[zoya]

I'm a red wine girl - I personally don't think that you *have* to pair something with something just because you're *supposed* to... but that's just me.. So I don't have any suggestions for whites. But as far as reds, I do think that a 100% Tempranillo or a Tempranillo / granache blend goes with just about everything....


... and in drinking news, I'm an avowed vodka girl, but I think I'm gonna have to give up the drinking for awhile. after an over the top party this weekend, I've got a belly full of gas that won't go away and acid reflux to beat all. Gonna go see the doc, but upon describing my symptoms to a family member who's in the medical profession, she said "alcohol. stop drinking. at least for a good while." urgh.

ah well...

[candycane_girl]

Does anyone have any favourite wines for Thanksgiving? Obviously I would have to go with something white to go along with the turkey. Usually I just get Bambino cause it's bubbly and I like the taste.

[bunnyb]

Vodka is definitely not MY Bustie. After three bottles of wine last night I had several vodkas and cranberry and managed to have a nasty tumble down a full set of stairs in a club and now one side of me is bruised and cut and very, very, sore. I haven't been that drunk for years .

[auralpoison]

Aw geez, I feel all self-conscious now. I posted the Sandy bit because fucktard was at the top of the list & I didn't just want to bump.

I've not written a real lick since I've been here. I've done the stuff I was contracted to, but haven't worked on anything real. Nothing LEGIT. Not writer's block, just a general "meh" since I don't have to work anymore. I would like to thank ya'll for the encouragement. What I really need is a hard kick in the literary ass!

I'm gonna try here & now.

I suppose I should explain how this project came about. When I wound up homeless last year, I bounced around & sofa-surfed for a bit. I just could not find a place to suit my needs. I lived with HB before it drove me mad & I ran away. One night I wound up staying in a sketchy motel because it was close to where I lived & was cheap. That night changed my life. I'd passed the place countless times never wondering who lived there. Who lived there & WHY?!

I opened up a dresser drawer in the joint & there was a bent tea spoon (the long kind) that somebody had used for cooking junk. Midafternoon, a violent fight between a hooker & a pimp erupted, the whore handed the guy his ass & went to county. And around all of this shit, the motel staff's children played like it was no biggie. It was just life as they knew it. It made my childhood seem idyllic in comparison. I was raised by a drunk junkie & a . . . I dunno how to even describe me Da. But I have warm feelings for both & miss them terribly. Fucked up as they were, I still think they did one helluva job. But I digress.

All in all, I stayed in three different fleabags. We drive past these places without a thought, never caring, never wondering about their denizens. I wondered. As usual, I wanted to fucking *know*. I'm an information junkie & had only read about that kind of world in books. I decided to make it real.

A new story . . .

Hmmmmm . . . perhaps we shall go with Tony. Mmmmm . . . Tony. Five feet seven inches of pure prison-issue muscle. He was covered, and I do mean COVERED with tattoos. The back of his head sported a tattoo dedicated to his mother that committed suicide when Tony was fifteen. He'd wound up in Sing Sing at nineteen on a meth charge. He wasn't a cooker, he was muscle because quite plainly, he wasn't smart enough for anything else. He only did five years, but managed to get hooked on smack in prison. When he got out, he did a faith-based rehab where he met Conrad. Conrad was an eighteen year old felon, but had a good soul as long as he wasn't fucked up. Somehow they wound up in CO & in the room across the parking lot from me at the Broadway.

I first met Tony because I bummed a smoke off him. When I asked for a light he asked, "What? Do you want me to smoke it for you, too?" That was hands down the most clever thing Tony ever said to me.

We became friends mainly because I listened to him. Tony was stupid. Plain stupid. But I listened to him & offered encouragement. He was such a sweet, sweet soul. I could tell that he'd not been treated with kindness or respect, so I tried make him feel . . . not special, but that somebody CARED about him. Because of this, he used to bring me trinkets. Stuff he got out of quarter vending machines or found on the street. Or weed (We smoked a lot of his weed as I was the only person with a bong). And he'd look so pleased & proud when he did it. I pray he's doing well.

Anyway, one night we're all chilling on the patio. Tony had told me again & again that he wanted to play a CD for me as I was the master of music. He'd never managed it since he almost always got drunk/high & passed out beforehand. He trotted off & was back in sixty seconds with no CD. He was pale, shaking, & sat directly in my lap with his strong arms around my back. I wanted to lick him, but he was upset. He told me that he'd gone into his room & that he'd found Conrad engaged in some . . . hardcore man on man fucking. He was shocked that the guy he'd met in rehab & that had been his roomie of three months liked it in the ass! Tony was okay with it once he'd calmed down, but he asked to spend the night in my bed. I explained that I am a VERY weak woman at times & there was no way I wasn't gonna molest him. He agreed & went back to his place once he was fucked up enough to cope.

I really tried to do right by Tony. He'd found jebus in rehab. One night it was just him & me on the patio & when he wandered off, I had an ominous feeling. Being that he was a Jesus Freak, I dug through my books until I found an appropriate bible quote for him & stuck it on his door. I don't know why I did, it just felt like the thing to do. The next night I came home & he nearly tackled me. He'd had a horrible day, but the scripture that I'd given him made him suck it up because he knew God had a plan for him. It made me feel good.

[i_am_jan]

Me too. Very interesting, AP.

[treehugger]

I am also intrigued by the Sandy story.

I drank way too much beer yesterday. It is my weakness.

[neurotic.nelly]

auralpoison, i remember you mentioning something awhile back about being a published writer... is this on point? the "Sandy story", or memoir makes me want more. if you are, a writer, where can i find your books/work?
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since this is the hooch thread... tonight... i'm off some organic red wine brewed in new orleans, sulfite free tonight.

[auralpoison]

I don't want to bum out the drunk Busties, but I have an interesting story.

During my low-life, Bukowski-esque, book research sojourn into street people, methheads, sign flyers & such I met a lady named Sandy. Sandy was fifty-two, but she looked MUCH older. She had a fondness for younger men & hotel bath slippers. You could always hear her coming by her Hilton shuffle. Her fave drink was Fruit Punch Gatorade & CHEAP vodka. Like, paint stripping, $7.99 a handle vodka. She'd get so drunk she'd vomit blood & walk naked digging into the dumpsters looking for food. She depended on others to get her hooch & Gatorade because if she tried to walk around, somebody would call detox. I witnessed her being hauled off to detox one day after she'd been threatening "Gypsy", the local prostitue/crank dealer/storage picker. Gypsy grew weary, the cops were called. I tried to plea with the cops for her as she was a harmless old rummy. As they were dragging her away (Literally. She weighed maybe ninety pounds, but she'd DIG those slippers into the ground!) she screamed that I was fat & ugly. When they brought her back a few days later it was like nothing had happened & she asked me to go to the 711 to get her some Fritos with chilli.

I met a lot of interesting people during that time. She was just one. It made me really look at the behavior of myself & my friends as upper-middle class drunks. We may have gotten our drink on, but we never got to the point of Sandy. I wanted to feel pity for her, but Sandy chose her life & would have spit in my face if I'd expressed anything but acceptance. She wasn't somebody that went from casual drinking to full-blown. Her father died tragically when she was a child & she started drinking heavily in her early teens & never stopped because she didn't want to.

I have life stories that would make your short & curlies go straight.

[bunnyb]

Here ya go: one thread for ways we like our hooch, where we drink our hooch and why we love our hooch.

I have killer toothache and plan to self-medicate this weekend with wine - what's wrong with that?!