Your "One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer" Quizo Update

You know, it occurs to me that your special teams have to be really, REALLY bad to make the Packers look good. I mean really, really, really, REALLY BAD.

On a positive note, the Philadelphia Binge Festival - it's like the Fringe Festival, only less healthy - opens next Tuesday with my production of Patrick Marber's "Dealer's Choice" in the restaurant at the Dark Horse Pub. Shows are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday Nights at 8 and Saturday afternoons at 4, September 18-29. Tickets to the show are a scant ten dollars. Doors will open ( i.e. I will be standing in the doorway, glaring at you, demanding money) 90 minutes before showtime, though if you want to eat/drink/whatever I strongly recommend arriving no later than an hour before curtain - I learned last night that I can't fit as many people into that room as I had previously, and space is going to get taken up very quickly. I'm a fan of early arrivals for pretty much everything in general, but in this case not only do you get a good seat but after paying me (thus putting a temporary halt to the glaring) you then get to take your time eating the... er... delicious dinner the DH provides.

It is worth noting at this point that my mother has always claimed she married an Italian so she would not have to spend the rest of her life making Irish food. Short of teaching me how to read and write I consider this to be the smartest move she's ever made.

It is worth noting further that I have been reliably informed by a number of sources who I consider quite trustworthy that the food at the Horse is excellent. I would not think for even a second to disparage the fare the DH provides, more that I am disparaging the entire genre to which it belongs, i.e. Irish/English cuisine, which by any reputable measure is absolutely repulsive. They say Scottish food is based on a dare; I would contend that Irish food is (or at least should be considered) a form of biological warfare and thus banned under the Geneva Protocol. That said, I have been repeatedly told that if one actually desires to take ones' life into ones' hands, the food at the Horse is a top-notch exemplar of Irish cuisine.

Of course, one year back when I was young my father got an unfortunate pang of nostalgia and asked my mother if we could do the traditional Italian dinner on Christmas Eve, which if you are not aware consists of seven different kinds of fish (aka, in typical Italian-American pidgin, "the Seven Fishes"). This was a poor choice on his part. This is not, I must add here, like the time a few years back my sister called us from her home in San Francisco on December 24 to tell us that her and her friends were "doing like we did way back in the day and eating the Seven Fishes," as she rattled off a menu consisting of lobster, crab, shrimp, mussels, oysters, sea bass, and scallops, leading to my comment "those aren't the Seven Fishes, those are seven things that live underwater, and five of them aren't even fucking fish."

It is worth noting yet again that - to my understanding - no one actually knows what the "official" Seven Fishes are supposed to be, so don't bother going to look them up, thinking I'm going to ask what they are tonight. I am not. If you sort of Rube Goldberg the Seven Fishes and construe it as seven Mediterranean fish that likely would have been part of a large dinner in actual Italy, well, you are in for one goddamn disgusting dinner. In terms of "worst Christmas ever" the year of the Seven Fishes ranks right up there with the year my dad - technological genius that he is - tried to book his and my mom's vacation plane tickets online and put them on a flight out on December 25 instead of 26 and we didn't even HAVE Christmas. If you really think about it I believe you'll come to the conclusion I did, that a smoking ruin of a Christmas is at least as bad (if not actually worse) than one where you eat eel.

On second thought, maybe the whole "reading and writing" thing was #1 after all.

Anyway, as far as the show goes, I am told the demand to see it amongst the legitimate theatre community is pretty hopping, so if you want to see it - and I sincerely hope you do, I would very much like everyone to - I would get back to me as soon as you can to make reservations. It's going to fill up fairly quickly. And the show is freaking awesome, which is always nice. Plus you get to eat and drink! (And drink, and drink, and drink...) What could be better than that?

(Hint: it's not seven different kinds of fish.)

JLK