If You Closed the Door, Keep It Shut.

Repeat Offender

Ingredients:
1 oz Tequila
3 oz 7-Up
Juice from 1 Lime
Repeat with a Float of Tequila
Lime Slice, for garnish

Directions:
Fill a lowball glass with ice. Combine the tequila, 7-Up, and juice from 1 lime in the glass. Stir. Repeat with a float of tequila. Garnish with a slice of lime.


Break-ups are the perfect excuse for bad behavior. It’s that special window where spray tans, lemon fasts, and OPBs (on purpose black-outs) are all perfectly acceptable. Unfortunately, I was four weeks into my break-up, and had yet to enjoy the perks of being dumped.

Lazily draped over my vinyl couch, I looked out the window for a change of scenery. Three fat men were smoking cigars on the balcony next to a plastic snowman. The freakishly short one puffed in my direction because he knew this was the closest I had gotten to a party in weeks. Closing the curtains, I decided it was time to get out there and make some bad decisions.

Two hours later, I sat in the passenger seat of a Jetta en route to the Troubadour with my ex-boyfriend (or whatever you call that guy you date for two months). I stepped out of the car, three blocks from the venue, and wondered whether our spontaneous outing was a date, a group event, or simply a spare ticket to Interpol for that lucky gal who had passed out on her couch. Watching Alex roll a joint, I decided I had no idea. The only thing I was certain of at this point was my newly single ass had grown with such enthusiasm that I no longer fit into my underwear. It felt good to be out.

Alex passed the joint, explaining that we had ten minutes to walk to the venue, get high, and pick up our tickets before the band came on. “I’m not good at smoking pot,” I said as if I was about to endanger a team sport.

“I know,” he said with a mischievous grin that let me know we were on a date. While we had only dated for two months, we had spent the last two years trying to recapture that one stoned moment when we thought our relationship might work out. Unfortunately, our perfect moment was cut short by a leaky roof that turned out to be his chest sweat dripping onto my face.

Stepping into the Troubadour, Alex led us to the back bar. Unable to feel my teeth, I turned to the bartender and ordered a cold beer. My cottonmouth had kicked in with such severity that the only thing I could utter was, “Bud.”

Without warning, thirty-seven of Alex’s closest friends started to close in around us. I clung to the bar, hoping no one would talk to me, and realized no one wanted to. I was the “ex” who wasn’t around long enough to be an ex-girlfriend. I was just an ex, and yet here I was again.

Midway between my first and last sip of beer, Alex asked me to come home with him. Staring into his blue eyes, and his sweet smile, I wanted to. Only I knew that we were no more in sync tonight than any other night. He knew it too. We had one bright stony moment together, but that’s all we were meant to have. At least that’s what I told him to avoid the bit about his chest hair leaking onto my face. After all, I had made enough bad decisions for one night.

Suggested Number of Drinks:

When He Tells You Who He Is, Listen.

Dirty Wanderer

Ingredients:
1 oz Whiskey
1 oz Pineapple Juice
3 oz Ginger Ale
For Martini Rim: ¼ Cup Simple Syrup and Brown Sugar on separate plates

Directions:
Wet the rim of the martini glass with simple syrup, and dip into the brown sugar several times to give it a “dirty” rim. Set aside.

Combine the whiskey, pineapple juice, and ginger ale in a cocktail shaker filled with ice, and shake. Strain into rimmed martini glass.


The world is full of sound advice that you happily ignore. It’s the beauty of being young, or in my case, younger than the couple sitting next to us at Macaroni Grill. But if I knew then that the advice I’d happily ignore on this particular morning would push my dating life onto a downward slope, I would’ve listened more closely.

“I love a good buzz in the morning,” my mother said ordering a crisp bottle of Chardonnay for breakfast. She smiled at the waiter as he filled her glass, and then turned her attention on me. I stared back, absentmindedly, hoping my vacant gaze would deter what was coming next.

“You really shouldn’t date a man who can’t remember your name,” my mother said getting her nose deep into the buttery Chardonnay. “Nothing good can come of it,” she said remarking on the pear notes tingling the back of her throat. “Unless you’re just in it for the sex.”

Unfortunately, the sex was nothing spectacular the day Joe returned from his outdoor adventure trip. In fact, the man I affectionately referred to as Beck, appeared less rugged than when he set out. In the two-weeks he had been gone, his boyish frame had thinned a bit, and his dimples were even more pronounced. The only thing that appeared the same was the tuft of back-hair peaking out of his shirt.

I studied his face for the playfulness that had first attracted me. Nothing. I listened for his impersonation of a French Chef selling used cars in Mexico. Silence. I waited for all of the things that had made me forget about our third date.

The Good Luck Bar was darker than most, which made it a perfect spot for our “transitional” third date. We both knew that if the date went well, we’d most likely transition from date to dating. If the date went poorly, the low lighting made for an easy escape. Already deep into our second dirty martini, Joe and I swung, dangerously, between the two.

In an oddly conceived French-Mexican accent, Joe ordered another round of drinks. He bobbed his head back and forth, pretending to sway to a Spanish guitar that would’ve been romantic had it existed. I laughed through the bottom of my drink as he bobbled toward me. In fact, I laughed so hard that I almost didn’t hear him affectionately call me, “Julie.”

Julie was his ex-girlfriend.

I stepped back, perching myself securely on my dirty martini, and asked him to, “Come again?” Joe stared back at a slanted angle that made him look like a lava lamp in this light, and let the mistake settle. A silent beat passed between us before his dimples started to apologize.

It wasn’t that he had actually forgotten my name, he explained. He was simply a lost soul. A wanderer. At twenty-six, he wanted to explore the jungles of Africa; travel through Europe tracing his family heritage; and then head to the Midwest to write a novel, preferably on a ranch where he could hunt and gather. He covered the next fifteen years of his wandering life, but failed to explain the bit where he called me by his ex-girlfriend’s name.

I quickly hit the eject button on our transitional date. Before I could locate the exit, Joe grabbed the stem of my dirty martini. He explained that he was lost, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t interested in me. Standing in the dark bar, wrapped in the warm glow of a heavy buzz, somehow it all made sense. I had to stay.

The next morning, I realized we had made the transition over several make-up rounds of martinis. I was now successfully dating a hairy, non-committal, passport-wielding nomad who may flee the country at any moment. Wrapping my arms around him, I wondered why the only place he could grow hair was on his back.

Seven months later, we sat on my vinyl couch with our knees touching at an odd angle. In a perfectly flat American accent, he explained that the nomad in him, resurrected on his trip into the wild, couldn’t commit to the relationship. In fact, he told me everything that I heard on our third date, but I still wasn’t listening. The only thing I could hear was my mother’s voice bubbling over a crisp glass of Chardonnay, “You should never date a man who can’t remember your name.”

Standing alone in my room, I was no longer shocked or upset. If anything, I was proud. I had ignored every bit of logical advice given to me in the last seven months, and had taken a chance. Under the red glow of the bar, even if for a brief drunken moment, I had followed my heart.

As I drifted off to sleep, it became clear to me that I was opening a brave new chapter in life. A chapter full of infinite possibilities. Only before that journey could begin, I had to Hoover his back hair off of my sheets.

Suggested Number of Drinks:

101 [The Beginning]

Staring into an empty glass, I have to admit the dating arena has changed. In fact, I could detect a slight shift in gravity the moment I landed in Los Angeles. Newly single and starting a job as an Executive Assistant to a film producer, I assumed the shift to be a positive one. After all, I was twenty-six, single, and living in a new city. The world was clearly my oyster!

Two years later, I realized the problem with oysters is they’re messy, off-putting, seasonal, expensive, and tend to leave a bad taste in your mouth. The gravitational pull had shoved my dating life over the edge. I was now downing a line of Oyster Shooters, hoping that with enough horseradish and pepper, I’d make it through the night without gagging. With an ever-shrinking dating pool, I had opened a new chapter in life called: Downhill Dating.

On the heels of this realization, I started recording my 101 Reasons to Drink. It was true, the dating arena had changed. The only problem: the drinks were still the same. In order to survive the descent, I had to become the mixologist to my dating life. Taking a hard swig of my “Lazy Spaniard,” I’m comforted knowing that the best thing to come out of a bad date was the inspiration for a new drink.

From three years of downhill dating comes a new series of cocktails, and the stories that inspired them in 101 Reasons to Drink. After all, every embarrassing, frustrating, deflating, exhilarating moment a girl can face en route to finding the one deserves its own drink.

Bottoms up!

DRINKING KEY (from bad to worse):

Are you sure there's alcohol in this?

If no one sees it, it didn't happen.

I'd rather eat my shoelace.

I hear Budapest is a nice place to relocate.

Mind Eraser please!