If You Stay Home All the Time. . . .

Originally Posted Thursday, August 8, 2013

I am drinking gin with both sweet and dry vermouth.  Vermouth gets a bad rap, I think.  A martini with both is called a Perfect Martini.  That is questionable, but that is the name.  Lawrence Osborne writes about a drink that is equal parts gin, sweet, and dry vermouth.  Mine is not quite that, but I like it better than a gin and tonic.  The trouble with it is that like vodka it goes down too quickly.  Clear liquors will turn you into an alcoholic.  I, however, am almost out of scotch and I do not with to make a run to the liquor store.  I have half a bottle of gin and plenty of both vermouths.  So tonight. . . gin it is. 

I dealt with the gas company and am now in compliance once again.  I am doing laundry with great élan.  How wonderful it is to be on the right side of things once more. I've already spent too much of my life on the other.  I've been poor.  Awfully and terribly poor.  I am no stranger to having the services cut off.  I need not any more but for old habits.  I am careless and a bit of a rascal.  I ignore the part of life you must pay close attention to. 

The fellow who would turn on my gas was already at the house when I arrived.  I got out of the car sheepishly and waved.  He waved back. 

"Hey, aren't you the fellow who travels?" 

He knew my entire history.  It was both scary and flattering.  I have my gas turned off far too often. 

"Thanks for coming," I said like a moron.  Then I explained the bill to him, how it said "due 8/18" at the top but "overdue" somewhere in the morass of things about 3/4s of the way down.  He didn't give a shit about that.  I told him I was nice to the woman on the phone because I am sure she hated the gas company more than I did. 

"They really fuck you guys, I'm sure." 

"You gone anywhere lately," he said in reply.  I guess he felt like we had gone for drinks together. 

"I'm thinking of going to Bangkok," I told him. 

"Aren't you afraid, you know, with all the trouble and everything?"

"If you watch the news," I told him, "you'll never go anywhere.  When they say it is dangerous, it gets cheap." 

He came in the house and turned on the appliances and we chatted more.  He was in no hurry now though I was getting worn out with it all.  And then at some turn in the conversation, he said to me,

"Well. . . it's like you said.  If you stay home all the time, you'll never go anywhere." 

What?  I began to chuckle.  Yes, we were buddies now.  I liked him.  I should have gotten the camera and taken his picture.  I hadn't said it, but it was true.  If you stay home all the time, you'll never go anywhere. 

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Addendum.  I went to the liquor store after all, one I go to only occasionally.  When I walked up, the girl behind the counter went right to the Glen Fiddich.  Jesus.  I have become too familiar in all the wrong places.