Survival Tips for the Urban Jungle: Vol.1

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"OJ, purple stuff, soda, brine?"

Somewhere out there in this wide, whimsical world, there is a man--no, at the very least, several men, by the sound of it--who have a deeply disturbing affinity for pickle brine.

Here is what one of those men has to say about one aspect of its versatile appeal:

A shot of whiskey backed up with a shot of pickle brine tastes good (way better than it sounds), but I feel as if there's something more to the pickleback: sentimentality, comfort. The pickleback is the macaroni and cheese of the cocktail world.

(courtesy Max Watman, HuffPo)

Hmmm...while that last claim may indeed be a disturbingly accurate description of this horrid drink's place in the current cocktail hierarchy, when you think about how much salt and shittiness is in Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, why is that designation meant to imply it's something people should be drinking?

Coffee, Booze, or Benzedrine?

I guess it depends on what you're writing, what kind of chemistry you got goin' on in your body naturally--but what is most interesting about the list below is how unsurprising it is that so many writers depend/ed on some kind of drug in order to be productive.

Believe me, I can relate--if you knew how many horse tranquilizers I was snorting every day, your puny little unenlightened mind would explode.

(courtesy Lapham's Quarterly)

Most of these associations are not terribly surprising, but Elizabeth Barrett Browning on laudanum? That one caught me off guard.

Good for her.

Bad for us:

Until the 20th century, laudanum was available over-the-counter, despite the fact that it contains opium, morphine, and codeine. Today, only infants born to heroin addicts or people with Guinness-record diarrhea can get permission to have a taste of that bitter delight.

Even more reason to try that muy picante salsa...


Dessert:
Much like laudanum, Benzedrine sounds like it was a whole lotta fun as long as you didn't know what it was doing to you in the long run...

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