Valentine’s Day

ALEXANDER KEITH’S RED AMBER ALE

My morning child abuse (abuse by children, if you haven’t been following) came with a reminder that today is a special day. I truly wouldn’t have remembered if Miss P hadn’t bounced around all morning about it—today is the day we defer to a soil-dwelling rodent on questions of climate. It’s Groundhog Day, my fellow inebriates, which means the creature will give us an opportunity today to either laugh off global warming or get up in arms about it.

Of course there’s a multiplicity of prognosticating vermin throughout North America. With a six-year lifespan, you can bet Punxsutawney Phil isn’t the original Punxsutawney Phil—unless Chuck Testa did an unusually good job reanimating him. Groundhogs mate like crazy between March and April, producing two to six young at a time, so there’s always a fresh supply for—given the media resources that get dedicated to the annual event—what must be the deadest day ever for actual news.

Cheesy Canadiana and/or Americana always make me feel like a beer, and with Miss P safely off to grade one, I decided to crack an ALEXANDER KEITH’S RED AMBER ALE. The cans had appeared in our fridge following a rare visit from (even rarer) friends of my parents—a “slumming it” product that I would certainly buy to take to someone’s house if I didn’t necessarily care about retaining their respect, or if I thought maybe I could trade up to something better in their fridge.

Everything about the pour suggests mass-produced domestic beer—hockey beer, if you will. The color is aggressively orange, the head loose and half-hearted. In terms of smell this amber ale doesn’t give much away; you have to just take the plunge and taste it.

And much the way my on-again-off-again-mostly-off girlfriend Dolly describes an evening with me, ALEXANDER KEITH’S RED AMBER ALE is pretty much a waste of time. It’s ordinary: tangy but sweet and thin with insufficient malt—the sort of brew that reinforces a general sense of unmet expectations and thereby propels the drinker toward more serious alcohol earlier in the day than planned. I do therefore recommend it for non-daytime imbibers as a method of jumping the mental hurdle into “Why not?” territory.

As I started a second can, I wondered if Dolly would be interested in Groundhog Day simply because of her fur fetish. Plenty of people share her proclivities, and with Valentine’s Day looming, they are probably stirring in their burrows much like Punxsutawney Phil and Wiarton Willie.

Social stigma hinders fur fetishists even more than it does daytime drinkers. According to my sources, “furries” fall into five categories, none of which dovetail too well with mainstream mores.

  • Fursuiters (those who like to dress up)
  • Otherkins (those who believe they are animal in spirit)
  • Furries (those who enjoy roleplay)
  • Furverts (those with fur fetishes plus every subset you can think of)
  • Trans-species (those who physically alter themselves to resemble kindred animals)

It was sweet of Dolly to cross the line into full-on bestiality with me, but I have to realize it’s over, and there are enough other bears in the house to give her whatever it is she needs without subjecting her to the odor of rancid beer. Drinking ALEXANDER KEITH’S RED AMBER ALE is my way of accepting Dolly’s rejection.

We all slum it sometimes, whether it be with Malibu or Alexander Keith’s. Dolly slummed it with me, but I think that was the bottom for her. And I don’t want to say anything mean about her. I really doubt she’d get that interested in a groundhog, even if it could predict the weather (which would be amazing given that the weather channel can’t).

So what happened anyway with North America’s groundhogs? Did they see their shadows?

According to the three most closely watched of these psychic vermin, spring is coming. So get out the hay fever meds, brush up on your climate-related conversation, and (Dad) take the Christmas tree down. Spring is sprung and love is in the air (unless you’re me).

How to avoid being alone on Valentine’s Day—let’s see if it works

My Fellow Inebriates,

Everything around me is pink and red! It’s a rose-petal blizzard of romance! Get the sense that everyone is partnering up? It’s like a terribly contrived race-to-the-airport movie-sequence, with 13 days to go until that amorous Day of All Days arrives. It’s like the New Year’s countdown, people, but the road to the coveted Romantic Kiss is more drawn-out and more lined with merchandise. OMG, it makes me feel so lonely! I’m going to be alone for Valentine’s Day.

After rattling this thought around my head awhile I decided to sign up with the dating service Plenty of Fish.

And Plenty of Fish said:

For some reason they were cool when I amended my name to Liquorstore Bearr.

And then the hard part started. OMG, it was like taking a test!

And then I had to actually take a test!! A chemistry test!!

Here’s some of the feedback Plenty of Fish gave me:

“As someone who exerts little control over your actions, you may find that you commit social blunders that might offend other people and get yourself in trouble.”

“…when it comes to romantic relationships, your openness might make it difficult for you to tolerate people that cannot appreciate diversity as much as you.”

Wow! Pretty spot-on! I think this might be a good thing. Maybe I will make a connection in time for Valentine’s Day after all!

Just one more step…

This is so awesome. No more loneliness for me 😉

Singing the mangy blues

My Fellow Inebriates,

Unless some bad shit has happened to you in the dating-and-mating department, Valentine’s Day signifies romance (or if you’re married like my mum, an excuse to gorge on chocolate). It’s hard not to catch the love bug, wafting as it does on social media, advertising, and television. Which means I’ve been looking around for Dolly.

I like Dolly; she’s a sweetheart, and she has a convenient bear fetish. Unfortunately there is a constant influx of new bears at this house, and she’s taken a liking to the newest.

We call him Fluffy, betraying not just a lack of imagination but a hint at the term “fluffer.” Yes, this comes from jealousy, but Fluffy is really, really fluffy. And Dolly likes that in a bear.

I found this out when I started sniffing around about her Valentine’s Day plans. Dolly came up with this chestnut: “I’m washing my hair.” I said her hair was perfect without washing, which it is. It is clown-red with just a few bald patches from the kids’ rug rethinks, to quote Martin Amis, and it’s never been barfed on. She said very pointedly, “I like the way my hair smells when it’s washed. Clean things smell good, LB.”

And then she indicated Fluffy, over in the corner, nonverbal as he has been since he arrived from my granny’s estate. She took a deep breath and smiled.

Because Fluffy smells like fabric softener. He used to live in Granny’s room where she chain-smoked until her last days. When relatives removed her belongings after she passed, they must have soaked him in Tide and Fleecy to remove the cigarette smell. I think these chemicals must have damaged his brain too, because he doesn’t communicate. He just watches TV or stares at the wall, his floral essence wafting throughout the room.

What a dangerous thing it was to suggest Fluffy smells a little feminine.

“At least he doesn’t smell like rancid sourdough starter, Cutty Sark and persecution,” she said.

We don’t even have any Cutty Sark. The cupboard is bare.

Got no liquor, got no company, got no girlfriend.

Oh wait—there is a bit of Malibu left.