TGIFF! No, that extra 'F' is not a typo. It's been a hard week but I don't really know why. Maybe work is more demanding than I will admit. As I look back upon the many, many jobs I've had, I do see a pattern- I tend to deny when I'm under extreme pressure and attribute my stress, anxiety and feelings of inadequacy to my being, um, well...inadequate.But maybe I'm not inadequate! Maybe my job is difficult and challenging! Nah, that can't be it...
Luckily it is Friday and I'm going to leave work early so I can get tickets to Live Wire Radio for tomorrow night. I'm so spent, but really looking forward to the weekend. I take the Max train into the city and jump on a bus so I can get the tickets at the theater box office. Yes, I could have just bought the tickets on line through Ticket Master, but after all those gouging "handling fees", 2 $15 tickets would have cost me $46 bucks. Fuck that! I am way too cheap and way too outraged to give them all that money. So, like a good citizen I go way out of my way to get to the Aladdin Theater box office to buy tickets in cash and pay only a $1 handling fee per ticket (which still kind of pisses me off- I mean, it's a freaking "Box Office", and by definition their sole purpose is to "handle" tickets, so now I have to pay you an extra buck to buy a ticket which is the only thing you are supposed to do? Yeah, that's like me asking for a "handling" salary to do what I'm expected to do at my job.) But I give it to them without rant and rave because the theater is cool- a shabby independent venue and hey, if freakin' Ticket Master can gouge huge profits by being a middleman, why shouldn't they hustle a few extra $.
I buy the tickets and now have to catch a bus all the way back across town to get home. It's only about 83 degrees, but on a skanky, urban intersection pounded by unrelenting sun-on-asphalt it has got to be 95 degrees. Luckily, the bus to take me from south to north (a challenge in SE Portland) is due in 5 minutes. Or 10 minutes? 15? 20- maybe 25...
I check the schedule online, call Trimet to see when the bus is due, check the posted schedule: All say the bus is scheduled for 4:15 and it is 4:36 yet there is no bus. I call Customer Servise and leave my usual "...I'm an annual pass holder, this is it- I'm buying a car...blah...blah...blah" The bus finally arrives and there are no seats, of course, but I should just be happy that it came within 40 minutes of the scheduled time, right? Plus, the air-conditioning seems to be working- yipee! But why is there no one sitting in those seats, I wonde
r...?Oh, I see.
You might be thinking that by now I am in a full-bore rage, but seeing this mysterious styrofoam box set upon a pile of fluid-soaked paper towels with such a simple and succinct message- DONT SIT- well, it just about made me cry.
Because not ever, EVER, since I've been a Trimet rider- have I seen a warning to a fellow passenger that they should avoid some undesireable fluids. Not once in 7 years.
Things are looking up!
After such a roller-coaster day, I decided upon arrival at Alder Street that I needed a cocktail. My liquor-inspiration follows the same pattern as my food inventiveness: concept>composition>assembly. As I am car-less and usually too lazy to head to the store, my best innovations come from using what is already in "the pantry." Following this pattern of creation, I debut my original cocktail.
As I prefer everything have a utilitarian purpose, so does my poison. Here are the ingredients and why they were included:
TRIMET ANTIDOTE
- 2 oz. vodka (or 4-6 oz, I don't know...)- because of it alcohol and "forgetting" properties
- 1/2 fresh squeezed lemon juice- to prevent scurvy; also to *reduce acid in the blood. *see, Yogi! I'm being healthy!
- 5 shakes Angostura bitters- to aid in digestive disturbances that riding public transit induces
- 1 teaspoon sugar- to counteract the healthy qualities of the lemon juice
- 5 leaves fresh Moroccan mint- the spicy, aromatic herb helps "cleanse" your spirit from the polluting effects of human piss, sweat, snot and yes, poo, that you knowingly-or unknowingly- came into contact with on Trimet
- 1 sprig fresh lavender- the antiseptic qualities will help keep your immune system healthy and the aroma will aid your imagining that you are actually in an ancient farmhouse in Provence. You are overseeing the building of a limestone patio by some local men. Young, dark, muscular men, lifting stones, glistening with perspiration...mmm...
Add all of the above ingredients to a cocktail shaker with lots of ice. shake, shake and shake some more. Pour into a martini glass and garnish with mint or lavender.
Ahhhhhhh. That's much better....
