The Aging Bartender

Through the Looking Glass…

Some profound thoughts upon waking this morning…Just gonna go full stream of consciousness here…Not much of it pertaining to my jobs, cocktails, buildings, all of that. I stretched myself a bit, wanted to write something with meaning about the cocktail world but the problem is that it isn’t profound…Cocktails aren’t life changing but not much…

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  • Through the Looking Glass…

    Some profound thoughts upon waking this morning…Just gonna go full stream of consciousness here…Not much of it pertaining to my jobs, cocktails, buildings, all of that. I stretched myself a bit, wanted to write something with meaning about the cocktail world but the problem is that it isn’t profound…Cocktails aren’t life changing but not much…

  • Christmas Movies Ranked

    Yes, it’s that time of the year…No, not just Jesus’ birthday coinciding with so many nogs coming out of the woodwork (did this happen last year?) but the annual ranking of best Christmas movies. Once finished you’ll notice many not on the list and I’ve left notes for those after as well as the why…But…

  • Sometimes They Come Back: Glass Hammer

    There’s a literary technique called a peripeteia which refers to a sudden reversal of circumstances or change in fortune. The device can take many forms but you’re probably most familiar with it in one of it’s less common forms where a character will leave and then come back right at the end to save the…

  • A Few Steps Down the Hot Drink Rabbit Hole…

    Yes, most drinks are cold. Why is this? Well, because they taste better that way, dumb dumb, and we’ve also been conditioned over the years to think it’s normal. Think about a warm Coca-Cola. Not so appetizing eh? But now pour that same coke over ice and we have ourselves a nice time. A cold…

  • Citrus Season Approaches…

    Just like that, a snap of the fingers, a blink of the eye, and we’re almost into 2024 which, to me, means blood oranges, tangerines, kumquats, pomelos (pummellos?), and of course, Meyer lemons. Yeah, it’s raining, dismal, and depressing out there. Grim. Foreboding. Wet. Beyond, beyond the colorful, knobby oil filled orbs we await cherries…

  • Notes on the Hot Toddy

    Here we go again. Some say the hot toddy originated in India in the early 1600s, other sources state it was Edinburgh, Scotland, and then some go back again to India, but with a specific, printed recipe date of 1786. In my own unpolished opinion I think people have always enjoyed themselves a warm bevvy,…

  • Movie Review: Boyz n the Hood

    Watching Boyz n the Hood as an upper middle class, middle aged white male, instead of a privileged white suburban teenager, was an entirely different experience but probably not why you think. Back when the movie was released in 1991, it provided a glimpse of life in a place most people in the U.S. and…

  • Garnishes Revisited…

    For whatever reason I decided to dig up this old saw once again. I attempted to make some headway on the subject of garnishes early in this blog’s life here. I chose not to reread my own words from March but instead offer a different take on how people dress up their cocktails. I said…

  • The Modern Dionysus?

    Thousands of years ago, the Greeks called him Dionysus, the god of wine, fertility, festivity, madness, song, frenzy, etc (they all go hand in hand), in other words, the god of self destruction and rebirth. He continues to reign in today’s day and age due to people always wanting to listen to music, get drunk,…

  • Movie Review: The Lighthouse

    There’s certain movies that are tailor made for a sick son of a bitch like myself. The Lighthouse is one of those movies. The sophomore production from the outstanding and twisted writer/director Robert Eggers, whose first movie was The Witch–a terrifying slow burn about a puritan family scraping away an existence in the woods back…

  • Restaurant Review: Community Goods

    There’s a new/old “restaurant” model going around these days. The pick up counter. No bathrooms, no waiters, nowhere to sit really. The big one to me is no waiters because they’re genuinely just awful and annoying to deal with. A necessary evil of having to own a restaurant…But the newish model is to just exclude…

  • Release the Kraken: A.K.A. What the Hell is Buddha’s Hand?

    One of the stranger “fruits” you see walking around the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market will be the Buddha’s Hand Citron. Yes, it counts as citrus even though it has no seeds or flesh to speak of. It’s a tale of mostly just oils and pith here which makes for a head scratching moment…What to do…