Losing The Rat Pack

Every once in awhile I come across a place that reminds me of 'days-gone-by' and they cause me to lament what we have lost as a society.
This time it was a restaurant and cigar bar hidden away just off a main street nestled neatly in the middle of the 1960s. I'd tell you where it is, but... NO. That would be like finding THE perfect deserted beach then telling everyone where it is. The next thing you know there'd be a resort planted on it with thousands of people trouncing MY sand and I'd have to go on a quest to find the new perfect deserted beach. And there just aren't that many of them left!! Well, this cigar bar and restaurant are the same way... there just aren't that many of them left… so, NO.
A good friend of mine deemed me WORTHY of sharing this secret Mecca and to whom I will be forever grateful. As soon as I walked in I saw men at the bar smoking quality cigars and I knew I was in the 'right place.' I had to pinch myself to see if I was still alive. Had I gotten run over by a bus on the way here and now I was dead?? This HAD to be Heaven. There were men smoking cigars in the bar!!! I thought there was nowhere left in the country where people could do THAT!!
My next reaction was to get in quick and lock the doors before the 'Smoking Gestapo' found out that we were smoking cigars in there!!! People smoking cigars in an enclosed area within a city limit!! What were we thinking?! What am I thinking? You can't even smoke in the great outdoors nowadays, why would I think we could smoke ANYWHERE and not have 'Brown Shirts' breaking down the doors? Yet, everyone inside seemed unexcited by a new entrant to their secret society and totally unconcerned that they’d be discovered, so it must happen all the time.
Once we got settled in and ordered a couple martinis – which turned out to be HUGE and GOOD compared to what you get at most bars – I was able to take it all in. The place looked like a throwback to 'Rat Pack' days. I LOVED it! I expected Dean, Frank, Sammy, Peter and Joey to come in the door any second, sidle up to the bar and start talking to the ‘broads.’ Perfection… And food to match. Low on foo-foo, high on steaks and lobster.
But as I looked around another ton of bricks landed on me. We’re losing these little ‘finds’ every damned day. Just a week earlier I was in a couple other restaurant-bars and the difference was… stark. First of all, cigars were absolutely FORBIDDEN even on the outside patio. They were glitzy, plastic and contrived – right down to the miniscule uniforms the girls wore. They were right out of some magazine – one of those ‘corporate cookie cutter’ magazines that shows us where we ‘should be’ dining as per some NYC office dweller. BS… I love the character that goes with the neighborhood place and the guys smoking cigars at the bar. It’s the REAL ‘authentic’ the other places are TRYING to capture and missing entirely.
Speaking of the ‘Rat Pack…’ brought to mind another thought. Las Vegas is a perfect example of what we’ve lost as Americana and the American Experience. The boys of the Rat Pack would barely recognize what’s there now. Back in THEIR day Vegas had character. It was grittier, bolder, wilder, more about gambling, drinking and sex and less about trying to be the Nevada Disneyland. Granted, there’s more money to be made from the ‘corporate’ angle, but look at what we’ve traded away.
We’re losing character in excahnge for our bottom lines – we’re trading away our souls to fill our pockets with gold. Is there such a thing as a happy medium? Can we save our character without destroying who we are?
Doubtful… Not any more…

Drinks That Help Dating

I’ve talked about the ‘Joys of Dating’ in 2009 before, but as I go along ‘getting my feet wet’ there are things I’m finding out that I never knew when I was sitting at home staring at ‘Dancing With the Stars’ or ‘American Idol.’
One of the interesting tidbits I came across was when I was out with this friend of mine. We’d had dinner and decided to head to the bar for a drink or two before heading back to our respective lives. We were having our usual great time, so neither of us were in any hurry to rush off. I’ve known her – my friend – for a long time and we share a lot of the same background and views on life which makes talking and ‘hanging out’ a great time. We have one of those relationships that’s fun, humorous, tender, understanding, good friends… and hot with a sexual tension running under the surface all at the same time. If everyone doesn’t have one of those kinds of friends – they need one.
When we got to the bar we asked the waitress what was good. She recommended a, “Tie Me To The Bedpost.” My friend and I looked at each other. I know SHE turned twelve shades of red and I can only imagine I did, too. The waitress went on to explain that if that one was lacking some kind of liquor we were looking for in a drink there was always a, “F…#&*! Me Blue.” (I don’t think I have to be any more explicit with the name than that.) Of course, the waitress said the name like it was an everyday drink, which added to the humor the two of US had with the drink’s name. My friend and I talked it over – a little sheepishly – and decided we’d have one of each. To us, they just seemed to go together.
The drinks themselves were not all that great, but the names have stuck with my friend and I and been the butt of some great ‘one-liners’ ever since. We figured that if you had enough of the two of them, you might actually end up being tied to a bedpost and having sex until you’re blue… whatever that means. But, it makes US giggle every time we mention it.
And then there’s the thought of TRYING it with this same friend about whom I have fantasies I can’t even START putting down in a blog!!
So, for those of you out there who are trying to get into the dating scene and you have NO idea how to get around to the next step… the sexual relations part of your relationship… you might want to wander into a bar and ask for EITHER of those drinks. Trust me, they’ll start a conversation that might lead to some really INTERESTING times!!! If nothing else, you’ll have some great one-liners to share – as I do with MY friend – about some really unusual drinks.

Looking At Food

Just when I thought I was starting to make progress on the weight loss… I saw a picture of something that looked tasty and started getting fat again…
What is it about THIS AGE that all I have to do is THINK about food and I can put on weight??? There’s no sense in even eating – why waste the energy? All I have to do is picture it in my head and the pounds just pour on. I can drink water and think about ice cream and you’d think I was eating double churn vanilla the way the weight comes on…I hate getting old…

The Battle Of The Bulge

Why is it SOOOO easy to put ON weight and so hard to get it off again? When I was a kid I could eat like a horse and my weight stayed the same. I could GORGE on food – no matter what kind – and my weight stayed the same. NOW it seems that all I have to do is LOOK at food and the weight goes on. And not in the proportions I ate it, either. NOOOO!! Food multiplies as I eat it and adds twice its weight to my love handles as I take in!!! So now I have to eat in much smaller amounts than I SHOULD have to just to stay even.
And why does it NEVER come off in the places I WANT it to come off? It always comes off NEXT TO where I want it to come off so that where I WANT it to come off looks even BIGGER!!! Lose the love handles??? NOOOOO. Lose above and below so the love handles look even BIGGER!!! Great… there’s nothing sexier in an old man than a bird-chest and big love handles. God loves his little jokes…
I know there are about a million diets out there – and I know they all work to one degree or another. The ones that advertise you’ll lose 200 pounds in a week are usually the ones to steer away from, but most of the others get the weight off with some kind of torture or other. “Eat only cardboard” or “Put a picture of a fat person on your refrigerator” (I think they may have discounted that the ‘fat person’ in the picture is actually the size we are trying to get down to) or “Eat only .” Whatever the diet they always get the weight off of you – and sometimes you have to be a little more patient than you want to be, but it still comes off. The problem is KEEPING it off!!!
For every million diets - and there seems to be at least that many - there are a handful of ‘maintenance programs.’ Perpetual diet and exercise seems to be the most predominant programs (continual torture for the rest of your life, basically), but it seems that the one that makes the most sense – as an aging person – is the timing of the meals. Eat the larger meals earlier in the day and eat smaller meals LATER in the day. Because as our bodies changed over the years we slowed down the digestive process. I’ve talked to all kinds of nutritionalists, personal trainers, doctors, nurses and read some of those celebrities who think they have something to add (and rarely do) – and the bottom line is you have to pay attention to WHEN you eat as well as how much. Because our bodies are slower than they used to be we have to eat our big meal earlier in the day. Sorry about that. I know we all like to sit around and watch night TV with our dinner, but that is when you should be having a VERY SMALL dinner or nothing at all. What you take in late is NOT going to get processed and you're going to end up with it in places you don't want it. Personally, I like to have popcorn without STUFF (that wonderful artery clogging butter!!) and my evening cocktail. Hey, get over it. There are some things I’m willing to give up and some things I plan to keep, even if I DO have to walk a few extra miles every day!!! I’ll give up the food, but the cocktail is NECESSARY to get through the kids and grandkids!!! I'm sure you could find a doctor or two who will tell me that will kill me, but when I was at the bar with my doctor the other night we BOTH had to agree alcohol is a necessary evil. She said there's always going to be SOMETHING that is going to kill us, but if you ask most of the 'centurians' how they lived so long the majority agree they had a shot or two to 'take the edge off' the day. Well, I'll probably from '8 Line' bus poisoning when I can't get out of its way fast enough, but I plan to go out happy. And that means I'm keeping the alcohol and the occassional cigar. Get over it.

Desserts

There I was having lunch with a friend and – after choking down a lunch salad and wondering why I passed on the burger and fries – the server came over and asked us if we wanted dessert. As with all desserts they looked delicious. Well, we KNEW better than to order one. He might as well as bring them over with a roll of duct tape so we can apply the dessert directly to bellies or hips rather than go through the whole torture of ‘guilting’ ourselves and have them end up there in the first place. Come on, dessert? Of course we WANT dessert, but we’ve spent the better part of our lives NOT eating desserts because we know what it’s going to do to our waistlines. ARGH!!!
Servers seem to know they’re torturing us when they come offering desserts. It’s in the glint in their eyes. They get their own little special revenge on us for having to bring us our food by tempting us with desserts they KNOW have a million calories in them. There must be a special ‘evil’ in servers that drives them to insanity. They seem to enjoy tempting us that way. They come to the table and offer us something they KNOW we want and then watch us squirm trying to wrestle with whether or not we can order one. Maybe if we split it…
It was on the way home I asked the question I should have asked at the table. Why NOT have the dessert? I exercise regularly, I get my physicals like I’m supposed to, I’m not in immanent danger of dying (that I know of) and a dessert once in awhile is a good idea. I think I can fight down the calories!! Just because I’m getting older doesn’t mean I can’t fight down the calories of a dessert as well as a youngster!!!
And then there was the REAL personal revelation. What am I saving myself for? Age has taken care of that 34-inch waistline. Years of work and the inability to get out there and work out have taken away the pecs, abs and biceps of steel. No matter what I eat I’m not going to get more hair on my head. No, I’m not advocating losing my mind and eating everything that comes across the lunch counter and gaining 200 pounds, but a dessert once in awhile is something we need to savor. For all I know I could be wrong about immanent death and look what I would miss. And for what?? It’s not like I’m going to be dancing in the strip clubs anytime soon. No one puts dollar bills in the thong of a man my age – trust me. Life is too short to give up the treats. We’ve all live too long and hard not to reward ourselves a little. If it doesn’t threaten my life, it’s time to go for it…