James Joyce drank. So did Raymond Chandler, John Cheever, Dylan Thomas, and Dorothy Parker. Legend says Ernest Hemingway loved his Mojitos, and Jack Kerouac dug the Margarita. Edgar Allan Poe heard cognac and brandy eggnogs rapping, rapping at his chamber door long before he wrote his famous poem. Despite writing The Rum Diary, Hunter S. Thompson preferred Mojitos, beer and Chartreuse. The poet Charles Bukowski was a guy who loved his boilermakers, as any self-respecting Barfly would or should.
Why do so many famous writers drink? I have no idea. This book is not about famous writers and their drinking habits; it is about an unfamous writer and his drinking habits.
Back in the 1970s and 1980s, while my friends were drinking cheap canned beer, I was enjoying whiskey sours and old fashioned cocktails. That love of the classic cocktail has never gone away.
For the past three years, I’ve enjoyed having The Soaring Pig, a home bar reminiscent of the little English pubs that I frequented in my youth.
It has taken on a life of its own. It has been an enjoyable hobby that is perhaps really a midlife crisis. But if it is a midlife crisis, it is the lesser of two evils because no one wants to see me wearing leather pants and driving around in an overpriced sports car.
Getting Shitfaced & Living to Write About It is a collection of what I’ve learned about alcohol as a home bartender over the years. It has recipes for the classics I love to serve as well as original cocktails I’ve created or modified. And there is a generous helping of booze and cocktail trivia.
I hope you enjoy the pages that follow.
The Soaring Pig Himself
Stephen Dafoe
Author’s Note: Throughout this book, I have used the words whisky, whiskey, whiskeys and whiskies. This is not in error. Different countries spell it differently. If speaking of scotch, it is whisky. If speaking of bourbon or Irish product, it is whiskey.