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The last post was about Thanksgiving, and not even at the restaurant. This piece was started on Easter Sunday 2011 while I was working the bar during Easter brunch behind the bar. However, this post is not about Easter; maybe next time. It started with the Easter Bunny in the suit on the left hand side of the drawing. The second bunny was the one on the far right who probably got hit by a bus, or grew up in the Proctor & Gamble factory. The former was colored in with red wine and the latter was colored in with blue ballpoint pen and bitters. Both would be eventually colored in Photoshop. Tim and I then decided that we would just do an entire piece of all different kinds of rabbits, bunnies, and hares. It took us a couple months to finish it though, so it sat around the restaurant collecting stains and going through a couple different incarnations.
The term "Hair of the Dog" is a colloquial expression in the English language predominantly used to refer to alcohol that is consumed with the aim of lessening the effects of a hangover. According to Wikipedia, the term dates back to the times of Billy Shakes and has also been recorded as being uttered in numerous countries. Of course, this method of boozing to kill a hangover seems to work for a while, although it really is just delaying the inevitable. I use this method during the weekend though, and will regularly have a Bloody Mary with brunch to help ease a particularly troublesome brain pain. When I was a kid, you couldn't pay me to eat or drink anything with tomato as it's base. But I still remember my first Bloody Mary. I was 21 years old and I was on Cape Cod visiting friends. We had gotten a room at a motel in Truro because my friends weren't allowed back in West Dennis after a rather insane summer the previous year. We went out in Provincetown the night before and had a crazy night full of booze and carrying on only to wake up groggy and hung out to dry the next morning/afternoon. We went to breakfast and my friends ordered some Bloody Marys. I expressed my disgust at the very thought of tomato-based concoctions, but when my friends' beverages appeared, they looked like the most refreshing things on the planet Earth. Salted rims, lemon wedges, supple ice cubes, and trunks of celery stalks reaching for the clear blue skies. I couldn't resist. I ordered one, and then one more, and then we were back. The rest of the day is inconsequential (although I'm sure it was pretty fun), but the thought of my first Bloody Mary will live on in my mind forever, or until I forget about it. I can't remember my first glass of milk, my first soda, my first gin and tonic. Some of these drinks have been memorable, and some hold special memories themselves, but remembering the first one is impossibly hard to place. I remember my first beer, and the first beer that actually got me intoxicated, but other than that, and the Bloody Mary, I really can't remember any of my "first drinks." Everyone has these stories about food and drink that made an impression on them at some point of their lives. I even remember the day that I actually appreciated tomatoes after an entire childhood of sticking my nose up at them. In fact, the discovery of tomatoes and Bloody Marys are only a couple summers apart. These revelations of culinary discovery are strange and interesting because they show you that even something as remedial as eating, which for so much of human history has been simply to survive, can be wondrous and exciting. I am talking about a breakfast beverage, and not even a particularly exciting one, and yet it had this profound effect on my memory. Sometimes, I guess, it's not about what you are eating or drinking, but when, where and why that really makes the event meaningful to your life. Think about the first guy that ate an oyster and didn't die. What a treat! And the gal who ate the first batch of non-poisonous mushrooms. Scary and life altering! I bet you those people remember the exact day that they discovered these culinary delights and they probably invited their friends back for seconds.
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