BlackChampagne -- no longer new; improvement also in question.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
I drunk alone...
I've got a ton of stuff I want to blog about, but not enough time to do it in. Well, I have the time, I'm just spending it on other activities.
I was out of town all last week; Monday-Friday, on a mini-vacation in New Mexico with my dad. We stayed in Santa Fe, and also drove to Taos and did some desert hiking, lots of Indian good stores, ate excellent food, saw the James Bond movie, ate too much at the breakfast buffet, etc. Pretty fun trip, and it was nice to get out of the usual routine. I'll post photos from the trip at some point; my camera is bloated with them, and I've got a dozen or so from my cell phone that are more conversational or quirky than artistic and panoramic.
Later for that. For now, here's something about booze.
I've noticed this several times over the past couple of years, while I've been living alone again and drinking more frequently (Prior to living with Malaya I never drank other than a very occasional glass of wine with my dad.) I've debated it with the IG, but come to no strong conclusions. The phenomena is that I feel far drunker, far more quickly, when I'm drinking alone at home. A beer or a good sized glass of wine or some vodka in a Pepsi will often give me a nice buzz when I drink it while home alone. But similar, or larger, quantities of booze consumed in a public place, especially with other people, or even at home with a guest, doesn't go to my head.
This was repeatedly demonstrated while in New Mexico with Dad, since I never felt buzzed at all, despite having a big glass of wine or a beer with every dinner and several lunches. The first night there I had a very nice Syrah with an expensive dinner, and then drank 2 plastic cups of wine back at the hotel, since Dad picked up a bottle of a not very good Zinfindel at the Whole Foods near our hotel. I felt sleepy, but that was to be expected, since I'd gotten up early for the flight. But I wasn't buzzed, when I'd have been reeling from that much booze at home with no one but the Jinxers around to companionship me.
I tried again the last day there. A Dos Exes with an excellent Mexican food lunch, that I didn't feel at all. Didn't expect to, though. I tried harder later, since Dad's flight out from the Albuquerque airport was @ 5, and mine wasn't until 7:30, delayed until 7:45. I was bored enough that I ended up in the sports bar near my gate, where I got a Heineken on draft. $7, but at least it was huge. A pint, I think. Certainly larger than a usual bottle/can in the US. I sipped that over an hour while reading American Gods, and despite my empty-since-lunch stomach, I didn't feel any buzz at all. I wasn't alone, since there were a lot of other people in the bar, but I wasn't interacting with anyone, and was sitting in a corner booth reading, which is just as inactive an activity as I'm usually engaging in at home when one beer will buzz me.
One more bit of evidence came in October, while at Blizzcon. One night there we had a site get together dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. It was pretty unmemorable, other than being a chance to meet the one Diii.net reader who showed up (a few showed up from the WoW site, and there were people who ran other gaming sites, so we had a group of 17 or so). My beverage was memorable though, since I got one of those jumbo cans of Fosters. The 750ml cans. They hold the same quantity of liquid as a wine bottle, albeit at a much lower alcohol content, but I'm sure one of those, equivalent to nearly 3 bottles of beer, would have me reeling at home. Drinking it over a long meal with much conversation in a restaurant, I felt nothing.
The counter example; first day back from New Mexico was Friday, and I had to run errands and buy food since I had nothing left to eat. I splurged, and wound up with two loaves of Italian bread and a big platter of mixed cheeses from Costco. To accompany that I opened a bottle of white and a bottle of red, since I've got a lot of wine on hand thanks to my dad's largess and the case I brought home from my San Diego visit while down in SoCal for Blizzcon last month. I had a small glass of each, enjoying the Sauvignon Blanc much more than the Shiraz, while eating most of a loaf of bread with cheese and deli turkey slices on top... and I was fucking hammered. Sleepy, felt dopey, couldn't work for an hour afterwards. Yet I know if I'd had that in a restaurant or a wine bar, while on a date of whatever type, I wouldn't have even known I'd been drinking.
Maybe this explains a lot of drunk driving? People are in a bar or club or having dinner with friends, talking, interacting, mentally active, and they don't feel buzzed, or not that buzzed, so don't think much about the several drinks they put down. Whereas if they had that much on the couch at home while watching rugby, football, or some other sweaty, tight-pants'ed, and somewhat homoerotic sport, they'd be like, "I am soooo fucked up." And wouldn't feel safe to drive a blender, much less a motor vehicle.
So it's that time of year again, and as usual, it's nothing special. I've been 29 (again) for 5 hours now, and eh... The two people (women) I enjoy spending time with are both out of town, and will remain there for several weeks yet, so in a way, my b-day will take place in late July and early August, when I get to do a couple of celebration events with Malaya and the IG. (Those will be separate events, needless to say.) Also, I was treated to several excellent meals and social events a few weeks ago, when my parents were in town for my graduation weekend, and that kind of felt like an early birthday.
Still, it would have been fun to do something birthday-esque on my actual birthday. Instead the day was like most others, if a bit hotter. In fact, it's finally cooling down nicely now, @ 5am, and I've had 2 fans going since it got dark/cool around 9pm.
I worked some during the day, and ran various errands, and never really gave a thought to the next day (today) being my birthday. That date did enter more into my consideration as midnight approached, and I weighed doing more work vs. having a few drinks and watching a movie. The movie won out, and it was an odd experience since I dug out an old video tape to watch my favorite Anime ever, Ninja Scroll. I've had a rapturous review/evaluation 2/3 finished for like, 4 years. I'll finish it and post it someday. Or maybe not. I've seen the film far too many times to remain objective; I don't want to review it -- I want to convince other people to watch it. You might as well ask an evangelist to "review" the Bible.
Watching it while sipping the mostly frozen second half of my peach pleasure Jamba Juice, which I'd well-mixed with Absolut, I enjoyed it as much as ever. Once I remembered how to run the VCR. I hadn't actually used that device since oh... September? Maybe December; I had Malaya tape some football playoff games for me last year (I've not had/wanted cable since the fall, and don't care enough to just go buy a rabbit ears antenna) and though I never got around to watching the NFC/AFC Championships or the Super Bowl, I think I FF'ed through some of the first and second round action in late December or early January.
Those memories didn't serve me very well tonight though, since I've got some rather complicated wiring on my "entertainment center," and it took some doing to figure out how to get sound to accompany the VCR picture. My TV is very old and possesses just 1 set of video/audio out (and no in) plugs, and the DVD half of my VCR/DVD combo machine is broken. So to play DVDs I have an old DVD player, but it's hooked into the VCR/DVD combo as if it were a video camera, and there's only sound for it through the tuner, where it's connected in the phono slot. (I do not have a record player, thankfully.) The sound for the VCR comes through the tuner too, on the TV input, but only if I first unplug the DVD (from the video camera input). Yes, this was a lot of fun to trial and error my way through while sipping a vodka slushy.
It's been more fun to write about, though probably not to read, since I'm now enjoying my nightcap; a glass of exceptional port. It's ruby port (sort of) which is a shame since I can't enjoy the walnuts and chocolate that pair so well with tawny port. But it's such a good wine that I can't complain. My dad brought up two cases of wine when he came for graduation, and since I like ports he emptied his extensive cellar (almost all of which he gets for free as a professional wine judge) and brought me 4 or 5 bottles. This is the first I've opened, and it's the best ruby port I've ever had (as well as the most expensive). Read about it here, if you want wine words.
A blend of Petite Sirah, Zinfandel and Syrah with flavors of blackberry, cassis and blueberries complemented with notes of dark milk chocolate, this is sweet and viscous in the mouth, blanketing the palate with a fine, velvety tannin.
What he said. It's an amazing drinking experience, thanks to the mixture of wines. Port is a dessert wine with very high sugar, but this one has high alcohol content too. It's 20%, and no, you don't see a lot of 40 proof wine. That's actually impossible in most vintages, since sugar that high kills the yeast that causes the fermentation that turns grape juice into wine. They do cold pressing and other tricks with port to give it kick while keeping it sweet, and the mixture of grapes in this one is amazing. It's got the usual smooth and sweet port taste, and then there's a kick of an almost Cab-esque tannins, and yet it's still got that fruity Zin in the palette, with a chocolaty finish. It's unusual for ruby port in that it does go well with dark chocolate, if not quite as perfectly as a tawny.
I'll have to get some good sharp cheddar and a baguette tomorrow, to have more apt food to pair with it. I'm allowed to splurge; it's my birffday!
As for other birthday plans... dunno. Probably nothing. I've been sporadically chatting with an interesting female, but she's too busy and too spotty on her email replies and lives too far away to make any plans for RL encounters with. I'd consider a movie, but there's nothing worth seeing in the theaters for at least another week. I don't think I'll be motivated to go out and eat by myself, and I don't really do dessert (other than dessert wine) unless I've got someone to split a sundae with. Plus, there's the weather. I know my birthday is the hottest day of the year; but must that be taken literally? 97!? I'll sleep as late as the temperature allows, stick close to the a/c during the endless hot afternoon, snack on the bread/cheese/wine, try to get some work done, and then splurge on a pizza in the evening when it cools down enough to eat hot food. Want to get me a birthday present? Make it be winter again already.
Perhaps next year I'll be more fulfillingly involved with an interesting female, and with her assistance I can engage in the more traditional dinner/movie/blowjob trifecta. June 20 falls on a Saturday in 2009, so I'd better start planning early. Happy birthday to me!
My dad was in town for the past few days, and it was nice to see him and just hang out some. Recap time!
Dad worked at a convention in The City (AKA SF) on Monday and Tuesday, (the primary reason for his visit to the Bay Area) but we got together for dinner late Tuesday night. It was a bit too late, unfortunately, since I didn't want to miss Kali class entirely, and Tuesday night is the only night of the week for that. So I drove to Oakland for class like usual, and had some fun/hard work there, including a rare opportunity to go double broadsword against another student using a staff. I got most of the hits in, but only because he was "throwing" for me and doing long, high swings to give me openings to get in and practice my cutting technique.
Staff, when used properly, i.e. not held in the middle like Daffy Duck doing Robin Hood, is generally the king of weapons since it's so fast and has so much range, and if it's got a point (would would make it a spear), and the person wielding it has a clue, the fight's all but over. Going against an un-pointed staff you've got a bit of hope, since you can maybe take a hit to the back or arm and get inside where your weapon, especially if it's bladed, will triumph. With two broadswords, real ones; not the unbladed ones we use to practice, you could just try to cut the damn stick in half, if your opponent were foolish enough to swing it in big sweeping motions to give you the opportunity.
Class activities were fun, but I had to leave a bit early to have time to drive back home and meet Dad for dinner. Unfortunately, it was well past 9 by the time I showered and got to his hotel, so we had to settle for Chili's. I used to eat there, with Dad, fairly often back when I lived in San Diego, and I ate there occasionally with Malaya until we realized that 1) it wasn't really any good, and 2) even if it was good, Claim Jumper was essentially the same thing and, 3) much better. (This is why you shouldn't drink and blog. It's late and I'm going through crappy microwave popcorn and a good portion of the half bottle of syrah Dad willed me when he headed back to SD yesterday. As a result I lost count while counting to three in that last sentence. Well, I started to count to 2, and then option 3 added itself on, and was initially numbered "4" because um... wine. More on excessive fermented grape issues in a bit.
I hadn't eaten a meal at Chili's in months, perhaps years, but it was okay. I got some kind of spicy Cajun chicken sandwich which was, like all non-Mexican restaurant food, nowhere near spicy. It wasn't bad though, and had to be better than the grilled salmon on faux rice'a'roni Dad got. (My half-drunken inclination is to say that going to Chili's for salmon is like going to a whorehouse for cunnilingus. Does that make any sense? I'm not sure, but I don't believe so. This is why you shouldn't drink and joke. Or blog.)
The next day I got up early (well, earlier than usual, despite not going to bed much earlier than usual) and we were off to Sonoma for some wine tasting. Mmm... wine. I am so fucked up right now. Anyway, um... wine. We toured a few vineyards and tasted their fermented product. I'd say which ones, but I never remember. It's funny too, since my dad's always saying, "And that time we went to ________ vineyard, and tasted all the zinfindels. You remember, they had the raven on the label and their tasting room had the big taxidermied hawk in one corner." I usually nod and smile, but I have no idea which one it was. Any of them was. Were.
So we went to 3 or possibly 4 places, and had a fair number of samples at each. Dad's been working at wine competitions in San Diego for decades, and he has undergone the certification process to become a wine judge, and he tastes and writes for a wine tasting magazine, so yeah, he pretty well knows from grape orchards. He was informing the wine servers at the places we went to, and explaining what malolactic fermentation is, and how bricks measurements work, and why barrel samples are different than the finished product, and why yeast sometimes stops fermenting if the residual sugar content is too excessive, etc. And yes, these are all real things that I sort of know about, thanks to talking to dad about it enough times. I find the science of wine making interesting, and I've developed somewhat of a palate, but I'm not really working at it, due to a lack of money or strong enough interest. But I get an immersive course every time I visit Dad or he visits me and we drive around to wine tasting places.
Best of all, Dad's good at schmoozing and he obviously knows his stuff, so they believe he's in the wine industry (which he is) and we get comp'ed at every tasting room. Most of the places in Sonoma and Napa now charge for tastings, usually around $5 for any 4 wines out of the 6 or 8 they're serving that day. Some places have higher prices for the reserve wines, usually $10 for 4 or 5 of those, but with dad there we get all we want for free. Last time he visited I got wrecked at Ravenswood on zins, since they had oh... 15 different types of zin, and they poured every single one for us. Dad's long since learned to spit, the way wine judges do when they have to try 50 wines in 3 hours. I'm no prom queen so I don't spit, but I seldom drink more then a couple/three sips of each 1oz sample poured for us. Since I seldom drink at all though, that's plenty to get me tipsy, and that's where the trouble began.
At the second place we drank tasted, which I'm sure my dad could name, (needless to say, I can not) we got another 6 or 8 samples, including some reserve (Cabernet Sauvignon, IIRC) that was not being poured for other people, and that cost something like $130 a bottle. Pouring them for us was a woman of about 25-30, who was of average attractiveness. Not ugly, not a model, and just kind of average all around. She was capable of making and maintaining eye contact though, and had a sense of humor, and while she poured for us and talked to us and we both listened to dad explain things, she leaned on the bar from the server side, I leaned from the customer side, and by about the sixth sample, I was envisioning making out with her. Right over the bar, right in front of her boss and about 20 customers and my dad, etc.
Now keep in mind that she was not very hot (unlike my perfect self, of course), was not flirting or chatting with me in any suggestive way, and was not drinking. She was working, doing her job, speaking with some slightly more entertaining than usual customers, etc. I knew, even in my slightly-pixeled brain, that there was absolutely no reason to think she was even vaguely entertaining the concept of kissing me, that she might well be married, that I wasn't looking to date her even if she'd been single, etc, etc. And yet with my wine goggles on, and our faces maybe two feet apart, and the revelatory nature of her being at work and me being a customer, I was pretty much sure that she'd happily welcome some lip lockage with me.
This, I realize, is why people go to singles bars. Not only do you meet people who are available (assuming you are yourself), but you're all half-tipsy, and in that state pretty much anyone of your desired gender looks good. Or if not good, good enough.
The really sad part is that I was so not drunk. I'd had about half of about a dozen wine samples by that point, over the course of an hour. So maybe 6oz of wine, which is maybe one drink, and at my body weight I should require about 2.5 drinks on an empty stomach, to be legally drunk in California. Legally drunk here, as all Lindsey Lohan fans know by now, is 0.08 blood alcohol content. I might have been at .03 or .04, absolute max. And even that much was plenty to strap on the wine goggles and completely destroy my usual inhibitions.
Now granted, I did not act on my wandering imagination. I knew I was being stupid, I knew it would be wrong, I didn't try to kiss her, etc. I was certainly in control of my libido, and if some porno movie scenario had suddenly unfolded I would have had no trouble resisting the opportunity. But the fact that I was even thinking in that way, without any provocation, was kind of troubling. In a trouble-free, idlely-amusing fashion.
There was more wine tasting later on Wednesday, and after a nice lunch we drove north through the valley and over to Santa Rosa, with a quick stop at the store where I got my computer earlier this year. I got another gig stick of RAM there, since a certain unnamed alpha test game has been loading new levels very, very slowly. I guess saying if the RAM helped would be NDA-violating, so I'll just say that I don't feel a need to get my $67 back. I do wish we'd gotten their earlier, since the traffic from Santa Rosa back to the Bay Area was horrible, and I was hardly able to get, on time, to the final exam of a summer school night class I've been taking. Yes, final exams while half in the bag and with no study time all day. The true road to academic success!
I think I did pretty okay anyway, and I finished in time to get dinner with Dad (mediocre pasta for me) and followed that up with some late evening reading and a bit of alpha-testing, before an early(ish) bedtime since Dad wanted to get brunch and tour around a bit more on Thursday before his flight home in the afternoon.
So that was that. A quick visit, but a fun one, and isn't that better than two weeks of family togetherness that reduces to seeing bad movies by the fifth day, after exhausting all other possible activities? Yes, yes it is. Was.
