Gotterdammerung

Setting: Early Saturday morning...Mackey's couch. I'm alive, at least on some immoderate level. Allow me to show you as best I can what was going on inside my skull:

Get the idea? I swear Mad Max and The Lord Humongous were chasing each other in what once was a reasonably active mind. All motor control, gone. Attempts to rise...utterly fucked. Well, seems like it must be the sixth of September.

You see, I rarely lose memories or blackout. Believe me, that's not always a good thing. I've seen shit that'll turn you white with febrile confusion. As for most of my birthday, as Mackey has recounted, I put on a drinking clinic before succumbing to unconsciousness. The truly great part of a real nasty birthday tear is the hostility your friends really have for you. Oh sure, it's great fun...till you see furtive giggles as one "friend" slinks off to a far bartender. Said sumbitch or third-rate tart won't comeback with a stout bourbon. No, those hours are passed by and by (along with respectability). Instead, Patron rears its nasty sombrero. Jager hunts. The bow legged woman demands an audience. Any number of drinks that end with -zee's and -drops follow at a pretanatural pace. The Valkyries were definitely choosers of the slain that night.

Feh. I'm glad this sort of power-drinking only comes round once a year. Always nice to have it around Labor Day and the start of football season...makes the transition into Drinksgiving that much easier. Still, the hangover was impressive and defied description. It was a definite badge of honor.

Many thanks to all those for their well wishes and I salute the drinking buddies from Friday night. I won't forget it, you bastards. Heaven help the next one of you with a reason to celebrate.

Monday Hangover

Whew, what a good weekend of boozing! Had a good time Friday night celebrating the birthday of our very own Lord von Lord. We met up with Tag Berauscht and his Freundin, plus another couple of friends and front loaded at my place before heading up to have some drinks at the Sunsphere Skybox. The elevator situation still needs to be addressed, but the service was better this time around and we all enjoyed our cocktails while looking over downtown and Ft. Sanders from above.

After parting ways with that group, LVL and I went to meet King Randall The Insufferable and his “queen” to have more drinks. Lord was already hammered because he had the day off work and had been drinking heavily for god knows how long, so the facial color changes of pale white, to light green, to red, to white again are of no surprise – we’ve all been there. But none of us were expecting the surprise visit of “Catfish”who joined us at the bar for many drinks. So that was nice – me, KRTI, and Catfish getting Lord all tore up (ourselves included) until I don’t remember anything.

Saturday 2 PM - that is when I got out of bed. I felt great! College football and the US Open were on TV so I plopped down on my couch and didn’t move for several hours.

I’d planned on going out for beers and a good lunch to put some final thoughts on a bar review for the blog, but that idea was squashed Friday when I was told the Crown & Goose had failed their health inspection.

One point away: Crown & Goose at 123 S. Central Street - Grade: 69
Food temperatures were a problem here. An inspector found soup at 129 degrees,
but 140 is the proper temperature for hot food. The inspector says a hand sink was blocked so kitchen workers couldn't wash their hands properly.

Now this isn’t entirely a deal-breaker for me. Some of my favorite places are rat-holes, and they didn’t even fail that bad – just one point. I mean it isn’t like “Easy” was smoking a cigarette in the server station while the general manager was raking his finger through the mashed potatoes and eating them right in front of the inspector or anything. Geesh! I’m going to reconsider this news and make a final decision about the review at a later date.

I did manage to go out for a quick bite of sushi at Nama downtown. Had a couple of beers, witnessed a group of students downing some sake-bombs, considered staying out and making a fool of myself but decided against that and went in for the night. There will be plenty more occasions to make a fool of myself with football season upon us.

Sunday was most excellent – I got some errands out of the way early so I could start drinking right at kickoff of the NFL games. After the early games I went to Tag’s where we feasted on leg of lamb for dinner with all the snacks and beer you’d normally expect.

Not to mention my team, The Bird, won its opening game and stand 1st in their division. Plus there was even more tennis – Andy Murray thwarted my prediction and defeated Rafa Nadal to make it to the final of the Open. Which, by the way I’ll be watching at 5 PM today. On top of that there are 2 more NFL games on TV tonight. So I have plenty of recreational drinking to tend to this evening, starting as soon as I get off work. Any friends of/and the authors are welcome to come by tonight if you're up for it. I really hope I don’t overdo it though – I have another friend’s birthday to celebrate tomorrow night!!

Off to work...

Back on Monday...

Weekend Quandary

WTF is happening this weekend? Here it is football season, week 2 and the Vols aren't scheduled for a game. Not that we need to get into a football discussion, but usually my weekends are mapped out from September - December watching the games. Sure I'll watch some other games and the US Open wrap up, but I need some other activity to coincide with my alcohol intake.

Let's take a look at some options:

Movies on the Town - Babe, The Gallant Pig. A family outing suitable for the kids! I don't think so. Not only because there won't be alcohol of any kind, but also because I don't feel like stepping around 100 piles of dog shit.

TN Valley Fair - another pass. I used to like the fair when I was 10 or so but can't think of the last time I've been to one. Do they sell beer at the concerts? I think the only concert this weekend will be the Village People, playing tonight. I've heard some people talking about going to see Loverboy but I will not be joining them. If I want to see overweight, past-their-prime, balding singers I'll look in the mirror and sing.

Lord von Lord birthday drinks - this is something I can wrap my liver around. I don't know what day exactly, but 'round here we usually take a week or so to celebrate these things. It's easier to share a drink with a buddy (or have one bought for you) if you extend the time period. Not that things will be much different than usual, except this one time a year we un-clinch our tight fists and purchase a drink for the honoree.

So not too much going on. This sounds like a great weekend to check out some bars I haven't been to in a while, or some new ones. It helps to move around and stay familiar with the bartenders around town just in case you get 86'd from your local, or you embarrass yourself so bad you can't show your face for a while. Plus there are about 10 bar reviews I've had on hold that need to be posted here, so maybe this weekend I can get some fresh perspectives and knock a few of them out.

Drink up beetches!!

Thursday Hangover

Man do I love holiday weekends. Not only do you get that extra day off work, but when you return you have a shortened work week. Of course there is the possibility of extra work that you have to catch up on since you were out a day (or more) so you have to weigh your particular situation. In my case, missing 3 days of work caused a considerable amount of extra work to do this week, which naturally sucks. Enough bitching though.

Looking back over the past few days there were some ups and downs. The biggest disappointment occurred when my beloved keg of IPA went dry at the start of the holiday weekend (not some upset loss on Monday night). Luckily the next best thing was available as backup: growlers of IPA. One of the pluses of hanging around drunks with similar tastes is that you're never too far away from that next favorite beer.

Thanks to Tag Berauscht and King Randall the Insufferable for supplying the beer on Monday. Though we lost the game, it was a good time and booze always helps soften the aches of defeat. Plus we almost had a full house of all the authors, with Scarlett O'Harlot away in Las Vegas probably trying to score a full house at the tables, or more likely black jack.

Lord von Lord already covered our visit to the Southern Graces Skybox. It has lots of potential to establish itself as a trendy, hip lounge if enough people are willing to pay higher prices for the view and unique location. The name could be better, and I agree with the readers who suggested "1982" a few weeks ago. Expect more updates from the authors.

And tonight is the glorious return of live, for-real, regular season, mutha-effin', NFL football. I'm fired up and will be in front of the TV salivating like a hyena over a fresh wildebeest carcass. One of the best sports blogs in the country, Kissing Suzy Kolber, sums it up best here. These guys cover and explain the NFL the way you wish you could see it on TV - not for the timid or PC.

So I'll have my booze, beer and snacks ready to go tonight at 7:00 PM. The only drawback is that it is on at about the same time as the US Open match of Andy Roddick vs. Novak Djokovic in the QFs. Most of you may sneer at the comparison of a tennis match vs. NFL football, but this is the final grand slam event of the year and actually a really good matchup. Still don't care? Think tennis if full of pansy-boys? Well take a look at this muscle...

Yeaaah! Andy Murray of Scotland will whup that ass if you think so. He is serious. And tough. Look at that scruffy beard!! Take a good look, 'cause he's about to lose to Rafa Nadal in tomorrow night's semi-final match.

Drink up!!

Bar Review: Southern Graces Skybox

Not long ago, Mackey regaled us with his prescient skills and foretold the good news that the Sunsphere would be pushing booze. He has that ability apparently when it is booze related. He is Beeradamus. Anyway, the setting:

Last week we took the long elevator ride up to the bar. First one must be patient and take the elevator on the right...Number One. This will only happen after Number Two answers the call five times in a row. At least. By the time you get to the 4th floor you will have found yourself thirsty, needing to take a whiz, and utterly spent of small talk for the ride up. Feh.

ELEVATOR FLIES OPEN

Well, first off you see the bar itself. The best piece in the joint actually. All the little things in the area seem to be well decorated and crisp. The bar looks out over the Fort, and you can really see quite a ways up to the ridge. Same with the other side of downtown and south Knoxville. It's quite bright...swinging back over to The Compound, and UT...the Hill and Stadium are prominent.

It's really dark in here. Like makeout dark. Most folks are trying and failing miserably at any suitable pictures...yours truly no exception.

Some things were curious though. The service is still badly working out the kinks. The cocktail tables to the left of the bar are high tops, and when boozing you get a righteous case of vertigo if you aren't ready for it. That does fade though, and one gets use to the dark surroundings in a hurry to really appreciate the view.

It ain't cheap...no draft beers, wine and liquor are encouraged. I have no problem with either. Especially the latter.

I hope this enterprise can make it...given the logistic concerns, crowd management might be a problem. Then again, I can think of worse issues. Get your ass up there soon, in any case.

NFL in 2 Days!!

Looking ahead to Thursday when we'll have a real season of football to follow. Let's try to forget we're coming off a holiday weekend - a weekend that also featured college football 5 straight days from Thursday to Monday. That's some serious drinking time, but it all amounts to crap when your team lets you down right before you have to return to work the next day. No amount of booze can change a loss to a win, but it can help you forget at least for a while.

Next time I may skip all the fancy snacks and just stick with the booze...