In Which I Rail About the Weather

Well you little son of a bitch, what's it going to be? Hmm? Do we get a timely and much needed Spring or will this miserable wet weather never end?

Half the country is buried under record snowfalls, but many of the lucky ones in those otherwise deadly urban traps will walk to local bars, and the rest of them should know to have ample stores of hooch at home. Keep the faith, folks.

For the last few weeks, we've bundled and medicated all in order to consume whiskey and drink as many strong beers as possible. Regardless of what the rat does in Pennsylvania tomorrow, this weekend is the Super Bowl, so we can all eat well then laugh at the expensive commercials. It's a sign of hipness and a badge of honor to show up Monday at work and still slightly reek. It's in the national character.

Once that holy of holy days is in the books however, yours truly is ready for warmer weather. St. Patrick's Day will loom large, as it always does in Knoxville(seriously, check out the Old City and Downtown that afternoon, you'll be surprised in the participation). Then come April, it's time for the fantastic street festival affectionately known as the Rossini Festival. Mackey has elaborated on that happy-as-shit fun time in previous entries, so maybe I will spell him and write this year's account. In the meantime, I'll continue to freeze my ass off...and pay attention to that gopher lookin' prick.

There I was completely wasting, out of work and down

Wasting? Yes. Out of work and down? No sir, although I am duly grateful during this foul oconomy. Thus with another Drinking for Vengeance in the books with the usual ceremonial JP lyric, we move into Whiskey Season right and proper on the first of December. During the holiday period with your exhaustive shopping and nauseating office parties, we remind you to hit the Makers, Jamesons, or Glenlivet early and often. Even if you only have a few minutes...and especially if you are at your wit's end with the droning shoppers and the hell of holiday traffic then its time to get stinko. You can find refuge nearly anywhere if you don't give in like a dandy.

Warm, inviting, non-judging...is there anything it can't do?

Drunken Jukebox Mark Zwei

Behold Denis Leary. We've all heard this one.

Danger Powers

At a moment of impulse I picked up this bottle of Irish whiskey to sample this weekend. And by sample I mean drink the whole damn thing. Surprisingly I’ve never had this brand before. Initially I was going to buy my usual Jameson’s, then I saw Bushmill’s and Powers sitting side by side and had to make a decision. After a second or two of drunken synaptic misfires my right hand reached out and grabbed the Powers off the shelf. I strode with pride to the register, made my purchase and completed the entire transaction in about 1 minute flat. Somehow the bottle remains unopened and I have yet to have a sip, but I suspect that won’t be the case very much longer.

Heheheh, I laugh every time. The first (and best) Austin Powers is comic gold. Or is it Powers Gold?

Sláinte

That’s about all I’ve got for you today. Enjoy your Guinness, Harp, Smithwicks and Irish whiskeys. I’m sure there will be a few Irish Car Bombs served up too. I’m hoping for a fine plate of American-Irish corned beef and cabbage along with a few drinks out on the town.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

The Ballad of Doh Da Thone

Boh Da Thone was a warrior bold:

His sword and his rifle were bossed with gold,

And the Peacock Banner his henchmen bore

Was stiff with bullion, but stiffer with gore.

He shot at the strong and he slashed at the weak

From the Salween scrub to the Chindwin teak:

He crucified noble, he sacrificed mean,

He filled old ladies with kerosene:

While over the water the papers cried,

"The patriot fights for his countryside!"

But little they cared for the Native Press,

The worn white soldiers in Khaki dress,

Who tramped through the jungle and camped in the byre,

Who died in the swamp and were tombed in the mire,

Who gave up their lives, at the Queen's Command,

For the Pride of their Race and the Peace of the Land.

Now, first of the foemen of Boh Da Thone

Was Captain O'Neil of the Black Tyrone,

And his was a Company, seventy strong,

Who hustled that dissolute Chief along.

-Kipling

http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_bohdathone.htm

In a few hours, go make the most of it. Get out your Boru Harp, and drink like Wolf the Quarrelsome.

If you need us we'll be roaming downtown and carrying it on to the Old City.
For Heaven's sake though, please don't need us.

Check out this mess

A little pre-St. Paddy's day discord, if you will. Personally I like it when St. Patrick's Day falls midweek since it forces some uncomfortable decisions regarding work attendance. The last time it fell during the weekend, I felt curiously unfulfilled. Not that we here in the south are quite as enthusiastic like some larger cities to the north are about the holiday, but there is just something more emotionally rewarding about being 'jobsick but barwell.'

I've not really called in to work for March 17 in a long time. It seemed necessary when I was younger, but now I admit to a few flaws in the plan. If you choose to rook your work and not go on the 17th, you will greatly enjoy the holiday proper. It will be fun, and you will get wasted and possibly comatose. While you knock back car bombs though, know that the bell will soon toll for thee. Work looms, and it looms with baleful glares from co-workers...it looms with your overwrought cologne(the cheaper the better) to stave off the booze smell that you noticed when you kicked that prostitute out of your hovel on the short side of 4AM. How much did you spend? Why is your phone lit up with text messages and voicemails in which you remember jack shit of?

Hurry fuckface, because you've got only a few hours before your perfidy is exposed by the hangover. It will go something like this:

Indeed. Not a pretty sight. Better to take the next day off...sure, if you call in sick you will be somewhat accused of sleeping one off, but that will only be a rumor...a nasty bit of shit that you, being a paragon of office virtue, can refute(by a duel if necessary). What's more is that your co-workers themselves usually have some weak sauce of their own that will manifest itself, so your situation is not likely to last for long. Trust me, I've noticed a pattern. In one of my earliest jobs out of college, the office prude all but accused me of calling in sick the day after the Super Bowl. I didn't have to remain stoic for long, because later in the day she farted at the copier. Not a squeaker mind you, but a fullbore olfactory holocaust. World War One type stuff. My point is that you can get past that one, at least once or twice. Don't abuse it, and your own experience may differ(almost assuredly). Some people believe the hardest part of this exercise is waiting out the clock on St. Paddy's proper, but once work is done you can jump in with both feet.

Anyway. Try this possibly terrible drink, courtesy of Asylum.com.

http://www.asylum.com/2010/03/03/corned-beef-and-cabbage-tom-collins/

Great Drunks of the Silver Screen 10.0

Peter O'Toole. Duh.

Clearly a no-brainer, this Irishman represents the last vestiges of inebriate actors from the UK.

Strengths: Irish, incredible agent representation, clearly immortal

Weaknesses: Irish, fire, passing out on the floor, gendarmes

We've covered his compatriots before in this ignoble series of powerful functional drunks. Behold:

O'Toole has managed to avoid the Reaper longer than the remainder of this heady, notorious crew....a baffling accomplishment given his literally being born into a drinking household. His father was a tremendous drunk that often boozed with his son.


Since Mr. O'Toole is still alive and kicking, I will this single time omit his numerous acting credentials beyond his notable rendition of Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia and his lesser known but much more excellent portrayal of Henry II in The Lion in Winter. How big are his acting chops? Well the ubiquitous Michael Caine was his understudy...and learning to live the debauched lifestyle of his mentor as well.

O'Toole set fire to many, many things. Notably, resort kitchens and usually his own bed. He also loathed last call, going so far as to purchase an Irish pub so they would continue to serve him. He of course cancelled the check the next morning. The owner had no hard feelings, and O
Toole attended his funeral...only to find in a daze that he was at the wrong one.

I rest much easier now that it is Fall 2009...as the Summer of Celebrity Death failed to take down this invulnerable drinking god.

Great Drunks of the Silver Screen 9.0

Presenting the iconic Richard Harris:

We praise the man and mourn the loss of another raging alcoholic from the UK. This Irish actor is commonly considered to be one of the true hellraising paragons during the latter half of the 20th century. Though he was reported to drink only with Hitler during his latter(Hodgkins Disease) years, we here can certainly recognize the decades of gin-soaked debauchery that he boldly had undertaken. This guy rocked.

Strengths: Irish, wide range as an actor, smartass in real life

Weaknesses: Irish, took a check for Harry Potter, outlived his organs

Mr. Harris's acting resume is well-known...what is generally not-known is that he was also a singer and spoken word artist. Harris got a later start than his drunken contemporaries of the day, first appearing in 1958 films and then feverishly making up for it during the sixties. His casting in Camelot was a headscratcher at first, but he parlayed that success into highly commercial film-making that gave low budget works like Orca some serious gravitas. I remember once as a kid being wonderstruck at A Man Called Horse and had no idea until much later that Harris was often so hammered that he couldn't be forced out of bed. His award winning career is one that today's shitass actors couldn't hope to match even if they were sober.

One of the most humorous and cliche' gutter remarks is attributed to Harris, when found by a Bobby in a storm ditch. "The world is spinning and I am waiting for my house to go by."

How fucking epic is that?

Damn them Doobies and they Chinese Grove

By Doobies I mean Irish. By Chinese Grove I mean Jamesons.

Why I drink this shit is beyond me. It always makes things extremely blurry.

The Irish Question

Well, lookee here. It seems the nation's second outright yearly excuse to get shit-housed has arrived.

Say what you will about the apocryphal origins of that snake-driving sumbitch, the end result these days is that we get to thumb our nose at any sort of responsibility to drink a metric fuck ton of booze.

I've posted in the past about my resentment of these holidays...which sends forth the amatuer to drink with the pros, the latter of whom recognize no drinking calendar other than "today." Bosses will be on the prowl in the morning, the uptight prohibitionists will sniff derisively at your bloodshot eyes and gamey stench.

Fuck them. As much as I don't care about St. Patrick's day per se(Lots of English blood, so I naturally wish to oppress them) I will side with the dysfunctional Irish over the sober. After all, we get polluted on Tuesdays by rote.

Hopefully each of you has a bar in mind for today, so I'll spare you the various activities that are advertised in the local papers and leave you with a simple charge: Consume.

The Irish Are Coming

Oh those arrogant Irish! I stumbled across a website yesterday about the 1st Annual Irish Festival of Knoxville. As a drunken Scots-Irish descendant you'd think I'd be excited about a new Celtic celebration, or at least supportive. But I'm rather confused by the whole fest. Do we not already honor their kind with a nationally recognized holiday in March? Is this some kind of reaction to Boston winning the NBA title for the first time in 22 years? Hardly. Apparently this is a fund raiser for the local police and firefighters associations. Ho hum, I guess that is okay, but do we need to have it in the middle of summer in freakin' July? I can see scores, perhaps hundreds of pasty-white "Celts" out on the lawns at World's Fair Park ready to burst into flames. (I hope to have my pasty-white arse on the lake!)

If you visit the site you'll find a brief history of Irish immigrants and public service, ticket information ($10 adults, kids free), vendor and sponsorship opportunities, and how the event will be Green. Get it, green? Irish Green - Environment Green. Whatever. Show me to the beer and whiskey vendors and let me drink - that's my heritage. I just hope the police benefiting from the event will let the crowd have a good time without making their arrest quotas on-site.