Category Archives: Gin

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emo gossip linkage

If only my parents had bought me this when I was little!

If only my parents had bought me this when I was little!

Okay so judging by the computer clock I have 12.5 minutes to finish this post and get it up, which may give you a hint why most of my posts seem rather … thin … lately. I have to jam them all up before the web cafe closes or walk several miles in the rain to get to the nearest 24 hour cafe and then pay another $2 for lousy coffee or $5 in the case of the nearest cafe, which has a two-drink minimum and NO I AM NOT EVEN JOKING so is it any wonder I’m having an emo breakdown? It’s only Monday by a few minutes and I’m already three days behind in posts.

So let me tell you about the time I had an emo meltdown on my one and only celebrity follower. Well, I have some celebrity journalists following me, thank god, because validation from writers better than one’s self is always welcome, but I have only one Actual Movie Star Follower, and that’s John Cusack. I’d tell you about him, but I don’t have time and you DO have google, so knock yourselves out.

It happened after I’d stayed up too long liveblogging Japan (for which I did get on the front page of Google for “Japanese Earthquake” for a time at least; I do think I did a good job, but GOD who can blog that for long without going ever so slightly insane, eh? I ask yez) two nights in a row and gotten an email from a friend in Hawaii mentioning the two quakes he’d had while he was replying to my email of a few minutes ago. Oh, swell.

Then I heard about the reactors.

That’s about when I DM’d my one and only Genuine Celebrity Follower, a man I know through conversations of about 420 characters total. And nothing is to be deduced from that purely coincidental number.

And what did I say to this near-stranger? “Do you ever have one of those days when you think the end of the world is actually here already?”

So, yeah, I’m apparently That Fan. Mother would be so proud.

On that note, here are your emo links for an early Monday morning. I should drink more, at least I’m a happy drunk.

Continue reading →

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Operation Global Media Domination: the Cocktail Situation

As someone who knows me (all too) well said, now I will be utterly impossible to live with: It will totally go to my head (or at least two or three of them will):

So there you have it: not only did Social Media Club Vancouver have a totally successful Meet the Geek dinner tonight (superthanks to Melody Fury of Vancouver Food Tour) but Operation Global Media Domination got the ultimate accolade: a tribute in booze and nomenclature. Can there be any higher? I think not! And not just because I’ve been drinking!

So, there you have it: a raincoaster cocktail is:

1 oz Gin (Hendricks, Plymouth, Broker’s, Old Raj, Beefeater)

0.5 oz Lillet Blanc

0.5 oz Cointreau

0.5 oz Fresh Lemon Juice

barspoon of Absinthe

stir, strain, add lemon zest (and Jay Jones always adds a great wide swath; none of your chintzy ribbons for him!).

Then, if you’re like me, you show it off to everyone at the bar and offer them sips of “your” cocktail and then before you or anyone who didn’t yet get a sip knows it, you’re staring into the bottom of your beautiful, vintage cocktail glass with the chipped gold rim, and there’s nothing down there but lemon zest and the dregs of regret. Ah, socialism! Perhaps I should cultivate a fondness for vodka instead?

Dorothy Parker, who really looks more Doloresy here

Dorothy Parker, who really looks more Doloresy here

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Dry Spell

Those of you who have been following the ol’ raincoaster blog for some time will know that I’ve been on a largely raw vegan die(t) for three months now, with the result that I’ve gone from an XL to an L and no, it was NOT worth it.

It was most particularly not worth it because I had to give up my beloved cocktails; in fact, I believe I only consumed alcohol one day in the month of July and that was my birthday. In August I gave myself a few more “days off” and enjoyed some wine, but it must be said that in this, as in most things in life, Dean Martin had it right.

Dino is my hero

Listen to Dino; he KNOWS!

“I’d hate to be a teetotaler. Imagine getting up in the morning and knowing that’s as good as you’re going to feel all day.”

Well, exactly.

So, how does it feel to be a neo-teetotaler in Lotus Land, when one knows all the best bartenders and they all know it’s a Negroni, up, when you walk in the door unless it’s cold outside and then it’s probably Jack Daniels or if it’s been a very bad day, Champagne? Well, it doesn’t feel good. Have you ever been the only sober person at a blowout? That’s right: it feels like a bad dream. It feels, in fact, just as depicted in this incredible documentary, 28 Drinks Later.

And, lest we forget, here are some words of wisdom from Diogenes:

“What I like to drink most is wine that belongs to others.”

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Post-Christmas Hangover and National Drunk Blogging Day: deferred!

Drunk Nativity Set

Alcohol
Image via Wikipedia

TRAGEDY STRIKES!

I have been informed that my vacation sponsors up here in Podunkaville can’t or won’t see their way into bankrolling my participation in National Drunk Blogging Day. Imagine! What’s the point of three week’s free vacation with a view, a hot tub, a fireplace, and a wall full of DVDs if you have to enjoy it sober? I ask yez.

So I have a plan.

  1. 1) Move the date back. This part is easy! Pick a date when 2. is available
  2. 2) Obtain booze sponsor. This means either Molson’s, who’ve been very, very good to me in the past, or a wine company, as getting a gin sponsor for this would be a) difficult (believe me, I’ve tried to get gin sponsors before) and b) massively destructive to one’s liver, as one must have one drink per post, and I make my Martinis on the large side.

So, anyone interested in hooking us up with some tasteh, tasteh C2H5OH, just let me know.

merry squidmas

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Economic Theory 101: the raincoaster index

If only I could afford the barrel

If you’re an economist, you’ve probably heard about all kinds of bizarre and no doubt three-letter-acronymed thingies that measure vitality of the economy. If you’re not an economist (demographically speaking, it is indeed likely that people reading my blog are not economists, as surprising as that may seem) you may have heard of things like the GDP, SET index, and similiar TLA‘s, but have you heard of:

The Hotness Index

The hotter the waitresses, the weaker the economy. In flush times, there is a robust market for hotness. Selling everything from condos to premium vodka is enhanced by proximity to pretty young people (of both sexes) who get paid for providing this service. That leaves more-punishing work, like waiting tables, to those with less striking genetic gifts. But not anymore.

A waitress at one Lower East Side club described to me what happened there: “They slowly let the boys go, then the less attractive girls, and then these hot girls appeared out of nowhere. All in the hope of bringing in more business. The managers even admitted it. These hot girls that once thrived on the generosity of their friends in the scene for hookups—hosting events, marketing brands, modeling—are now hunting for work.” A Soho restaurateur I know recently received applications from “a couple of classic Eastern European fembots. Once upon a time, these ladies must’ve made $1,500 a night lap dancing. At my place, they’re not going to make that in a week.”

In the same vein, and somewhat more directly relevant, at least to MY life and probably to yours, too, since who can afford to eat out anymore, I’d like to present:

The raincoaster Index

Image of raincoaster raincoaster
12/14/09

I was invited to fourteen corporate holiday parties last year, all within walking distance of one another, all with open bars. This year, NONE! And I didn’t suddenly become more obnoxious, companies have really cut back.

Okay, gripe over. Fucking cheapskates.

@raincoaster: I’m convinced that your drinking binges are a better measure of the economy than the number of advance durable goods shipments.

Questions? Challenges? Drink offers?

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