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I'm a writer, I told her, and so is my friend, who also worked
with Andy Warhol in New York City, and I was so happy she
had taken the time to explain all this to me!
Junipero is a kind of gin, I told her, made here on the west
coast. Any good gin will do, though. You don't have to say,
"Junipero."
Now, "in-and-out" simply means "pour the vermouth
into a shaker full of ice, swirl it around a little so it
coats the ice, then pour it out!" This simply leaves
a residue of the vermouth on the ice, so it's more a flavor
in the martini than an actual ingredient.
"Oh, I see, so it's similar to a spice!" my passenger
said, fully joining the ride. I love it when I hit it off
with a passenger.
Another time I happened to mention to a black lady in my
cab I was divorced, that I had married a girl I had known
from first grade, who was the daughter of my pediatrician,
and now that we were divorced, I had found God!
And the reason I had found God, I told her, was when I realized,
We Didn't Have Kids!
And the black woman had said, "You married the daughter
of a doctor?" and I said, "Yeah, she was my pediatrician's
daughter," and the black woman had said, "That's
really something."
Anyway, back to the martini. After I explained, and we had
a little back-and-forth about, how "extra cold"
means, "now pour the gin into the vermouth-coated ice
and leave it there a little longer than usual, so a little
of the ice melts into the gin, adding what is called smoothness,"
and "up" means, "No ice! Pour the martini into
a glass without the ice," and "an extra olive with
a twist," refers to both two olives and a lemon twist,
that some bartenders ignite with a match for a dramatic effect,
before adding the singed lemon peel to the martini.
"And don't let them add an onion!" I told her.
"That makes it more a salad than a martini!"
"I used to add equal parts vermouth and gin!" she
said.
"Me, too!" I told her.
"And they were terrible!"
"Eghtttt!"
Anyway, we were both so happy when we reached the Hyatt Regency,
and as we disembarked beneath the carriage entrance, under
shelter of the front of the building, the three-hundred-pound
man, who had ridden along mostly in silence, said on breakaway,
"Your bullshit is extremely good today."
I felt that was kind of an insult.
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