In Toronto, going to the bar has become a remarkably unpleasant experience. You aren’t allowed to smoke and if you aren’t surrounded by a bunch of shrieking hoochie mammas, who are determined to live out some desperate Coyote Ugly delusions on top of the bar, then there’s a Russian gangster giving you the ole’ dead eye. (Usually there’s both.) People dress like they’ve just pulled themselves out of bed and the music is too loud. The usually lovely affair of getting slowly plowed with a few friends has become expensive drudgery.
Luckily, there is a solution: An old piece of technology that somehow fell by the wayside. Like the polar bears, lions, tigers and elephants, this noble beast is dying off. It is being murdered by television. I am speaking, of course, of the liquor cabinet.
As with any piece of endangered technology, education and raised awareness is the key to saving it. Far from being a senseless anachronism it is, much like the whoopee cushion, a testament to the wisdom of our ancestors. Properly stocked, it breeds the pink elephants that you will ride to sweet oblivion.
So how do you go about stocking it? You can find the best advice, as usual, in Modern Drunkard Magazine. But you may also wish to consult Everything2. They provide a good list of drinks you’ll need and some good guiding principles for assembling the machine.
After the hardware (booze) is procured you need to start thinking about what software (mixes) you wish to install. That’s where The Internet Cocktail Database comes in. It provides a map to drunkenness. I recommend the scenic route. After all, that and the company of a few good friends, is what the Liquor Cabinet is all about.
