In which the Author discovers Brandy
/All I learned in the very last Covid-19 lockdown is that I actually quite like brandy. (And, thanks to the community Facebook page, that one of my neighbours built a milk bottle igloo.)
Side note: I am writing this in Google Sheets, which has a questionably helpful function where it will suggest the next word in the sentence when it thinks it knows what that word is. Instead of “Things I Learned: I actually quite like brandy” it prompted me to write “Things I Learned: I actually learned” which is a slightly insulting non-sequitur, but also very deep, if you think about it, and if this was the direction this sort of post normally goes, which I’m afraid to say it isn’t.
Here’s how the brandy came about: at the start of the lockdown, I bought a drinks trolley for my office, because what’s the POINT in having an office if you can’t go a little bit Mad Men on it?
THE ELEPHANTS REPRESENT INDUSTRY! WATCH AS THEY THRUST THE TUSKS OF PROSPERITY INTO THE SOFT HIDE OF THE CORPORATE GAZELLE.
Also, a drinks trolley is office furniture, so you can claim it as a business expense. If you occasionally wheel the trolley out into the lounge when you have friends round then nobody has to know.
Perhaps one day those friends will become clients.
Perhaps now your brandy is an advertising cost!
Wooo, business!
PICTURE UNRELATED.
ALSO IF THE IRD IS READING THIS, I AM KIDDING. THE ELEPHANTS OF INDUSTRY FUCK WITH MANY THINGS BUT THEY DO NOT FUCK WITH THE IRD.
I was thinking about what to put in my decanters, because where there is a drinks trolley there must also be decanters.
Here were my criteria:
In the interests of authenticity, must be something that you could reasonably expect to find in a decanter (e.g. a spirit).
In the interests of office productivity, must not be one of my favourite spirits.
In the interests of office morale, must not be one of my least favourite spirits, or something disgusting.
In the interests of vanity, must be relatively cool spirit.
So after ordering a thing (bottle) of whiskey and a thing (bottle) of some purple liqueur that I had never tried* but thought looked very good and decanty I was stuck on the third option.
*It’s called Parfait Amour and it is disgusting. boyfriend likes it though; he says it “tastes like licking the bowl after you’ve made icing with vanilla essence in,” and if that’s your idea of what should be in a decanter then you can get out of my office.
Side note: the third option is required because there are three decanters, these aren’t all going in the same one. Although there was a day last week where I ran out of whiskey and topped it up with brandy and that was… odd, at best. Briskey. Whandy. I’m going to open a BBQ joint called Briskey N’ Brisket and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.
I initially looked into HENNESSY because all I know about is that it is a decanterish sort of spirit and 50 Cent likes it.
YES, THIS IS MY REFERENCE BOOK SHELF AND YES, THAT IS 50 CENT’S BOOK AND YES, I HAVE NESTLED IT NEXT TO THE GUARDIAN STYLE GUIDE
However, when I announced to boyfriend that I was going to invest* in some cognac he said thoughtfully, “I don’t know about cognac” and then when I said “it’s Hennessy, 50 Cent likes it,” he gave me the look of somebody who is swiftly and critically re-evaluating your entire relationship.
*still better than NFTs
A LOOK NORMALLY RESERVED FOR WHEN i PUT PICKLES IN MY GIN.
He suggested brandy, and so I got brandy. Brandy is delicious! Did you know that? I didn’t! But it is. I see why people drink it out of balloons.
YES, EXACTLY LIKE THAT.
I would say I’m having a brandy right now, but - depending on what time you’re reading this - you might judge me. If I wasn’t busy having a brandy, I might judge myself!
It’s become apparent that this post has no ending and very little story, but I’ve already put the pictures in. (I’ll happily delete a partially written post, but it takes AGES to do the pictures.)
So to round it out, here are some wisdoms from The 50th Law. I was going to do 9 wisdoms because 50 Cent was shot 9 times (or thereabouts, I’m not looking it up) but that seems like a lot, so you can have three. I found these by opening the book at a random page and I hope they serve you well.
“In general, you must be less respectful of the rules that other people have established. They do not necessarily fit the time or your temperament.”
“A hustler must transform every little event and every trifling object into some gimmick for making money.”
“He had to prove his toughness, that he was no wanksta, so he released his own diss tracks.”
Later wankstas! I’m off to have a brandy.