fantastic settings, set against supernatural enemies, to make a point about humanity. (This is very similar to what I'm trying to do with my own novel series, in fact; but that's not important right now.) It's difficult to critique epics as such. Things like characterization, realism, and other craft-related concerns go flying out the window. The audience already knows, basically, who the characters were; there's no need to develop or even introduce them. Realism, as I've pointed out, is rendered moot by the mythical antagonists. One key element remains: plot. So let's talk about Gilgamesh. In reality, he may have been an actual person. There's a good chance that he was one of the first Sumerian kings, ruling the empire from the city of Uruk (lying between present-day Baghdad and Basra) in the 26th century B.C. Yes, that's right. TWENTY-FIVE HUNDRED YEARS BEFORE YEAR ZERO. You and I are closer to Jesus than Gilgamesh was, chronologically speaking. This was a long time ago, folks. Nearly five thousand years. That means there might very well have been woolly mammoths clomping around North America when Gilgamesh was king in Uruk. Don't that beat all? Okay, sorry for the digression. At some point, the Sumerians deified Gilgamesh. The legend goes that he was two parts god, one part man. He was neither an ideal king nor an ideal god, though. He was actually kind of a jerk. He didn't do mass purges or play his fiddle while the city burned, or anything. He just threw crazy parties, whooped it up all over town, and was into droit de seigneur, if you know what I mean. The good people of Uruk finally got fed up with it, and complained to the gods. The gods figured Gilgamesh just needed something to occupy himself with, so they created a wild man in the forests of Sumer, Enkidu. He ran with the wolves and was suckled by the donkeys, or something. A trapper spotted him, and decided to lure him to Uruk and see if he couldn't get Gilgamesh to calm down. I like this trapper guy. He's smart. He uses steel and nets and snares to trap animals. What does he use to trap a wild man? A prostitute. The trapper fetches a courtesan, Shamhat, from Uruk. They wait in the bushes and then, when the time is right, spring out at Enkidu. Of course he's smitten with with Shamhat, and agrees to accompany her and the trapper back to civilization (after Shamhat—ahem—persuades him). Enkidu and Gilgamesh fight, and a rapprochement is reached: Enkidu acknowledges Gilgamesh's rightful kingship, and the two become buddies. They do all sorts of good deeds, like slaying the vicious demon Humbaba in the Forest of Cedar. Enkidu eventually dies, and Gilgamesh, lonely and now afraid of death, travels the world to seek immortality. His quest leads him over the Sea of Death, into a battle with its ferryman and his stone henchmen, and to the door of the great sage Uta-napishti. The lone survivor of the great Deluge, Uta-napishti directs Gilgamesh to dive to the sea floor and retrieve a special plant that grants eternal life. Gilgamesh does so, but on the way home he leaves the plant unattended and a snake steals it. Heartbroken, Gilgamesh returns to Uruk. And so, what began like a comedy about an inept, randy king turns into a morality tale about the inevitability of death. Even Gilgamesh, two-thirds god, who built the mighty walls of Uruk with his own hands, is not powerful enough to escape the last great adventure. Throughout the epic, we observe Gilgamesh struggle, fight, toil, performing many acts of courage and valor. But in the end, it does him no good...apart from a safe empire and a host of worthwhile memories. One can only imagine the bald-headed Sumerian preceptor attempting to teach The Epic of Gilgamesh to a classroom full of fractious kids. I don't envy the guy. I'm still progressing through Little Women; I'm almost to the end of Part I. Aunt March, it seems, is going to blow the roof off Meg and Mr. Brooke's little secret, even though Jo already knows (and therefore, Laurie). And we're going to have us a wedding. My feelings on this are mixed. I hardly know John Brooke—hell, he wasn't even introduced until the eighth chapter or something. And I had no idea Meg had feelings for him until a few chapters after that. This engagement thing came out of nowhere. Se la vi. Now that we're over the triple threat of Amy's fall through the ice, Father's sickness, and Beth's fever, I think we can all relax and get on with it. I can't wait to see what happens to the rest of the girls in the remaining two-thirds of the novel. I'll keep you posted. And so onto the new volume into which I have now delved: Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five. I've heard a lot of good things about Vonnegut from friends. Always meant to pick him up and read him someday. As I understand, he's the closest thing to Douglas Adams: an eminently satirical, gut-bustingly funny dude, a phenomenal and lyrical writer. So, of course, when I open up the book to the first chapter (Vonnegut's preamble) and learn that the book, in fact, concerns the fire-bombing of Dresden during the Second World War...I'm a bit thrown off. I enjoyed the introduction nonetheless. Vonnegut self-deprecates a little, but what impressed me the most is how unapologetically opinionated he is. He is anti-war, but not in the insufferable way that most hippies and beatniks are. He's against war because he's actually been in one. In the introduction, he recalls going to a friend's house, a war buddy, with a bottle of Irish whiskey. They plan to reminisce and take notes for the book Vonnegut is attempting to write. The friend's wife's irritation is thinly veiled. She eventually comes out with it: "You were just babies then! Babies!" Vonnegut admits this is so. "But you won't write it that way, will you," she huffs. The friend's wife's fear is that Vonnegut will present himself and his buddies as heroes, and that a new national interest in war will rise up, and another war will ensue, and more babies will be killed. Vonnegut assures the woman that he intends no such thing to happen. "I tell you what," he says, "I'll call it [the book] The Children's Crusade." And indeed, under the title of Slaughterhouse-Five on the first leaf, the words "or the Children's Crusade: a Duty-Dance with Death" are inscribed. This might be an entirely different book than I thought. And now, before I let you go, I simply must tell you about this: Yep, I won an award. Again. This one's the Sunshine Award, given to "celebrate the positivity and creativity of our fellow bloggers." Wow. I have a host of friends. I'm incredibly honored and humbled by these accolades. This one's from Entrepreneur Chick, an eminently classy, brazen lady, whose business-savvy and kindness and street-smarts know no bounds. Check out her blog if you're the slightest bit interested in entrepreneurship, successful business practice, wise tips for living and finance, or dancing. (Wink wink, EC.) The rules for this award are kind of a trade-off: you don't have to write ten facts about yourself (whew, I'm running low). But you have to nominate twelve fellow bloggers for it. Twelve. Yikes, do I even follow that many blogs? Okay, here goes:

• [carrotspeak.]
• Amelia K
• From the Faraway, Nearby
• JINXED
• Let's have a cocktail...
• Life at Willow Manor
• propinquity
• ResidentAlien
• smithyblogs
• Things I Yell at You
• Through Laura's Eyes
• Where Sky Meets Ground

Congratulations everyone! You're creative as all get-out, and just plain fun to read. Pat yourselves on the back. That is all. Tune in next time for one of my few-and-far-between movie reviews.

coulda, shoulda, woulda

I wouldn't last long in the military. You know why? Because I'm stupid, that's why. Most recruits in the armed forces have this thing called routine. There are certain tasks they're expected to accomplish each day. To help them accomplish them, they have a drill sergeant. But perhaps more importantly, they have another really neat thing called work ethic. (It might also be construed as fear of the drill sergeant's can of whoop-ass, but let's stick with the perfect world, shall we?) They have to want to get their assigned tasks done. They have to want to be at boot camp. They have to want to sculpt perfect hospital corners whenever they make their beds, finish their morning run in good time, score high during marksmanship trials and so forth. By adhering to that work ethic and by steadily completing their routine every day for weeks, recruits get an idea of what's expected of them, what they're supposed to be doing, and how things are supposed to go. They know what to do, how to do it, when to do it, and what the benefits are to doing it (not being appointed a permanent latrine orderly, for example). Me? Not a chance. I just sort of caper along through life, visions of dancing daisies in my head, whistling a happy tune until I run smack into a brick wall or fall down a manhole. Very, very rarely will I actually stop in my tracks, straighten up, scratch my head and yell, "Hey! I should be doing THIS!" That happened to me this morning. It was eleven o'clock. I had woken up at 9:30, rolled out of bed, eaten a heaping bowl of Honey Bunches of Oats, dragged a brush through my hair, and had been reading other people's blogs all morning in my pajamas. After a while, I finally got off my duff and into the shower. As I was bending down to pick up the bath rug and hang it over the edge of the tub, I suddenly thought, "HEY! Instead of loafing around the house all day, blogging, studying bartending flashcards, lackadaisically searching for a job, reading The Epic of Gilgamesh or playing video games, I could be starting in on my second novel!" (Well, something like that, anyway.) Immediately following, an enormous rush of childish glee ran through my body. It was as if Christmas was suddenly the day after tomorrow, or I'd suddenly won an all-expenses-paid trip to Las Vegas, effective immediately. It was the old, intoxicating feeling of anticipation and excitement. It was the writing fever. And it was back. It had fallen by the wayside in the wake of my first novel, replaced by the revision blues. I don't know about you, but I've never really liked editing and revising and proofing. Anyone who's ever spotted a typo in my blog posts will realize that. Typos are anathema to me. I'm a good speller. I'm something of a wordsmith, in fact. But I do make mistakes. And what's worse, I can't always be bothered to find them and fix them. I'm working on that, but it's a hard slog. But never mind about that. The point is that there's always something more I could be doing. And very rarely do I realize it. I get complacent too easily. I fall into a rut, stagnate, and just sort of stew for a while. Often it takes some calamity to make me notice how much I've slacked off. I mean, come on. I love writing. I'm drunk on this story I'm creating. Writers understand how much of a trip, a joy, a high, a tremendous kick in the pants writing is. It's like a drug, an illicit love affair (as Laura said). I can't understand why I would hesitate to dive back in. I'm not daunted by the task. I actually have a much clearer idea of the plot of this second book than I did for the first. Even now, as I contemplate the prospect of writing the next chapter in the series, my pulse quickens and my eyes gleam. I just got complacent. Lazy. Indolent. Mush-brained. The only thing I have on the docket for today is studying, studying. I have one final time-trial to pass at bartender's school, sours and blended drinks. (While we're on the subject of dithering, I could've been finished with bartender's school a lot sooner, too.) The newly-completed flashcards are sitting right here next to me on the bedspread. I have merely to roll over, pick them up, and begin the long process of memorizing 40 drinks before tomorrow. But in the meantime, I sat here for an hour and a half in my PJs, wasting precious time on the Internet. Yesterday I made those flashcards, sent an e-mail to my potential employer, and took an introspective walk. That's all I did. I've been dreaming and scheming about this novel series for years, and it was only the act of stooping to pick up a bath rug that made me realize that I'm spinning my wheels. Sometimes I really wish I could reach inside my head and punch my brain. A lot of writers can fall into this trap. Writing is fun, but it's hard work, too. Like an exercise routine, it can sometimes be difficult to start—even to remember to start. Maybe you're busy with other things: children, work, studies, hobbies, friends, obligations. You harangue, you chivvy, you exhort, but you just can't seem to get started. Perhaps you rationalize, and tell yourself that you'll get started first thing tomorrow morning. But tomorrow morning rolls around, and the idea stays in your head and your fingers off the keys. Maybe you throw up straw men, working on lesser projects while the Big Idea simmers on the back burner. That works for a while, but something's gotta give eventually. The best suggestion I've heard for combating the Great First Hurdle of Starting was given me by Stephen King. In his excellent autobiography-slash-writing guide, On Writing, King suggests that you get yourself a routine. Pick an hour in the morning or the evening. Make sure it's the same hour every day: six o'clock, or 7:47, or 11:09, whatever. You must be consistent. Sit down at your computer (or typewriter, if you're the old-fashioned sort) and write. Even if you don't feel like it. Even if your brain tells you that you'll never accomplish anything by forcing yourself to write. Even if the video games and millennia-old epics are calling to you. Just get on with it. Soon, King says, you'll notice that the words are coming easier. That the initial difficulty is slacking off, inspiration is welling up, and you're suddenly in the Writing Zone. It may take five minutes, or it may take five or so sessions. But soon, you'll notice that it becomes easier and easier to get on a roll. The writer's block will start crumbling faster. If you keep up your routine religiously, writing for an hour (or two) every day, same time, same place...good things will start to roll off that keyboard. It may seem counterintuitive, but it works. I myself was highly skeptical when I first read about the method. With my nose in the air and my voice laden with hauteur, I scoffed, "Poppycock! A routine would defile the creative process. Writing on a schedule is like trying to paint a masterpiece every month, or carve sculpture from nine to five. One must wait for the creative juices to flow, and then write." It didn't take me long to realize that if I sat around waiting for the creative juices to flow, I'd be in my 90s before I finished my second book. So I gave King's method a shot. And I noticed that soon, I was checking my watch and thinking excitedly, "Oooh, my writing hour is coming up." In no time at all, the creative juices were flowing, even before I sat down at the computer every night. I know this, and yet I haven't started doing it yet this year. I've set myself some goals for 2010, a battle plan (as delineated by Jon Paul). There remains but to buckle down and do it. Like those damnable New Year's resolutions, I can't seem to muster the diligence nor the intelligence to actually set myself a routine. Maybe I need a drill sergeant.

Help me, R. Lee Ermey. You're my only hope.

random travel destinations - Austria

Austria.

Looks nice.

Great mountains.

Scenic towns.

Charming villages.

Friendly people.

Clean mountain air.

Orchestral music to die for.

Steeped in history.

Good beer.

Sausage.

The Alps.

Birthplace of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Pretty little country. Especially Innsbruck. You should go and see it.

If you can get a tourist visa without committing an act of terrorism, that is.

cocktail review no. 32 - Stinger

I'm beginning to feel like a manipulative five-year-old again—or more like a genie in a magic lamp. With a sigh, or an impassioned look, I can summon any bottle of liquor to this house.

Partly out of pride in my progress through bartender's school, and partly out of parental affection, my folks have been stumping up for strange liqueurs all seven months I've been home. The most recent acquisition? A bottle of green crème de menthe. Ordinarily, my folks wouldn't be caught dead with crème de menthe. Mom, in particular, wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole. She hates mint, especially minty drinks. She can't stand 'em. Naturally she was somewhat averse to the idea of bringing a innocuous green bottle of the enemy into the house. But after I painted glowing pictures of all the cocktails I could be making IF ONLY I could get my hands on some crème de menthe...Mom relented. Bless her loving heart.

The things my folks do for me...I don't know how I'll ever thank them. Probably by living next door to them and taking them out to lunch every day.

It wasn't just motherly sacrifice, though. Ma was vaguely curious. One of her favorite movies (and mine) is The Apartment, with Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine. (Fancy a guy named "Lemmon" being in the same movie with cocktail parties! There may very well be a just and loving God after all.)

There's a particularly memorable scene in that film, involving a cocktail party. On the menu that evening were "a frozen daiquiri, a Rum Collins, a Tom and Jerry, and a stinger." Ma had heard of some of these drinks before, and was intrigued. Over the course of the last seven months I have eagerly sated Mom's curiosity about those drinks. One by one I've mixed them up for her, she and Dad and I have sat around in the living room and tested them, and duly crossed them off the list. As of the night of February 16, only one remained. This one.

• 2 ounces brandy
• ½ ounce white crème de menthe

In a mixing glass half-filled with ice cubes, combine the brandy and crème de menthe. Stir well and strain into a cocktail glass.

Yes, yes, I know. The recipe says white crème de menthe. As I mentioned, we had green. But there's no difference in flavor between the two; just color. We didn't mind drinking green drinks if we knew we were still getting the authentic stinger flavor. And get it we did.

We weren't expecting much. We anticipated being overwhelmed with mint. We expected liquefied pillow mints, in fact. What we got was something else entirely. We found, instead, that the mint flavor of the crème de menthe was more like kiddie mouthwash: pleasant, mild, not overwhelming in the slightest. We weren't puckering up while drinking it.

Moreover, we could still taste the brandy, which is fortunate, because we've got some good brandy at my house. There's some E&J VSOP on one side of the liquor cabinet ("VSOP" stands for "Very Special, Order of the Prince"; definitely upper middle class), and a bottle of Hennessy cognac on the other side. In other words, the stinger pleasantly surprised us. It's not overpowering or wanting in good taste. On the contrary, the mint and brandy boutiques complement each other rather well. Up top, the heady aroma and cool flavor of the mint liqueur dances over the tongue, backed by the burnt depths of the brandy beneath (how's that for some alliteration, eh?). Be sure to heave a slight sigh after every swig; your mouth will feel an Arctic blast, as though you've just run a measure of Listerine through it...and the brandy will have a little to say as well.

Worth your time. Just pretend your Frasier Crane from Cheers and drink up.

introducing the "Drunk at First Sight" Blogfest!

A few of my fellow bloggers and I have got a proposition for you. Recognizing that St. Patrick's Day is coming up fast, that Valentine's Day is not yet cold in its grave, and that we all like to drink beer, Jon Paul and a couple other shady characters have masterminded the "Drunk at First Sight" Blogfest.

Now, I've never had the exact dictionary definition of the word "blogfest" explained to me, but from what I gather, it's where a bunch of bloggers all pick a topic, write up a post, and then everybody reads each other's posts and comment on them and have a great big literary discussion or somesuch. It's great fun, from what I hear. I've never participated in one before, and I'm jazzed for this one. (It's a shame I missed the Fight Scene Blogfest a while back...I would've had a great entry for that one!)

Here's how it works:

1) Cruise on over to Where Sky Meets Ground and sign up. Enter your name and your blog URL.

2) Write a new scene or short story, or dust off an old one, about a love/relationship situation that also includes one or more of the following elements:

—St. Patty's Day as important event or setting
—Use of Ireland or anything Irish as a setting or prop
—An alcohol related event (party, hangover, cocktails, AA meeting, etc.)

3) Just prior to March 17th (the big day itself), post said story to your blog.

4) On St. Patty's Day, cruise around the other participants' pages, drink in hand, and check out everybody's amazing fiction.

That's about it! We've got a litany of splendid bloggers helping out with this:

• Emily from The Chronicles of Emily Cross
• Bone from Cruising Altitude
• Scott from A Writer's Blog

We've got a lot of people signed up already. So what are you waiting for? Belly on up to the bar and write some fiction!

the best of times in South Korea

Picture this:

Four people crowd around a small table in a one-room apartment on a tilted, crooked street. The street is in the second-largest town on the second-largest island off the southern coast of South Korea. Two of these people are English, one is Canadian, the other American. The lights are low. The drink has been flowing for several hours, courtesy of yours truly, your friendly neighborhood expatriate bartender-in-training. There's a bed, a few poles with clothes hung on them, a dresser, a derelict TV, a refrigerator, a tiny kitchenette, and a bathroom around the corner. By now, the linoleum floor is gritty with tortilla chip crumbs and dropped peanuts. The air is filled with the smell of alcohol, salty snacks, laundry detergent, Korean pepper paste, citrus, and maraschino cherries. The laptop is on. Several YouTube videos on the screen, one playing Curtis Mayfield's "Superfly"; Groove Armada and Oasis wait in the wings. Jokes are being cracked, stories told, laughs exchanged, fun had. Four plastic highball glasses (filled with rum daisies, tequila moonrises or Chelsea Hotels) are making the rounds between table and lips. Occasionally, one of the four people leaves to use the lavatory; sometimes the entire company adjourns to the rooftop to stargaze, or to look out over the uneven, haphazard, Mary-Poppins skyline of the city. All of us are in a drunken stupor, a happy haze. We've had a hard day of teaching hyperactive Korean children the finer points of the English language. Perhaps we graded 30 journals at a stretch, having to add in all the articles (or subtract all the excess) ourselves. Maybe little Tommy was acting up again and gave us a headache. Maybe it was hot as hell in the classroom because the head secretary's too goddamn cheap to turn on the A/C. Maybe we just had a bad day. But it's all gone now.

We're having a damn fine Friday night in.

tales from the wine cellar

For your information, that's supposed to be a takeoff on Tales from the Crypt.

Why? Because this is a horror story. We are going to discuss a topic of deepest fear, staggering infamy, and gruesome depravity. Abominations of nature, travesties against humanity.

In other words, yucky drinks.

Hanging around bartender's school, one tends to hear about libations which seem, after the ingredient lists are reviewed, somewhat questionable. These drinks often don't seem as if they were born of any rational or sane mind.

They seem, frankly, just plain disgust-o.

Anyone ever heard of a "red-eye"?

It's half beer, half tomato juice, and one raw egg.

Eeee-YUCK.

Wade, the head of the bartender's school I attend, was talking about red-eyes with another student last Saturday, and I overheard. He claimed that the person he'd heard about it from (apparently a heavy drinker) endorsed the red-eye as an end-all hangover cure.

To me it sounds more like an end-all, period.

Back in Korea I knew this one South African fellow named Jay. He knew all about drinking. He belonged to the "quick sticks" school of Friday night boozery. He believed that a proper pregame should include downing a fifth of soju before hitting the first bar. Soju—the Korean firewater, resembling sweet vodka—is not strong stuff. It's just about 40 proof. But to down a whole bottle of it before the night's binge commences...well, that's a whole different kettle of fish. Nonetheless, I gave it a try. I downed a bottle and went out on the town. Don't remember much after that.

Anyway, all the island's expatriates were down at Jazz Bar one night, standing around, shooting the breeze, throwing darts, chatting with the bartenders, and just generally unwinding after another hard week. I was halfway through a B & B and feeling pretty mellow. Over my right shoulder I could hear Jay talking to Adam.
"You ever heard of a Mexican asshole?" Jay asked, in his languorous way.
"No," Adam answered. "What's in that?"
"It's half tequila and half Tabasco."
"F—in' hell, mate," Adam said, with a record-setting grimace on his face.

That drink has impinged itself upon my consciousness. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the sheer, unadulterated, loathsome horror of it. Drinks, as I understand it, are meant to be taken for enjoyment. For pleasure. For fun. Shooting something like a Mexican asshole seems both fatuous and masochistic. I resent the mere thought.

Masochism aside, some of the shots that we've learned about in school—which are apparently popular—sound nasty.

Ever heard of a Scooby Snack?

It's revolting. Midori (melon liqueur), crème de bananes, Malibu (coconut rum), and pineapple juice. And cream. Shaken, then shot.

Enough said.

BLARGH.

It's a given that, anywhere you go in the world of hooch, you'll run across something disgusting. Even the vaunted Bartender's Bible conceals a few stinkers within its pages.

Don't believe me? Try a jillionaire. It's bourbon, triple sec, grenadine, and an egg white.

Yes, an egg white.

The rest of those ingredients would be nasty enough by themselves (whoever thought it was a good idea to mix bourbon and grenadine, for Pete's sake?!?).

But add an egg white, and this thing turns into an all-out suckfest.

No drink with an egg white in it has ever turned out well, in my experience (except for the Tom and Jerry, where they are whipped into soft peaks.) Egg whites normally make a drink foamy, slimy and somewhat sticky on the draw. Combine that with the rotten combo of bourbon whiskey, orange liqueur, and cherry syrup, and...

Oh, I can just see your cute little faces puckering up as I type this!

I've been on my quest to find the Perfect Drink for about three years now, and I've mixed, sampled and tested a lot of drinks. My success rate is probably something like five percent. For every five or six goodish drinks that I find, I have to choke down 95 stinkers. Learn from my mistakes. Through excruciating trial-and-error, I've compiled a list of drink no-nos to avoid at all costs, in my humble opinion. Peruse them at your leisure:

• egg whites. I just explained this. Makes the drink slimy and sticky and yucky. 
• combining SoCo and bitters. These do not mix, trust me. You know what Southern Comfort and bitters taste like when they're in the same drink together? Cough syrup.
• Jägermeister. Don't drink ANYTHING that has this in it. And certainly don't drink it straight. Don't even touch the bottle. Try to avoid looking at it for too long if you can help it. This stuff is mandrill-puke. It's awful. Trying to capitalize on the success of schnapps, the Germans thought they'd follow the Britons' lead and distill a bunch of plants and herbs together. But they didn't wind up with gin. They wound up with Italian-sausage-flavored mouthwash. 
• more than two fruit juices. Tropical drinks are all well and good, but I'm one of those drinkers who likes to taste the liquor he's ingesting. A lot of drinks cover the booze up with a cornucopia of fruit juices: pineapple, cranberry, grapefruit, orange, grape, or even prune. If it's got more than triple the ratio of fruit juice to liquor, pass it up. Unless we're talking tropical drinks; those are supposed to be like that. 
• grenadine. Watch this stuff. I like it, certainly. It's cherry-flavored syrup, made from pomegranates. It's completely nonalcoholic, and can be used to make cherry Coke or Shirley Temples. But it's not Supreme God of All Mixers. A lot of cocktails I've run across seem to have grenadine in them only for good measure, almost as an oversight. And sometimes (as we've seen with the jillionaire), grenadine just doesn't belong where it's put. Don't drink pink drinks. If your drink comes out pink, and you didn't expect it to, blame the grenadine. I don't think grenadine should go into any drink containing whiskey, brandy, dark rum, or any other dark liquors. Doesn't work as well as you'd think. 
• sweet plus savory. Make sure to match your mixers with your liquors and not cross them. Don't use, say, dry vermouth in a rum drink, or you'll have a distasteful clash of sweet and un-sweet. Gin and vodka are liquors which, to some degree, take on the flavors of whatever you mix them with, so you're okay using whatever kind of vermouth or fruit-flavored liqueur with them. But tequila and rum (especially dark or aged rum) have a distinctive, sweetish essence, and should be mixed with care. A rum martini might look good on paper, but think twice before you try one.

If you want something simpler, here's a rule of thumb my father likes to promulgate. He says:

"If a drink's got more than three ingredients, it's not worth your time."

Pop figures, quite rightly, that a surfeit of ingredients muddles the drink. It's the jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none principle. A drink with a bazillion components makes for a miasma of flavors which only obscure one other, or get in each others' way. Moreover they disguise the booze. Drinks should be kept simple and straightforward, Dad reckons. (In case you haven't guessed, he's a martini drinker. An extra-dry double martini drinker.)

That being said, there are some notable exceptions to the three-ingredient rule. Mint juleps, old-fashioneds, and all your tropical drinks (like zombies) are okay.

So now I'd like to give the floor to you, dear reader, and invite you to divulge the most disgusting drink you've ever had. (Those of you who aren't old enough to drink, feel free to stick your two cents in about drinks you may have heard from friends or relatives.) What grossed you out? What was in it? Where'd you have it? What possessed you to try it? What, in your opinion, makes a bad drink?

The decision is ultimately yours. Don't forget that. But please stay away from the Scooby Snacks.

they call me "Sugar Doll"

That's right, sucker. I'm a sugar doll. You know how I know? Says so on this award here. A thousand congratulations to Jon Paul from Where Sky Meets Ground on receiving this award himself, and a thousand thanks for bestowing it upon me. Like him, I would've questioned whether or not I was a "sugar doll" but seeing as how Entrepreneur Chick (bless her heart) has called me a "dollbaby" before, I think I'm not too far out of bounds in accepting this. I hope I'm not. I'm tickled pink to have gotten this accolade. The rules are simple: list ten facts about yourself and pass the award on to four deserving bloggers. However, since this award was given to me by a man's man (who also got it from a man's man), I shall delight you with the most masculine facts I can dish up. It's time to man up, people. Ready? Let us begin!

1. The worst hangover I ever had was the second morning of the Korean New Year, Seoul, late January 2009. My expatriate friends and I had been out on a bender the whole night previous: pub crawling, karaoke, the works. I must've drank my weight in soju. My head was literally fit to split. I couldn't even move for the first hour. The second hour I inched my hand across the tousled bedspread and somehow managed turn on the TV. The third hour I groggily watched The Matrix and thought about trying to sit up. Eventually I dragged myself into a scalding hot shower and went out for a long constitutional in the freezing winter breeze. It worked.
2. I'm not technically "scared" of anything: spiders, snakes, murky water, the dark, or whatever. But I do not like centipedes. They're not the comeliest of beasts. And they move too fast.
3. I think millipedes (and tarantulas, and slugs, and eels) are cute, though.
4. I have this Microsoft computer game called Impossible Creatures. It's a strategy game, where you are the commander of an army and have to fight other people's armies. The cool thing about it is that you make your own units. You combine different animals together to make super-powerful hybrids: amphibious whales, winged lions, gorillas with wolves' heads, elephants with hornets' stingers, bulls with porcupine spines, you name it. Anything you can imagine, you can make. The best animal I ever created was a "rhinorpion": a rhinoceros with a gigantic scorpion's tail, and pincers coming out of its shoulders. It had horns, claws, and a poisonous tail; and it was a bruiser in close combat. It couldn't stand up to my brother's lobster-shark, though.
5. I have many different ideas about what I want to do when I get old and retire, most of which fit into some stereotypical mold or other. Sometimes I want to sit in a rocking chair on the porch and dispense unsolicited pearls of wisdom; sometimes I hope to go driving my Bentley through people's flowerbeds; sometimes I wish to wear a floppy straw hat and ride around on a donkey on hot afternoons, drunk as a fiddler. I think I'll just settle for owning a corner bar and listening to people's problems, though.
6. When we lived in Tennessee, there was an enormous grassy hill right next to the long gravel driveway we shared with our neighbors. With their permission, my brother Harlan and I would sled on it in winter. In summer, we'd get our trusty little red wagon (a genuine Radio Flyer), hop in and go rolling down that hill à la Calvin and Hobbes.
7. I like the name "Azerbaijan." It just rolls off the tongue, don't it?
8. I have six scars: one on my left index finger (soap-carving accident); one on the top of my left foot (a dropped plate); three chicken-pox blemishes on my torso; and one on my right forearm (a brush with a wine rack).
9. I love Star Wars. I hate Star Trek.
10. Okay, let's see...is this list masculine enough? I've talked about drunkenness, scary animals, combat, retirement-era hell-raising, boyish pursuits, exotic places, scars, and my discerning tastes in science fiction. Looks good to me, so let's finish off with the ultimate manly pursuit: speculating about the fate of the planet. If given the chance to gain immortality, I'd pass it up. I don't want to live forever. I just wish I could live long enough to see (a) the ocean floor explored completely; (b) contact made and diplomatic relations opened with sentient beings from another planet; and (c) what manner of fantastic beasts will evolve on Earth millions of years from now.

And now for the lucky four, in no particular order:

• Gently Said: Jerry, a 65-year-old man who works in a tall building in Houston, muses on the little everyday things that make life so strange and wonderful. One man's calming thoughts on dogs, dancing, word definitions, music, family, with a bit of short fiction thrown in. Help me out here, ladies. He is most certainly a sugar doll, right?
• It Was Dark, Stormy and I Lost My Serial Comma: Here is a doting father, great storyteller, lover of Fruity Pebbles, trafficker in dirty blog titles, all around funny guy, with a warm and entertaining blog. Spells "sugar doll" to me.
• Fortune Cookies and Men: Chloe C is hip. She's a native New Yorker. She's Chinese-American, a former Serial Monogamist, self-sufficient, independent, brassy and refreshingly straightforward. What more could you want in a sugar doll?
• Jane Jones: She still believes in summer days. She knows the secret nooks and crannies of the heart and soul. She's traveled to hidden places. She likes to cook for the fun of it. She's a not-so-apologetic country music fan. But most importantly, her writing is ethereally beautiful. Familiar, somehow; like a doll for the soul. Sweet in its truth, like sugar for the mind.

Congratulations to one and all! You've earned it. And now it's time for the six o'clock news. You don't have to read all of this if you don't want to. It's rather long. Just pick and choose the headlines that look interesting, like I do when I read a newspaper. AREA MOTHER PURCHASES NEW DOG You remember the new collie we got a few months back, Maggie? We had to euthanize her. She had a herniated esophagus or something. Couldn't stop hacking up bile. We had to put her down; it was either that or let her suffer. Not wanting my dog Harriet to be lonesome, Mom and Dad stopped by the Apple Valley animal shelter a couple of weeks ago, perused the selection and picked out a seven-month-old German shepherd. They signed the paperwork and a few days later (after he was "fixed") brought him home. We dubbed him Dash, and he's an absolute champ. Things were a bit rocky at first; he whined a lot until he got used to his surroundings, and we had to set some boundaries for him. (No climbing on the furniture, unless it's the old futon in the front room, and the kitchen is strictly verboten.) He still doesn't walk on a leash very well, and can't sit on command, but he knows his name and is learning to fetch the squeaky tennis balls he loves so much. At seven months, he's not fully grown; his feet, ears and tail are awkward and oversize. He'll grow into them, though. He's going to be a truly massive dog, 120 pounds, the vets reckoned. That's more than twice what Mom's old Belgian sheepdog Molly weighed full-grown! GARBAGE TRUCK GETS STUCK IN QUICKSAND The tremendous rains we had a little while ago washed the roads out something terrible. We had huge gouts and ruts and swathes carved out of neighborhood streets. We're so far out in the sticks that the roads aren't maintained by the county, so we have to shift for ourselves. The local water board got out its heavy equipment and began bulldozing the roads flat again, filling in the ruts. In this case, that created a problem. The ruts were filled, but they were filled with loose sand and smoothed over. I went out walking shortly after the work was finished, and when I stepped on this smooth and deceptively firm sand, my foot sank in up to the ankle. It wasn't quicksand, but it was the next best thing. I was out painting the eaves last week when I heard a peculiar banging sound in the distance. I looked around, but couldn't see where it was coming from. A short while later, I heard it again. Bang bang bang bang bang. I turned around. Behind the house, just up the block at the corner of Corto and Horizon, I saw one of the big maroon-and-white Avco Disposal garbage trucks. It was just sitting there, cocked across the intersection at an odd angle. As I looked, I heard the engine rev up. Dust began to fly. The truck started to shake, so violently that it began to make the metallic banging sound I'd heard earlier. Then it stopped, and sat quietly again. I'd been stuck in loose sand too many times not to realize what was happening. I saw a couple other people gathering about the truck, so I didn't just jump off the ladder, snatch up a shovel, and go and help. I kept painting, figuring that if the truck was still stuck by the time I finished the south side of the house, then I'd go and help. I was almost done with the southwest corner at the time. I finished, and the truck was still stuck. So I put everything away, opened the shed, grabbed a shovel, slung it jauntily over my shoulder, and strolled the hundred yards up the dusty road to the site of the disturbance. I must've looked a sight: work boots, cargo shorts, a Chargers cap (on backwards), sunglasses, and a red T-shirt reading THE PARTY HAS ARRIVED. Plus the shovel on my shoulder. Superdude to the rescue. The garbage truck, trying to turn around at the intersection, had run straight into the sand loosely packed into a former culvert, and had gotten stuck. I actually didn't wind up doing much. I shoveled some loose sand out of the way of the truck's tires, and tamped down some more behind them, but Kert (the driver) still couldn't get out. Another garbage truck came and tried to pull Kert's truck out of the sand with a chain, but then he started slipping. Finally, a semi with a winch was dispatched to the site and managed to yank 'er out. While we waited, I had a lovely chat with Kert, the woman who owned the house in front of which he'd gotten stuck (Jeanette, and her articulate, autistic, adopted son, Elijah), and a couple other neighbors I'd never spoken to before. It was a lovely day and rather nice to talk to new people. Elijah and I had an erudite discussion on why stop-motion and other old-fashioned cinematic effects were superior to computer graphics. ASPIRING BARTENDER POLISHES OFF MOST DIFFICULT LESSON That's right. On Monday I went down to Riverside and, after a grueling three hours and 40 minutes, passed both parts of the wickedly tricky Lesson 7, concerning shots. It wasn't hard, per se, but there were so many ingredients to remember and so many different mixing methods that I came close to forgetting myself. I just barely made the six-minute time limit on both parts of the test, even despite the rather raunchy mnemonic devices I'd learned. A strawberry cheesecake shot, for example (vanilla vodka, cranberry juice, and cream) has to be mixed, shaken, and poured. B-52s (Kahlúa, Bailey's, and Grand Marnier) need merely be layered. But Scooby Snacks (Midori, crème de bananes, Malibu coconut rum, pineapple juice, and cream) have to be shaken with the tin and then cracked like an egg into an old-fashioned glass. Like I said, tricky. But I passed it. Now I just have Lesson 5 (blended drinks) left, and then the final, and then a bit of POS training and job placement, and then...I'm a bartender! And in brief... I've resumed flying after taking a six-week hiatus (due to money issues which have been resolved thanks to Mom and Dad). I'm doing instrument work, where they strap a hood over your eyes so you can only see your instruments and gauges and not what's going on outside the plane. Then they tell you to do stuff. I think I'll put that in a separate post. Dad had some coworkers from Lake Tahoe down for dinner last night. I was the designated bartender. I only made one drink (a vodka martini), but I made it well. I was also introduced to a new libation I'd never heard of before, even at bartender's school: something called an "astronaut." I'll have to ask Wade about that one... Finally, the weather's been lovely. Sixties and seventies, sunny, breezy, hardly a cloud in the sky. Spring's already sprung in the desert, and once again I'm sweating on my 4.6-mile walks. Just wait'll it's still 90 degrees out at sunset. Sigh...I miss winter already. Not.

me Tarzan, you fell

So, says the storyteller, sitting in a chair by the fireside, a gin and tonic in his hand, did I ever tell you about the time I broke my arm? It was 1998. I was eleven years old, and a reluctant Boy Scout. My troop and I were camped just off the road running past Norris Dam, on the Clinch River in eastern Tennessee. It was just an inch away from car camping, really. The vehicles were parked a few hundred yards from the tents. This would prove to be fortunate. My memories of being a Boy Scout are not fond ones. I wasn't in the best of troops. I was a pretty wimpy kid, and the other guys were far from supportive or brotherly. I'd been on several outings with them already, and none were the kind I'd remember wistfully. But during this trip, I thought things were really going to turn around. The weather was beautiful (unlike Big Hump, which was negative temperatures coupled with 30 mile-an-hour winds; it was snowing sideways). Dad and my brother Harlan were along, meaning yours truly, Mommy's boy, wouldn't be left all alone (unlike Savage Gulf, where I was crying and moping and smelly all week because I'd forgotten to pack soap). Camp Jim was a marvelous place, too. It was a big, wide clearing in the woods, floored with dry brown soil, packed hard. It sloped gently upward to meet the wooded flank of a ridge. The trees surrounding and dotting the clearing seemed impossibly tall to me back then. The sunlight trickled down through the canopy and dappled the forest floor with those dancing bits of sunlight which I found (and still do find) so dazzlingly wonderful. All in all, it was a picturesque spot. But most importantly, it seemed the other guys in the troop were beginning to warm up to me. Near the center of the clearing was a particularly gigantic tree. I'm afraid I can't remember its exact dimensions. And I was so short back then that it must've been a lot smaller than it seemed. In my memory, it was gigantic, the next thing to the California redwoods. It was a towering oak, gray-barked and rough, no branches less than 30 above the ground, the trunk so wide that six of us would've had to link arms to encircle it. An enormous tree in the camp would've been awesome enough for us. But no, this one just happened to have thick brown vines hanging from it. And what's more, one of them was swingable. I was wandering around camp one golden afternoon not long after we'd arrived, a bit bored and a bit tired. (Two owls had chosen the wee hours of the morning to start having a conversation, and one of them happened to be perched in the tree right above our tent. And these owls didn't hoot, either. They screamed. Nobody in the camp got much sleep that night.) I look over and I see the guys swinging on this vine. And I think, cool. Here's the setup: the massive tree is just at the foot of the slope of the ridge. In front of it, the ground slopes gently down for a few yards, then suddenly drops fast—a steep embankment, the wall of a shallow gully running through the camp from north to south. This makes the vine-swing that much more thrilling. The guys, grabbing the vine and pushing off the trunk of the tree, swing out over the gentle slope, and then over the embankment. At the farthest outward point in their swing, they are about 15 feet above the ground or so. I make up my mind to try that swing or die in the attempt. The guys make room in the line for me, something I wasn't expecting. Surprised and gratified, I take my place and wait eagerly for my turn. I watch my predecessors take theirs, trying to pick up tips. Push off from the tree as hard as you can. Grasp the vine and climb up the side of the trunk a little to give yourself some extra height and oomph. Push to the side, making your swing wider, longer, more circular and less ovoid. I'm not the only one watching the proceedings. One of the older boys—I think his name was Lee or something—is also perusing, standing on the gentle slope below the tree. The guys are swinging directly over his head. Lee's extremely tall—must be nearing six feet. He's also quite thin and gangly, like most boys his age. My turn comes. My heart in my mouth, I grab hold of the vine, bend my knees as far as they'll go, and push with all my might. It's wonderful. I go swinging out, clutching the rough bark of the vine for all I'm worth, the sudden breeze blowing back my hair, the sunlight sparkling through the leaves high above, the ground dropping suddenly away until it seems I'm as high as a bird, I can see the whole camp and practically everybody in it, I can even see through the trees and over the hill to the road and the Clinch River beyond—and then suddenly I'm swinging back, and I pivot and kick out my legs to stop myself smashing into the other side of the tree. Breathless, I hand the vine to the next lucky bugger, and get in line again. No way one swing is enough. It seems to take ages, but eventually I'm back at the front of the line again. I grasp the vine (I'm probably grinning like a punch-drunk monkey), climb even higher up the trunk, and push off even harder. I start my outward swing— And suddenly it feels like someone clamped a ball-and-chain around my ankles. I can barely hold on. My grip is slipping, the rough bark of the vine skinning my hands. I glance down. Lee, the older boy, is hanging onto my shoes. He's swinging along with me. I look up. We're over the embankment. My head empties. My only thought now is to hold on. The ride is forgotten, except inasmuch as I really, really want to get off now. I try to hold on. If I lose it now, we're falling a long way. But I can't do it. Lee is just too heavy. Just as we reach the peak of the swing and begin to head back, I lose my grip. Those few split-seconds that I fall 15 feet and land on the slope of the embankment are a terrifying, toxic blur. WHAM. Lee rolls away, unhurt. I land on my hands and knees on the steepest part of the embankment, facing uphill. I know I'm hurt. But I've never broken a bone before, and I don't know the signs. My arm doesn't hurt yet, but there's that numb sort of feeling which precedes pain. It's in both of my arms and both my knees. How I managed to avoid planting my face in the dirt, I'll never know. Maybe it was the slope that saved me, who knows. But it does a number on my right wrist. Even after I've been picked up, dusted off and set to rights, it keeps throbbing. And in a few minutes, it starts to hurt. It starts to hurt like hell. Even sitting perfectly still, it hurts as though it's going to fall off. And if I try to move it, or even touch it, however slightly, fresh waves of raw agony shoot through my whole arm. Dad doesn't believe I've done anything serious to myself. He observes me on the floor of our tent, cradling my arm to my chest, whimpering, tears in my eyes, and says "Oh, come on. You're all right." Later, I felt rather sorry for him. Mom really tore him a new one for not believing I was hurt. In Dad's defense, I didn't fall that far, nor land that hard. It was inconceivable that I should've broken something. Pop probably just thought I was scraped up a little, and was trying to get me to toughen up. I'm glad he tried, at least. Dad and the troop leaders try various things on my arm: wrapping it in bandages; ice packs; warm water; immobilization. Nothing works. Eventually, the call is made. I'll have to be taken to the hospital. Dad calls up Mom and she comes A.S.A.P, driving our huge Ford B-Wagon van. That thing was amazingly capacious. With two seats up front and two benches in back, plus a vast amount of cargo space, it was the Post family's workhorse for nearly ten years. It chauffeured a family of four (and two dogs) on numerous picnics, transported entire soccer teams, supplied car campers with a week's rations, and was the best thing for a relaxing after-lunch nap while driving home from the restaurant. My memory blanks out here. I don't remember the ride from camp to the hospital at all. Such is my curse. I have an awful memory, and it's photographic to boot. This means that conversations, sounds, sights, and sensations are often utterly lost, and all I'm left with are images. I'm fortunate to remember as much of this incident as I have. I don't remember what explanation Lee gave for leaping up and grabbing my feet. I don't remember how the other guys reacted to our fall. I don't remember much of anything apart from what I've told you here, unfortunately. My apologies. The X-rays come back and the tall, dark-haired doctor puts it up for us to see. I have a spidery crack halfway through my radius. Nothing that needs to be set or splinted, fortunately, but enough to technically qualify as a "break." It also qualifies for a cast. Now that I've had some anesthetics put into my system and can actually move my arm without wanting to scream, I'm rather pleased. That's the way I recall feeling, anyway. I got to go home early from the Boy Scout trip and had a broken bone into the bargain. I didn't want to break a bone, mind you, but I felt it was something I needed to do at some point in my life. And have a cast. Then I could hold my eleven-year-old head up and proclaim, "I am a man of the world. I have broken a bone, and worn a cast. In your face, Herman." I don't know who Herman is. He just stands for all those bullies at recess who called me a girl or a wuss or a homo. For some unexplained reason, I picked the color orange for my cast. I don't know why. It didn't have anything to do with football. The colors of the University of Tennessee (with whom Peyton Manning was playing at the time) were orange and white, and all of Knoxville lit up with those colors every game day. But I was too young (or too wussy) to like football yet. I just liked the color orange. So they put it on. It went from my wrist up to my elbow, extending between my thumb and index finger. This made it impossible to hold a fork or a pencil, but I grinned and bore it for six long weeks. And I got all my classmates at middle school to sign it. I felt good and proud and accomplished for the first time in my life. I look back on the whole affair now with mingled amusement and shame. I'm ashamed that I couldn't have been stronger and held on to the vine as long as it took to return to the tree safely, even if I skinned my hands raw. That would've been the brave, selfless, manly thing to have done. Maybe that's what Lee was trying to teach me, I don't know. I'm just glad he didn't get hurt. I'm ashamed that I spent the rest of the afternoon moaning and groaning and writhing in the tent. That wasn't very manly, either. I'm amused at how the whole thing must've looked, though. Tiny Little Me, swinging on a vine. Tall Skinny Guy grabs my shoes. Suddenly TLM is swinging from the vine, and TSG is swinging from me. That must've been a sight. Then suddenly TLM lets go and the whole shebang plunges to earth. TLM spends the rest of the afternoon crying and whining on the floor of the tent. There was a lesson to be learned here, but it's temporarily escaped the author's mind. AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is the first of the fireside chats that I mentioned earlier. Well, not really the first. I've already told a few stories on this blog. There's the one about how I fell into a pond in fall in Ohio when I was a kid; another concerning a certain all-night party in Korea that nearly resulted in a lost watch; and a third—oh yeah, did you know that I once saved a rabbit's life? Ever wonder what living in a Buddhist temple is like? Check 'em out. There's much more to come. P.S. I've decided to postpone that award-ceremony thingy until tomorrow, and combine it with the news report I've been compiling. I've got some rather juicy tidbits for you. We have a new dog, for starters. The garbage truck got stuck in the sand up the road a couple days ago, too. HALLELUJAH, I passed the big scary test on shots yesterday! This morning I had my first flight lesson in a month and a half; I went "under the hood" for the second time. Dad has tapped me to play bartender for the dinner party he's hosting tonight. And did I mention how nice the weather's been down here lately?

Jeffrey goes to Leicester Square

This is another thing I like about having a blog—I get to insert insidious rants about things I dislike, and sententious vaunts about bits of esoterica I enjoy. (The only reason I didn't call this blog "the Insidious Ranter" was because that seemed excessively negative.)

One of those bits of esoterica is Jethro Tull. Most of you probably know who (or rather, what) J-Tull is. It's a band, an English prog rock group out of Blackpool, formed by Ian Anderson.

This Ian Anderson, dummy:


Categorizing Tull is like trying to tell what color a chameleon originally was, or describe the size of a bread box. These guys wore a lot of hats during their career, which has now spanned 40 years (and counting). They started out in blues and jazz, moving into folk, acoustical rock and heavy rock, dabbling in progressive rock and concept albums, classical or Renaissance rock, breaking into synthesizers and electronics, even throwing in a little Asian influence later on. Though J-Tull's heavy stuff (like their 1971 album Aqualung) gets the most radio play, the band's best remembered for their medieval compositions. If you've ever wondered what would've happened if six or seven Elizabethan minstrels had fallen through a time warp and onto the rock 'n' roll scene in the 1960s and '70s, Jethro Tull's the best band for the job. Flutes, hand drums, mandolins and fiddles trade places with heavy electric guitar riffs and bashing drum kits. Ian Anderson, indeed, was a consummate flautist, and a great many Tull songs feature one of Ian's incredibly nimble flute solos. It was a sound—a symphony of aural sensation—never witnessed before or since.

One of the most underrated albums by this underrated band is 1969's Stand Up. (That tune I played at the end of this post is off that very same record.) Still firmly entrenched in Tull's blues and folk period, Stand Up has the feel of a country picnic or a barn-raising—with a good dash of the medieval pastoral. The minstrels are coming and a hootenanny is going down. There is romance, reminiscence, even a ribald ballad or two. "Fat Man" is a tongue-in-cheek philippic against obesity. Nourished by tambourines, hand drums, mandolins, and Anderson's lively, omniscient flute, we are given the idea that a court jester or fool may be playing this tune in the king's hall before honored guests. Try listening to the record in the dark with a glass of mulled wine or a mug of ale in your hand, maybe with a strategic candle burning here and there, and see if the effect isn't lost on you.

Classical influences are easy to detect on Stand Up: one track, "Bouree," is actually a jazzy adaptation of J.S. Bach's Bourrée in E Minor. The track's jazz compositions, like the cavalier, commiserating "Nothing is Easy," give way to the loveliest of love songs, like the acoustic- and piano-based "Look Into the Sun." It's a quiet, ethereal tune, so simple in arrangement but so evocative in actuality—one can see, in one's mind, two lovers meeting in the soft light of evening. "We Used to Know" is a shoulder-shrugging glimpse down one man's Memory Lane. Sustained by descending acoustic chords in 4/4 time, it's an emotional and thoughtful tune, somber but soothing. And then, of course, there's "Jeffrey Goes to Leicester Square," such a genre-bending cavalcade of flutes, bongos, triangles, bass, and guitar, assembled so jauntily and so lusciously, with such rhythm and grace and ease of listening, that I'm not going to tell you about it here. Suffice it to say that I heard the opening bars and knew I had to buy the whole album.

Such is Tull's versatility. Anderson's songwriting abilities are staggering. He could turn his mind to side-splitting ballads in one moment, heartrending love songs the next, jazzy grooves in another. His hard rock compositions, like "Aqualung," "Locomotive Breath," and "Minstrel in the Gallery" (which starts out medieval and then retraces its steps with electric guitars and heavy bass) are rhythmic and harmonious. They're more than enough to induce a bit of reflexive head-banging or foot-stomping, and are certainly able to compete with anything laid down by Tull's contemporaries. And yet, for all his musical brilliance, Ian did not neglect his lyrics. He writes with a witty, often satirical air, but not vitriolic nor antagonistic. A keen observer, he often sent up other band's works. His 45-minute magnum opus, a concept album made up of one single long song, Thick as a Brick, was intended to be a spoof of J-Tull's contemporary prog-rock groups. And yet, thanks to mellifluous lyrics and Tull's one-of-a-kind sound, as infectious as it was unique, it became a brilliant success in its own right.

That's what made Ian Anderson so great, though. He put his heart and mind into his music. He was soulful, but intelligent. He wasn't some angst-filled teenager or an insufferable, disenfranchised punk rocker. He was a musician, plain and simple: a satirical, fun-loving bard with a penchant for the rhapsodic. His vision put him far ahead of his time. Perhaps too far: Tull's critical success ebbed and flowed like an ocean tide. Sometimes Anderson was hailed; others, lambasted. The fan base, though substantial, was never comparable to commercial groups such as KISS. Even Ian's band-mates often couldn't identify with his ideas; J-Tull's membership has changed so often and so completely that the band has something like 30 former members. Only Ian Anderson and lead guitarist Martin Barre still remain from the 1969 lineup.

None of this really matters. Jethro Tull's winning combination of poetic lyrics, symphonic musical arrangements, anachronistic instrumentation, melodic music and flamboyant performance has endeared them to generations of fans, and earned them a place in the heart of any music lover who still prizes talent over mass appeal. Not least among those fans and music-lovers is yours truly. This is easily my favorite band. Anderson's obvious wit and intelligence, his boldness to go where no critic thought he should, and the sheer beauty of his music has cemented his primacy in my mind. I mean, come on, how could you not like this guy?


This concludes my review. And now for a few important announcements: I have now managed to obtain a copy of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five from the library, so I shall start in upon it once I finish The Epic of Gilgamesh. This means, then, that you shall be hearing another book review soon, and that the folk with whom I've agreed to read Slaughterhouse-Five (you know who you are) should begin reading it as well. I'm trying mightily to stick to this three-posts-per-week regimen that I've set for myself, but the universe is conspiring against me, the old rascal. I've just been nominated for an award by the most gracious gentleman, talented writer, helicopter pilot, and serviceman, Jon Paul. (Thanks a million, pal.) I will host my acceptance ceremony tomorrow morning. Stay tuned for ten manly facts about yours truly, too, as per the regulations of the award.

There are some things which I have not told you about which I probably should tell you about when I get the time. Like my Mom's new dog, Dash, a purebred German Shepherd. Or the fact that I'm painting the eaves. Or that a garbage truck got stuck up the block the other day and I went to help dig it out. Or the weather: it's been in the 70s and sunny for the last three days. We've actually got the windows open today. In February.

Well, shucks...looks like I just told you. Postie out.

Liberties Taken: a sestina

Today is my official Write Your @ss Off Day, so here's one of the results. This is my entry for the Big Ole Poetry Challenge the Pollinatrix has got going on her blog. As part of today's eight-hour writing marathon, I'm also working on a new science fiction short story (going well), some nonfiction travel articles (going worse) and, of course, the novel. Maybe I'll put up a report card or something later on and tell you how I did. But in the meantime...

Liberties Taken: a sestina

And once again, they come inside to find                                                     

that time did not see fit to wait, and fly                                                        

across the road to fields of light and dance                                                   

their time away. The dancers do not see                                                        

the answers which can help. And soon they break                                        

and scatter far, until the next new day.                                                         

For endless nights, these folk who dream by day                                         

and waste their nights in revelry, and find                                                    

no dreams, no gold, no life, they soon will break.                                         

But we who sit behind the walls and fly                                                       

on wings which we in dreams can use, we see                                              

the light of years, the life ahead, and dance.                                                 

In time we grasp the stems of hopes in dance,                                              

climb up the stalk to flowers, gleaming days.                                                

For now, we sit at home and work. I see                                                       

the happy land that only I can find.                                                              

I work and slave to someday go, and fly                                                      

into the clouds, where windows shake, and break.                                       

Between that land and I lie years. It breaks                                                  

my heart and wounds my mind. I do not dance                                            

to think of what is there. Someday to fly,                                                     

I do not wish to live on Earth. The days                                                       

go by, as slow as snails. I cannot find                                                                       

the light, the hope, the dream I once could see.                                            

So time I waste, and dreams I spurn. You see                                              

in me a lazy man, with faith which breaks                                                     

in toil and sweat. I think and dream, but find                                                           

no reason, purpose worth the strife of days.                                                  

I dawdle, treading water, scorn the dance,                                                   

Forget  that once back then I dreamed to fly.                                                

I do not want my liberties to fly                                                                    

away against my will. I want to see                                                               

the hour when I achieve my goals, the day                                                   

when all I worked for comes to me and breaks                                             

the doors and windows down, and I can dance.                                           

The toil of ages dies. My dreams I find.                                                        

Thence comes my life. I find that I can fly,                                      

I find my feet can dance, my eyes can see,                                       

my hands can break. In time will come the day.

FOOTNOTE: Just in case you're wondering, I stuck to the rules. This is a proper English sestina: thirty-nine lines (six six-line stanzas and a tercet), all of which end with one of six words. Each stanza's end-words are properly ordered, and (this is the part I decided to grit my teeth over) the poem is written entirely in iambic pentameter. W.H. Auden, eat your heart out.

I also want to say, right here and now (just so I won't be like this idiot), that this poem was inspired by Robert E. Howard's short story The Tower of the Elephant. In it, the elephant god says, "Let me be free of this cage of broken blind flesh, and I will once more be Yogah of Yag, morning-crowned and shining, with wings to fly, and feet to dance, and eyes to see, and hands to break." I always thought that was a lyrical turn of phrase, even for Howard...and that's where I got four of this sestina's six end-words. Attribution over.