Cocktail Talk: The Wine and the Waistcoat
Wait, hold up, before introducing this quote, let me say happy freaking New Year booze-y pals. Here’s to a fantastically tipsy 2009. And, while it’s not 01/01/01/09 (the first second of the first day and all), it’s still the year’s start, and this quote is a sillily lovely way to start said year. It’s another bubbling gem from The Complete Imbiber #1, from an essay by Paul Holt (who, I feel bad to admit, I don’t know much about–any help?) called “The Wine and the Waistcoat.” In it, he talks about drinking and dressing, but it’s a fairly long quote, so I’m just gonna back out of its way:
“In this connection I feel I must deal with the problem of pink champagne. It is well known that many a romance has been wrecked for the lack of this romantic tipple.
I would say, here, that if it must be drunk in such a good cause, the costume is absolutely de rigueur. A sincere dressing-gown with red morocco slippers is as important as the guardsman’s bowler and brolly. (This last attire goes excellently with a large whiskey in the morning, particularly if you can manage to hide the brief-case that so cruelly accompanies it these days.) . . .
Perhaps, after all, it is best to stick to Pernod, if the sartorial consequences of imbibing interest you as much as they do me. This if only for the reason that however you start off drinking the stuff, you’re bound to end up more or less naked.”
– Paul Holt, “The Wine and the Waistcoat”
