The Inedibles

Normally I reserve my Captain’s Chair pulpit for things I’ve learned since becoming a father, and I had a really touching post all ready to go for this week. However, I have had a special request from WeaselMomma to relay a story – at least as much of it as I can remember, anyway – about the dangers of succumbing to peer pressure (a/k/a, the night my affair with all things Jose Cuervo came to a sad and abrupt end).

That fateful night took place in the small hamlet of Marblehead, Massachusetts where I lived about a year after finishing up college. In the ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ center of town are five corners filled with bars and restaurants. As much as I’d like to, I can’t for the life of me remember the name of the place we were drinking that night, but it was your basic run of the mill townie watering hole.

After grabbing some dinner, my three friends and I decided that we would just sit back, relax and have a few cocktails to wash away the stressful week we all had just had. We were all in some aspect of the financial services industry and we took our turns swapping war stories from the week and reliving our glory days when impromtu road trips to other cities and states were possible.

During those days my particular poison was single malt scotch, preferrably neat. Yes, I was the college snob that brought his own liquor to parties and didn’t drink much from the keg. To me, drinking a small bottle of scotch over mass quantities of low grade beer was more productive in achieving a state of altered reality faster. Plus, I had a fraternity brother who worked in a liquor store in the very town where our school was located.

At some point during the night the waitress began offering shots of tequila that also had blue curacao in them, and, since we were well on our way to that altered state, we bought a few rounds from her. After three rounds it somehow deteriorated into a prick waving competition over who could out do who on shots. And I’m pretty sure that it was my ill advised comment that had us abandon whatever well brand they were serving with the pretty blue stuff and order the next several rounds of straight 1800.

By the eighth round the waitress was not getting to us fast enough, so we were forced to get up and fight the crowd at the bar for our libations. Two of my friends threw in the towel after the ninth, but another friend and I soldiered on past the tenth. As I went up to get what would be the eleventh, and final, round my friend said it was on him and gave me some money.

I returned to our booth, gave him the shot and his change, which amounted to a little more than a dollar. For whatever reason he threw the dollar back in my face, but what I did next defies all logical explanation.

I stood up, looked him straight in the eye, crumpled the dollar bill up in my fist and ATE IT!

That’s right, I put it in my mouth, chewed, swallowed and proudly did shot number eleven. Needless to say I don’t remember how I got home that night. No driving was involved, as the house I was renting was maybe a block or two north of the five corners intersection.

The next morning I awoke, fully clothed, on the couch in my living room. Our coffee table had been moved out of its normal spot and there was a large stain on the carpet. Rubbing my eyes to focus because I was unable to find my glasses, I noticed something that was sitting in the middle of the stain – a partially digested dollar bill.

As it turned out, after I made my grand gesture, I ran out of the bar and straight into oncoming traffic. Pulling me to safety before I became a hood ornament on someone’s vehicle, my friends guided me home and put me down on the couch. They took great pleasure in filling in the large blanks of the evenings story, as I sized up the looming carpet cleaning bill. Later that morning I would have to return to the scene of the crime to retrieve my jacket (did I mention it was early January north of Boston?), glasses and wallet that I had conveniently left there the night Jose and I decided to part company, literally and figuratively.

If you’re wondering what happened to the poor dollar bill, well I washed it off, dried it and put it right in my wallet.  After all, a dollar eaten is a dollar earned.

And now you know…the rest of the story.

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Tagged as: Boston, Captain, Drink, Food, Jose Cuervo, Liquor, Marblehead, Massachusetts, Recreation, Single malt Scotch, Tequila, Whisky