Naturally.

If.

Anonymous, L'homme au verre de vin, n/d

Drinking causes drinking. Heavy drinking causes heavy drinking. Light drinking causes light drinking… The reason to moderate is to avoid having to quit, thus losing a pleasure that’s been with us forever. We don’t have much freedom in this life and it is self-cruelty to lose a piece of what we have because we are unable to control our craving. 

In drinking, as in everything else, the path is the way. What you get in life is what you organize for yourself every day. There is an ocean of available wisdom from Lao-tzu to Jung to Rilke. It’s there in a preposterous quantity.

If you drink way too much it will kill you and the souls of those around you. If you moderate you can have a nice life.

Jim Harrison, from Off to the Side: A Memoir

Jimmy Buffett, "Turn Up The Heat And Chill The Rosé"

Wonderful.

Outside on the rue de I’Odeon I was disgusted with myself for having complained about things. I was doing  what I did of my own free will and I was doing it  stupidly. I should have bought a large piece of bread  and eaten it instead of skipping a meal. I could taste the  brown lovely crust. But it is dry in your mouth without  something to drink. You God-damn complainer. You dirty phony saint and mart}^’, I said to myself. You quit journalism of your own accord. You have credit and  Sylvia would have loaned you money. She has, plenty of  times. Sure. And then the next thing you would be  compromising on something else. Hunger is healthy and the pictures do look better when you are hungry.  

Eating is wonderful too and do you know where you're going to eat right now? 

Lipp's is where you are going to eat, and drink too. 

It was a quick walk to Lipp's and every place I  passed that my stomach noticed as quickly as my eyes or my nose made the walk an added pleasure. There were few people in the brasserie and when I sat down  on the bench against the wall with the mirror in back and a table in front and the waiter asked if I wanted beer I asked for a distingue, the big glass mug that held a litre, and for potato salad. 

The beer was very cold and wonderful to drink. The pommes à l'huile were firm and marinated and the olive oil delicious. I ground black pepper over the potatoes and moistened the bread in the olive oil. After the first heavy draught of beer I drank and ate very slowly. 

When pommes à l'huile were gone I ordered another serving and a cervelas. This was a sausage like a heavy, wide frankfurter split in two and covered with a special mustard sauce. 

I mopped up all the oil and all of the sauce with bread and drank the beer slowly until it began to lose its coldness and then I finished it and ordered a demi and watched it drawn. It seemed colder than the distingui and I drank half of it. 

Ernest Hemingway, from A Moveable Feast

Culture.

Don't bother with churches, government buildings, or city squares, if you want to know about a culture, spend a night in its bars.

Ernest Hemingway

Invention.

The natural history and application of the Gin and Tonic ...

From The National Library of Medicine National Center for Biotechnology Information, "The history of Gin and Tonic; the infectious disease specialist long drink. When gin and tonic was not ordered but prescribed"...

ABSTRACT

Winston Churchill statement promoting Gin and Tonic as a life saver during British Empire extension hides many truths. As a matter of fact, the modern cocktail is thought to be born in India where it was widely distributed by Royal Navy for its anti-malarial properties. The aim of the present work is to review and unveil the history of Gin and Tonic through the centuries. As a matter of facts, primitive Gin and Tonic protective effects were well understood by physicians far before the advent of the “germ theory” and its fortunate invention is one of the most fascinating approaches in the history of preventive medicine. Indeed, quinine, a compound with protective effects on the replicative cycle of Plasmodium spp was discovered in 18th Century and since 19th it become the main compound of tonic beverages such as Schweppe’s ones. Interestingly, it was administered to British expatriates’ seamen and soldiers in order to prevent febrile paroxysms. Soon after, British military doctors demonstrated that the addition of lime or lemon peels to tonics was effective in preventing scurvy. While, addition of alcoholic beverages and gin contributed to make more enjoyable the bitter and unpleasant taste of this beverages.

RESULTS

The spectacular voyage of Gin and Tonic teaches us that a popular recreational drink of our Century was a powerful prophylaxis which certainly helped British colonial expansion.

Saveur has "The Miracle Cure".

Sipsmith on the fours eras of the G & T (beware of letting "your creativity" spoil greatness [for those who don't habla, stop it with the cucumbers and rosemary]).

Have you ever heard of genever?

A note from the Editor ... There are three gins: Tanqueray, Plymouth Navy Strength, and Heminway's favorite, Gordon's (I know what you're thinking, but it doesn't matter.  He was a professional).  One tonic, and one tonic only, please: Schweppe's.

Thanks, Mum.

Happy Birthday, Fisher

Dining partners, regardless of gender, social standing, or the years they’ve lived, should be chosen for their ability to eat — and drink! — with the right mixture of abandon and restraint. They should enjoy food, and look upon its preparation and its degustation as one of the human arts. They should relish the accompanying drinks, whether they be ale from a botde on a hillside or the ripe bouquet of a Chambertin 1919 in a great crystal globe on finest damask.

M.F.K. Fisher, a fine Michigan girl, born on this day in 1908, from Serve It Forth

Tonight.

Fight.

Harrison on survival techniques ...

The other day on a very warm border winter afternoon, I was sitting on the patio with my wife Linda, sharing a bottle of delightful Bouzeron. We were watching a rare pair of hepatic tanagers at the feeder. These birds evidently don’t get hepatitis. It was all very pleasant and I recalled again a passage from the journal of a Kentucky schizophrenic who had escaped from an asylum. He wrote, “Birds are holes in heaven through which a man may pass.” I had this little epiphany that wine could do the same thing if properly used. We all have learned, sometimes painfully, that more is not necessarily better than less. When Baudelaire wrote in his famed “Enivrez-Vous,” “Be always drunk on wine or poetry or virtue,” he likely didn’t mean commode-hugging drunk. Wine can offer oxygen to the spirit, I thought, getting off my deck chair and going into the kitchen to cook some elk steak and dietetic potatoes fried in duck fat, and not incidentally opening a bottle of Domaine Tempier Bandol because I had read a secret bible in France that said to drink red after dark to fight off the night in our souls.

Enjoyable.

America's great workhorse red grape produces the world's most wanted Zinfandels ...

The very fact that wine critics, judges, writers and educators have a tendency to dismiss Zinfandel – certainly in contrast to their slavish adoration of Cabernet, Pinot, Malbec and the rest – might well be an attraction for a generation that really doesn't care what the wine intelligentsia thinks and that is really just looking for something fun and enjoyable to drink.

Above.

Goines, Domaine Chandon, 1996

Oh, that second bottle, Harry, is the sincerest, wisest, & most impartial downright friend we have, tells us truth of ourselves & forces us to speak truths of others, banishes flattery from our tongues and distrust from our hearts, sets us above the mean policy of court prudence which makes us lie to one another all day for fear of being betrayed by each other at night.

John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester

Happy Birthday, Harrison

I don’t drink before four in the afternoon, but of course wine at lunch on the river is not drinking.

Jim Harrison, born on this day in 1937

Suggestions.

Tongs.

Hugh Johnson demonstrates opening port with tongs ...

Benefits.

You should drink what you like, in the quantities that you like. It may hasten your death, but this small cost will be offset by the benefits to everyone around you. You should not, through your drinking, inflict pain on others: drink as much as you like, but put away the bottle before gaiety gives way to gloom.

Sir Roger Scruton, from I Drink Therefore I Am: A Philosopher's Guide to Wine

Happy Birthday, Hemingway

It was a quick walk to Lipp’s and every place I passed that my stomach noticed as quickly as my eyes made the walk an added pleasure. There were few people in the brasserie and when I sat down on a bench against the wall with the mirror in the back and a table in front and the waiter asked if I wanted beer I asked for a distingue, the big glass mug that held a liter, and potato salad.

The beer was very cold and wonderful to drink. The pommes a l’huile were firm and marinated and the olive oil delicious. I ground black pepper over the potatoes and moistened the bread with the olive oil. After the first heavy draft of beer I drank and ate very slowly.

Ernest Hemingway, born on this day in 1899, from A Moveable Feast

Excellent.

An excellent book ...

Moderation.

Harrison's Principles of Moderation

Quite some time ago I turned a corner with the emotion of wanting more consciousness. The following list had a wondrous, albeit slowly evolving, effect on my life. These are relatively mild pointers, though the consequences of ignoring them are as fatal as shooting yourself in the head in a curious time warp wherein the bullet takes many years to reach its inevitable target.

1. Drinking causes drinking. Heavy drinking causes heavy drinking. Light drinking causes light drinking.
2. The ability to check yourself moment by moment has been discussed at length by wise folks from the old Ch’an master of China all the way down to Ouspensky. This assumes a willingness to be conscious.
3. The reason to moderate is to avoid having to quit, thus losing a pleasure that’s been with us forever.
4. We don’t have much freedom in this life, and it is self-cruelty to surrender a piece of what we have because we can’t control our craving.
5. Measurement is all. A one-ounce shot delivers all the benefits of a three-ounce shot. A couple of the latter turn one into a spit-dribbler. Spit-dribblers frighten children and make everyone else nervous.
6. With any sedative there is a specific, roomy gap between smoothing-out and self-destruction. There is no self-destructiveness without the destruction of others. We are not alone.
7. Naturally there are special occasions. When you get older like me, it’s once a month, if that.
8. It’s hard to determine pathology in a society in which everything is pathological. The main content of our prayers should be for simple consciousness. The most important thing we can do is to find out what ails us and fix it. Often we need outside counsel, for clarity and to speed up the process. (I’ve had more than 20 years with my mind doctor).
9. A lot of overdrinking comes from feeling bad physically. One over-drinks to feel better in physiological terms. This can be avoided by vitamins, exercise, and a reasonable diet. Again, it’s a cycle: Overdrinking causes overdrinking because you feel bad.
10. Another source of the problem is the unreasonable expectations we get from others and ourselves. Unreasonable expectations can be removed by thinking them over. They can’t be “drownt” pure and simple. Everyone can’t get to the top, or even the middle.
11. Oddly enough, our main weapons in controlling drinking are humor and lightness. The judgment of others and self-judgment (stern) are both contraindicated. When we fuck up, we mentally beat ourselves up. It doesn’t work at all and has to be expunged. The reason to slow down is to feel better, and it works real good.
12. You begin by cutting it all by a third. After a few weeks you go down to a half. After that your soul will tell you, when you listen. Often it is simply a matter of one drink too many.
13. We need always to separate the problem of virtue from the problem of lack of control. Certain countries — France, for example — drink more alcohol but have fewer problems. This is partly due to the predominance of wine, which has less of a stun-gun effect on behavior, but also because drinking isn’t connected to virtue or nonvirtue. It is a practical problem. Drinking has to be strictly self-controlled the moment it negatively affects our character and behavior. 

Celebratory.

Bouguereau, La Jeunesse de Bacchus, 1884

Life is so short you want to remember all of it, bad and good.  It has occurred to me that I’m drawn to wine for the same reason that fishing and bird hunting have been lifelong obsessions. The pleasure is in the path, the search for something good; finding and drinking a fine, reasonably priced wine is similar to catching a trout in an unlikely eddy of a river, or a two grouse in the bag on a cold, rainy October morning -- it is celebratory rather than sedating, a nod to the realities of existence rather than an erasure.

Jim Harrison

Gentler.

Unlike booze, good wine resonates so broadly it draws in the world that surrounds us. The effects of it are slow enough so that you can check yourself, an absolutely vital talent if you drink. As a Zen dictum says, you must find yourself where you already are and the effects of booze make this unlikely. Good wine increases the best aspects of camaraderie and sweetens the tongue for conversation. It softens the world's sharp edges in contrast to the blunting power of booze. In short, you don't become dumb at a blinding pace, and your mood swings from gentle to gentler.

Sir Roger Scruton, from I Drink, Therefore I Am