Tumblr Hero Kyle Hilton of Flannel Animal makes these awesome paper dolls. Here’s everyone’s favorite tv-libertarian.
And the lovely Lucille Bluth. Note her rape horn. Like anyone would want to ‘r’ her.
And finally, Tom Haverford, creator of Tiny-ass cakes, porksicles, butter boats, and more TomHaverfoods.
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I don’t drink alcohol or take any drugs recreationally, and never have. I realize that that puts me in a fringe minority of the population, especially because it’s not for any kind of religious reason. The drive to use psychoactive substances is nearly universal, so I’m an outlier. Why do I value personal teetotalism?
I consider Penn Jillette an inspiration for this decision. Penn’s libertarianism obviously doesn’t imply personal or political teetotalism, but personal teetotalism does offer a solid rhetorical point for libertarianism: that one can choose not to consume even a legal substance like alcohol highlights that the primary basis of a choice to use a drug isn’t the law. Having this rhetorical point isn’t a reason for Penn or me to choose teetotalism, but it is an additional compatible argument that disconfirms the omnipresent claims that libertarians advocate for drug legalization only out of a selfish, personal desire to use drugs.
One core reason for Penn’s teetotalism is simply that he wants to be smarter, and using psychoactive drugs recreationally obviously makes you stupider, even if just temporarily. James Randi, who is an inspiration to Penn Jillette for his scientific skepticism, is also a teetotaler. Randi articulates part of my justification for teetotalism: having control over your mind and understanding and addressing reality as accurately as possible. This is a big part of my justification. Once you study a bit of the literature on heuristics and biases, you’ll realize that your own map of reality is already hopelessly flawed. It seems base to me to handicap myself even more.
It is often said that the young drink to rebel. I just never picked up this habit. Maybe it was just to express my own individuality, rebelling against the popular notion of youthful rebellion? I have always been weirded out by conformity.
It’s not just that as a utilitarian I want to appreciate and understand every precious moment of my own existence. It’s also that as a materialist atheist I recognize that consciousness arises from a physical process in the brain only. Taking a psychoactive substance isn’t modifying the access point to the mind; it is modifying the mind itself.
How does this play out socially? I find that drinkers roughly fall into two categories, those who use alcohol as a substitute for experience, and those who use alcohol as a complement for experience. I should caveat that obviously one person can be a different kind of drinker at different points in time.
Some people drink as a substitute for meaning and happiness. Unsatisfied with their classes, jobs, careers, or personal lives, they drink for a temporary escape. These kinds of drinkers have little to look forward to other than a break from an otherwise unfulfilled life.
Others use drinking as a complement to their own lives. Already having attained, or at least successfully striving for meaning, purpose, and value in their lives, personal and professional, they use alcohol to enhance their lives, enjoying the physiological effects for their own sake, enjoying the taste of the drinks for their own sake, and perhaps using alcohol as a social lubricant.
I think that substitute drinkers often suffer low self-esteem, and that they have a hard time socializing with principled teetotalers like myself. In a social situation, a substitute drinker feels threatened by a composed, happy teetotaler who doesn’t use alcohol as a crutch. By juxtaposition, the teetotaler’s very presence calls attention to the substitute drinker’s void by not validating the substitute drinker’s behavior. Since they’re Insecure, substitute drinkers more often seek to socialize with other substitute drinkers to validate their decisions. Humans, after all, do have biological drives for conformity.
There’s a habit among substitute drinkers to use the nuances of drinks as a vehicle for vacuous conversation. I find excessive deliberation about a drink’s attributes, or talk about what a drink says about a person, endlessly insipid.
Complement drinkers on the other hand, well-adjusted and secure, can socialize with teetotalers quite well, because complement drinkers are not threatened by teetotalers. Complement drinkers can be interesting, can abstract, and can carry on conversations about more interesting things than the drink they’re holding and what exists only in their immediate vicinity.
Exclusively socializing with other non-religious teetotalers would be a quixotic task, since there are too few, so I do my best to seek out complement drinkers instead of substitute drinkers.
Cross-posted to The Paltry Press
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Panera Bread is overpriced, streamlined, and filled with fake corporate quirkiness. It’s an imitation sidewalk cafe for a culture that doesn’t encourage sidewalk cafes (and actively threatens business serving people on the street). But the food is good, the coffee is decent, and the service is usually fine. I wouldn’t ever think “hell yeah, PANERA!”, but I’ve got nothing against it. Also, the cinnamon crunch bagel is awesome.
A year ago, however, I was thinking about Panera. Like, a lot. The company announced that they were testing out the idea of voluntary payments, at stores they named “community kitchens”. Schmeer my bagel, Christian Science Monitor:
Most patrons, it finds, drop the entire retail cost, or more, into the voluntary donation box, in essence subsidizing a meal for somewhat who can’t pay the full amount. Panera says about 60 percent leave the suggested amount; 20 percent leave more; and 20 percent leave less. The largest single payment so far? One person paid $500 for a meal.
“The lesson here is most people are fundamentally good,” he says. “People step up and they do the right thing.”
The cafés, which serve soups, sandwiches, and baked goods, look just like other Panera stores. But there are donation boxes instead of cash registers, though employees can process credit card payments as well.
Approves of beer+donuts
This tends to confirm the libertarian suspicion that negative actors are a small threat, and usually outweighed by the aggregate good will and creative energies of normal people. In college, one of my good friend’s father owned a few Dunkin’ Donuts franchises. By state law*, at the end of the day the stores were required to toss out any uneaten food. My friend would often take some of that food and distribute it to some of the homeless folks around town. He’d also frequently bring donuts to parties. You’d be surprised how well High Life and Boston Creme Pie donuts go together. Fortunately, Panera operates on a similar, if less boozy and haphazard, model:
The company also participates in more conventional charity programs, such as donating unused baked goods to churches, schools, and hunger relief organizations, says a story in at Cleveland.com. “Before a cafe even opens, we have organizations set up to receive day-end donations. Not a single item goes to waste,” says Panera’s Regional Marketing Director Cara Sutch.
At the Portland, Ore., café, Carl von Rohr bought a bowl of potato soup and a cup of coffee and paid a dollar more than the suggested donation price (the retail price), says a story in the Portland Tribune.
“I’m willing to give this concept a try,” Mr. von Rohr said. “You walk [outside] and there are a number of people asking for money, and you never know what they’re going to do with it. You put in the extra money here, and you know they’re feeding people with basically healthy food.”
*According to my friend, I have no reason to doubt him and haven’t looked up what statute this might be.
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Recently a Chicago Chili’s served a four-year old a sippy cup full of booze. Simple mistake? Or dastardly plan by BIG ALCOHOL CORPORATIONS to ENSLAVE CHILDREN?* The someone-think-of-the-children crowd did their thing and got all morally up in arms, but in the D.C. we have our own scourge. This is unquestionably the worst thing to ever happen to this city ever.
Gentrification is one thing; bringing kids to bars is another. I see this same crap all over Clarendon; Buffy and Todd want to still feel young and cool and have a bloody mary with Sunday brunch. So little Crapfactory or Princess get to come too. Yay, role models!
Dcist will explain, while I go to my glass cage of emotion:
From a business standpoint, can we fault The Heights for wanting to pull in customers from the burgeoning family population in Columbia Heights? Regrettably, no — if I were a restaurateur, you could bet that I’d like as many families as possible to be walking in that door, despite the collateral damage that such a business plan would no doubt inflict on the poor wait staff who’d have to serve little Timmy his chicken fingers. (Plus: The Heights has plenty of competitors in the ‘hood that already cater to such an audience.) But it appears as if, in the last couple of years, such philosophies have opened the door to the increased fortification by the kind of people for whom happy hour is less associated with shooting the bull with a beer in hand than it is with whole wheat pasta, smoothies and face painting on increasingly valuable patio space. It’s just…wrong.
If you bring your kid to a bar, you should at least go visit her at the strip club later in life. You know, if your restraining order lets you get that close. I hope that face paint is filled with arsenic.
*Simple mistake, in all likelihood. But the more important point is why doesn’t Chili’s serve sippy-booze-cups? IT WON’T TIP OVER.
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Groupon is getting in trouble with state liquor laws. At least it is with Massachusetts’
Alcohol Beverage Control Board, citing violations of various liquor laws in the state, but mostly regarding discounted drinks. However, Groupon appears to be the only one of its kind under scrutiny, as competitors like KGB Deals continue to promote coupons applicable to food and drink specials.
In some others states, at least, Groupon appears to be somewhat in the clear. In New York, for instance, it appears to be [permissible] to discount drinks as much as 50% – but no more – while in California, anything is game as long as Groupon never uses the word ‘free’ around an offer where alcohol is involved, according to officials in those states I spoke with Friday. Of course there are 47 other states, approximately one-third of which are similarly strict as Massachusetts around the sale of alcohol. It’s a good bet Groupon will face more booze troubles.
One commenter at Forbes writes, since Groupon’s policy change in response to the purported violations, “How are we going to eat $50 worth of $2 tacos???” Naturally, this leads me to question a few things: If Groupon (and implicitly the bar or restaurant in question) is not allowed to offer coupon discounts, does this apply to discounted restaurant gift certificates from venues like Restaurant.com? Are coupons and gift certificates treated as one in the same legally, or does this differ from state to state? Does it matter if a third-party is offering the discount on a coupon or a gift certificate? I assume that, if you purchase a gift certificate from a restaurant (or even get the restaurant gift card from Costco or a grocery store), it is treated as cash at said restaurant, and is therefore applicable to both food and alcohol. I’d like to know if that’s not the case in some states.
I fail to see a distinction between Groupon’s and Restaurant.com’s wares: both are pre-paid deals. Whether I pay $10 for $25 worth of food and drink at an establishment with a Groupon or pay $10 (sometimes $2 or $3 if you have a promo code) for $25 worth of food or drink at an establishment with a Restaurant.com gift certificate would seem irrelevant. Then perhaps Restaurant.com’s “gift certificate” is a misnomer as it is a discount with restrictions like Groupon. And yet, it appears that you can continue to buy both food and drink with a regular restaurant gift card/certificate. If a restaurant compensates you for a bad experience with a gift certificate, is it in violation if you use the gift certificate for “free” drinks? Is it in violation if it compensates you 100% for said bad experience immediately and your order included alcohol? What about if you win a certain amount off your tab during a restaurant-hosted trivia contest and the like?
And finally, I’m disappointed with the Internet’s offering of state liquor laws compilations. There’s Wikipedia’s reference, but it seems incomplete on restrictions. I suppose I was expecting a ranking with up-to-date descriptions, because I’m not entirely clear what each state comprehensively allows or restricts in 2011. Perhaps a project to pursue later, unless y’all have a better reference.
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This year Spring is taking her sweet time getting her act together. There have been one or two nice days when she showed us a little ankle, but mostly it’s been baggy sweaters and no makeup. Metaphorically speaking. But when she finally breaks out of her funk, I found a drink that will help you bust out your own. Presenting: the Basil Mojito.
Ingredients:
Directions:
Muddle the basil leaves, lime, and simple syrup until the basil is thoroughly bruised but not pulverized. Pour in the rum.
Fill the glass most of the way with crushed ice. (If you don’t have a “crushed ice” option on your refrigerator, wrap ice cubes in a towel and hammer them with a kitchen mallet.) Pour in the club soda to the top of the glass. Garnish with a lime wedge or basil leaf. Enjoy!
Sounds pretty tasty. It’d probably go really well with a Margherita and some sunshine.
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