Thursday 10.2.08: A New Understanding

Many people think this is a drawing of me with a hangover. It's actually a photo. Damn that liquor.

ANOTHER NIGHT DRINKING, ANOTHER MORNING TO THE BIRDS. Doubled up on my alcohol intake post-set, playing court jester for Rojeanne and Brick, per usual. Feed the rummy drinks and watch him dance. Yelled into random ears for a while before dissolving into the blare of DJ Lee's Austin Powers retro-muzak express, exiting the bar with nary a goodbye, and waking up the following morning with my head swaying like that pendulum in the Griffith Observatory lobby that knocks a pin over ever ten minutes. Something's gotta give.

Look guys, I'll drink battery fluid for any one of you. I'm known by the bartenders as the bottomless stomach in the corner that will accept any godforsaken mixture of liquid made by mistake or refused by a customer, and I wear that badge proudly. As a child, a frown would contort my father's enormous Barnum & Bailey moustache whenever I left even a scrap of plate on my plate as a child, and he would remind me of all the hungry kids in Africa. This is why I continue to eat and drink everything in sight to this day - although I'm not sure how a starving child would benefit from a Captain Morgan's and Coke.

But things have changed, so things have to change. As of last Tuesday I'm a successful businessman, and consequently, time spent staring into space at my computer in a hung over daze is precious money out of my Dickie shorts pockets. I am not going to be "the sober DJ", just like I'm not going to take a shit after taking a shower. But there has to be a way to minimize the damage, other than drinking less and not mixing liquors. OK, I guess I just answered my own question.

I would be insincere if I didn't make the point that I have a new respect for you guys behind the bar. Dan fed me a Chartreuse (thanks Ian for the spelling correction) the other week, which tasted like the contents of an ashtray dumped into a small glass of water. To drink so much crazy shit so often and remain relatively functioning human beings, we must not be made of the same stuff.