A couple of days ago, an old friend of my wife's stopped
by for Happy Hour. She recently married someone we haven't met, and we haven't seen her for several months. For many years, she and my wife have been friends, based on old college days stuff. I've always thought she was a bit flaky, but got along with her well enough and generally enjoyed her company.
Apparently the man she married is way off in Crazyland, though. Shortly after the usual catching up stuff got discussed, she started going off on a combination of right wing crap and libertarian crap, mixing them up in a way that showed that she had no idea what she was talking about. I shrugged it off and had another gin and tonic. It got worse. She and her husband have invested in some high-tech startup that they think is going to make millionaires of them, but that clearly is going to go belly up. Unlikely. Then she started talking about her grandmother's place in North Dakota that she has an inheritance interest in. There's a fracking contract attached to the place. "Well, I don't like the fracking, but there could be a lot of money in it for us."
The last straw was when she starting quoting Alex Jones about some shit. I had been rolling my eyes madly all along, and consuming far too much gin for my own good. With the Alex Jones nonsense, I finally reached the end of any patience I had left, and then she started praising Jesse Ventura's "Conspiracy" show, and began a diatribe against the Bilderbergers. I broke in and quietly, but firmly, said, "Look, we need to stop talking about this worthless shit and move on to stuff we have in common, or I'm going to launch into a long rant."
The conversation changed to a discussion of old times and school stuff I'm not involved in. Soon enough, she left and went off to listen to Alex Jones or whatever. My wife said, "Thanks for getting the subject changed. Looks like her new husband is a nutcase." My wife is smart.
And so it goes...
= new reply since forum marked as read
cheap gin is just fine. Now, for martinis, good gin makes sense, but I drink too many of those, so I make tall gin and tonics and take my time. A little buzz is a good thing. A big buzz means that the hornet's about to sting you bad. 
Either that your you have a larger booze budget. But, we all fall down, sometimes, eh? 
I drove from my home in California, halfway between L.A. and SF to Tucson to attend a wholesale mineral show. It's an 11 hour drive. To avoid making stops, I didn't drink much on the drive and sorta forgot to eat lunch. So, I got to my motel in Tucson, put my bag in the room and hastened to the bar in the motel. I was planning to get a nice big cheeseburger, but thought I'd have a double bourbon on the rocks...you know...to take care of that dehydration problem.
Well, after that I put the order in for my cheeseburger. Next thing I knew, I opened my eyes and a couple of paramedics were looking down at me. I managed to convince them that I was OK, and took my cheeseburger to my room and ate it there, lying on the bed. The rest of the trip went fine.
Moral: When you drive 11 hours, do stop and drink and eat along the way, lest you meet up with a couple of paramedics at your destination.
drop in. Truly.
I could go for one right now.
