You’ve heard of the Hermit Kingdom, land of a dictator, well, I live in the hermit hovel, an old bungalow, with a cat and countless mice, who under threat of Death By Cat, stay mostly in their hermit holes within the hermit hovel.
I am not a dictator, I’m an affable loner, formerly a gregarious husband and man about town. It’s a different story now. Few people, in fact nobody seeks admittance to the hermit hovel, except once in a while the handyman who comes around when something breaks and we have a beer together but most of the time I don’t call him and I try and fix it myself or just deal with it.
In my brief sorties into the outside world, I drive to the liquor store and the convenience store, conveniently avoiding the supermarket, and then I drive back home where I looked after my wife when she fell ill and was at her bedside when she left the planet and went to another— I don’t know where she went, another planet, a kingdom maybe, I don’t know, I kind of doubt she went anywhere, but you never know, even if you think you know.
I live in a limbo of hopeless hope, or perhaps it’s hopeful hopelessness. I didn’t choose to live this way, especially not live my last years this way but that’s the way it went and there’s nothing I can do about it.
After nearly two years of the hermit life I was getting psyched up to go out and seek companionship, not a new lady, just some friends maybe, go back to the bar my wife and I used to go to, it’s only a mile down the road so you can have a few drinks and still drive home safely or walk home if you get plastered.
But covid had a different plan. We’re all in the same boat there so I’m not going to complain about that. I’m not really complaining about anything, except that I’m out of beer and it’s two o’clock in the morning and I’ll have to wait seven hours to go out and get some more.
One of the things I’ve discovered during my hermitage, besides the stark charm of Japanese poetry and the comforting presence of a cat, is that a breakfast of bacon and eggs tastes even better with beer. I’ll just stay here until I’m old and broke.
The other lesson… Stock up! I have I think 5 months stock of coffee 😎, of course I need dogfood tooooo
Yep, in for the long haul. Stay safe, Daniel.
I’ve never had bacon and eggs and a Beer. But when I was young, and especially hungover, I would sometimes add a spicy Caesar to my breakfast. Wasn’t a foolproof hangover antidote, but at least I was getting my morning juice! Lol!
Spicy Caesar. I had to look that up — a specialty of Alberta — a Canadian Bloody Mary — vodka, tomato juice, clam broth, hot sauce and Worcestershire sauce! Wow! Sounds delicious, I must try it, all I need to get is the clam broth — is that the juice in a can of clams?
In Canada its sold as “Clamato juice” off the shelves in most grocery stores. Mix of Tomato juice, spices and dried clam broth. I like to spice it up even more with some Tabasco sauce and some Worcestershire sauce. Good stuff man! Hair of the dog spiced to your liking!
I’m making one as soon as I get out to the store and buy a can of minced clams, use the juice from that and then use the clams for linguini and clam sauce.
You should really use Clamato juice if you guys have it there. Maybe just use a little clam juice with tomato juice and spice it with Tabasco if Clamato juice is out of reach. Either way, happy cocktail experimentation my friend!