The Tequila Incident, or the Red Rocker does San Francisco

Before the tequila, there was Sammy Hagar.

 

Mr. Hagar – the Red Rocker to his friends – had just released his autobiography.  He was going to make an appearance at ye olde bookshoppe in San Francisco.  It’s often a combustible mix, when the famous write a book and go on tour.

 

Your typical book signing?  The folding chairs are set up – not too many, because it’s better to bring more out than fold the extras up.  A few friends of the author arrive early, eager for a seat near the front – unaware that all the seats will be near the front.  With luck, a few customers - intrigued by the store’s display – will show up.  If ten or twelve people are in the house, you’re golden.

 

Then there’s your untypical signing.  Say, for someone who’s not a writer, but famous for spectacular feats off the court, on the screen or in the bedroom.  First, there are the riders – the demands in a contract that bookstores must fulfill in order to secure that writers appearance.  Most authors don’t have riders – they’re happy to have an audience.  If pushed, maybe they’ll accept some coffee from the joint up the block.

 

Maybe not.

 

But for the famous, the rich?  Indeed, Mr. Fitzgerald, they are not like you and me.  The best rider we ever consented to included Belvedere Vodka (on ice) and boxes of Red Hots.

 

What makes these tours potentially combustible is the meeting of the two worlds.  The Book World - known to booksellers, a given, no surprises here - and the World of the Celebrity.  The Celebrity attracts fans, and because these fans aren’t often inside a bookstore, they can be as astonished and rattled as a bookseller would be if thrust onto the pit stop at Indy.  Danica, we’d ask, kicking the tire in front of us, What am I supposed to do with that?

 

So when Mr. Hagar came to town, we didn’t know what to expect, not exactly.  My friend Rich ran ye olde bookshoppe, and he called that day, wondering if I could come into town, supply the pit crew with another pair of hands.

 

 

It was a Friday night in San Francisco, so I arrived early.  Authors don’t usually have Groupies, but there they were, like cattle at a crossing, waiting outside.  One of Rich’s coworkers had written, in fancy chalk-letters outside the front door, The Line for Sammy Hagar Starts Here. And after those words were others, chalked by Mr. Hagar's patient fans:  After Tom & Gayle! and then JESS & KIKI and then Janine and Amber! and then Bobby, and then Roger…all the way down Chestnut.

 

The line began assembling before the store opened at nine in the morning.  The event was at seven that evening.

 

Usually, for a book signing?  Customers aren’t queuing up ten hours in advance.

 

With the hundreds of people in line, Chestnut Street had taken on a different flavor than usual.  The air was...aromatic.  The liquor store on the corner busy.  But the Red Rocker's fans were terrific at policing themselves - keeping doorways to other businesses clear - and as the clock crept closer to seven, their anticipation grew.

 

Mr. Hagar hadn't demanded vodka.  He did request – bless Red! – that to get in line, you had to have a receipt from ye olde bookshoppe.  The guy with the Amazon box under his arm, the guy who was late to the party?  He couldn’t understand why it mattered.  We didn’t have time to explain it to him because, at about a minute to seven, a Hummer limousine pulled up to the store.  The line erupted.  The Red Rocker himself jumped out of the limo, looked up at the cheering mass, threw his hands into the air – doing that horn thing with his fingers – and shouted, Let’s do this!

 

Following in the Red Rocker’s wake were five guys.  Now, sometimes authors have escorts.  Drivers who deliver them to signings, maybe help the staff if books need to be opened in preparation for the author’s signature.  These guys?  They were not your mother’s escorts.  They were – tough.  Not big, necessarily, not Mr. T.  But, well, menacing.  They had things hanging from their necks – shark teeth.  A bear claw.  And the great thing?

 

When a guy with a bear claw hanging from his neck says, Hey pal?  Where’d you buy that book?  Amazon?  You kidding me?  Listen, see that register?

 

And Mr. Claw points to the cash register at the front of the store.

 

Go buy yourself a book, he says.

 

When I tell the story, I add that Mr. Claw ended his admonition with the word, capiche.  But that didn't happen.

 

Anyway - again - the great thing?  When a guy with a bear-claw necklace tells you to buy a book from your local independent bookseller?  The local independent bookseller who coordinated the event you've driven to?  To get an autograph from one of the most famous singers of his generation?  You don’t have much room to maneuver.

 

The regular booksellers?  We’re cheering inside.  Because, see, Mr. Claw has just voiced something that we think about all the time.  When we host an author, and a customer comes to the store with a book he purchased somewhere else, it defeats the purpose, for us, just a bit.  We keep our doors open, in part, so we can have events.  Publishers send authors to us to promote the author, the book – and the bookstore.  But if you don’t buy the book from us, it’s difficult to keep our doors open to host other events.

 

So when the guy with the Amazon box says, I don’t see what difference it makes, and my new friend with the tight silk shirt and the bear claw around his neck just stares at him until Mr. Amazon walks over to the register?

 

I hear angels singing.

 

And those angels continue to sing as Mr. Hagar and his entourage sweep through the store.  We’ve got lines marked off on the stubby blue carpet with tape, lines that wend and weave to the table in the back.  The line begins moving forward before Mr. Hagar has even taken his seat.  Rich has me and a few other managers in addition to his regular crew – we’re guiding customers through the line, and we’ve got Mr. Hagar’s associates helping us, and that means the line moves quickly.

 

So quickly that one guy passes me, the opposite way, almost in a dead run, right out the door and back onto Chestnut Street.  I lose sight of him for a few seconds before he pops right back in.

 

I’m sorry, I say, you can only go through the line once.

 

But, but, this guy sputters, this fan in a red t-shirt with a white 55 across the front.  But look! he says.  And then he shoves his hands towards me.  The line's moving so fast, I didn’t get my book!

 

What? I say.

 

My book! he says.  I got pushed out of there without my book!

 

If this was the Indy 500, and if this guy were Danica Patrick, things would be happening fast there in the pit.  Cars would be screaming by – kind of like the line is screaming by me.  Other crews would be on their bellies, yelling at each other as they tightened belts and loosened lugs – much as some of my coworkers are getting yelled at by a slightly intoxicated fan of the Rocker, a fan who is certain that Red would love to make her acquaintance.

 

You know, for later.

 

So while this screaming and yelling is going on, I’m replaying in my mind what happened to the guy in the I Can’t Drive 55 t-shirt.  Did he have a book in his hand when he passed me?  Was he out of sight long enough to hand the book to an accomplice before coming back here to scam us out of a book?  And did I really just use the word accomplice?

 

My book! Mr. 55 pleads.  Man, c’mon, that ain’t right!

 

Sir, I say.  Honestly?  You gave your book over to be signed, you’ve been waiting in line for ten hours—

 

Seven! he says.  Just seven!

 

–for seven hours, and in all that time you’re preparing for one thing?  To get a signature from Mr. Hagar—

 

Red! he yells.  The Red Rocker!  Yes!

 

–and after all that time, waiting outside, just waiting for that moment - and then when the moment finally comes, you leave the book behind?  Is that what you’re asking me to believe?

 

And suddenly Mr. 55 looks at me kind of strange.  His hands drop to his sides.  His head cants to the left as he inspects me.  What are you saying? he says.

 

I just look at him.  He knows what I’m saying.  I don’t want to say it again, because the line, it's moving so fast, people are wondering if they should buy more books and get back in that fast-moving line for another moment in the reflected glory of the singer, this man who’s been on so many radios in so many cars on so many afternoons, but before I answer his question, Mr. Claw walks up to me.

 

Hey, he says, and he holds up a copy of Red, My Uncensored Life in Rock, by Sammy Hagar.

 

Hey, Mr. Claw says again, and he holds the book out to Mr. 55.  You left this on the table.

 

Right then I’m feeling pretty stupid, but Rich calls my name, asks how the line is going while Mr. Hagar’s associate heads back, and when I turn around my guy is already gone, gone and out the door.

 

Rich, I yell back.  I’m going outside, ok?

 

He gives me a thumbs-up and I run outside.  My guy?  He’s got a sweet parking spot just across the street.  Even that's possible in the Marina if you arrive early enough.  I dodge an Accord and head over, get to his Firebird as he’s unlocking its door.

 

Hey, I call out, and he looks up.

 

I wanted to say I’m sorry.  To apologize.  That I didn’t mean—

 

My guy just smiles.  Dude, he says, it’s cool.  The Firebird is open now and he tosses his signed book inside.  It’s cool, he repeats.  Then he throws his hands into the air, he does that horn-thing with both of them, just like the Red Rocker did before he yelled, Let’s do this!

 

My guy?  My guy yells, too.  The Red Rocker, man – I met the Red Rocker!  And he yells again, somewhere between a war cry and the mating call of, I don’t know, a musk ox.  A really nice musk ox.

 

It’s cool, dude, it’s cool!  No harm no foul!

 

And he gets in his Firebird and sends me a thumbs-up just like Rich did.

 

When I get back to the store, Mr. Hagar is high-fiving customers as he leaves.  Those still in the store cheer – their cheers are met by the cheers of the hangers-on outside.  Before the cheers end the Red Rocker is back in his limo and gone.  Where do rock stars go early on a Friday night in San Francisco?

 

That’s a question I’ll never be able to answer.

 

I look at my watch.  It’s 7:14.

 

Rich, I ask, and Rich has anticipated all of us.  He’s at the register checking the numbers.

285, he says.  285.

 

You sold 285 books? I ask.

 

And he signed every last one of them, he says.  In fourteen minutes.  Rich smiles and shakes his head.  In fourteen minutes.

 

 

It’s later.  We've returned the store to some semblance of its usual self.  The tape's been pulled off the carpet.  The chalk on the sidewalk is a little scuffed, but still readable.  After Tom & Gayle!

 

Rich and I head around the corner to a Pierce Street watering hole.  I don’t drink tequila, not regularly - I had a bad tequila incident once.  Hasn't everyone?  But Mr. Hagar owns his own distillery, so I order tequila for me, whiskey for Rich.  I tell him about my guy, and my mistake.  Rich just drinks, and laughs.

 

It’s cool, dude.  It’s cool, he says.   And he laughs again.

 

We clink glasses and sip.

 

No harm, dude, no foul.

Bermuda Postcards #2 - Holding Hands Underwater

In the days before we left for Bermuda, we kept score on Tropical Storm Debby.  She was supposed to churn into Texas, so we rooted for that, selfishly hoping that Debby would do Dallas because then Bermuda and our vacation would be safe.

Instead, Debby exited, Stage Left, then cat and dogged across Florida before weakening to a tropical cyclone - huzzah! - only to regain strength and again become a tropical storm - boo hiss.

The girls wondered why I was so interested in the weather.  I thought it'd be a hoot to tease them, talk about cyclones, maybe tornadoes - tornadoes would have led to Dorothy, Dorothy to Toto, then I'd do my Wicked Witch cackle - but before I could begin, Karen gave me a look.  So I didn't.

Fortunately, by the time we ourselves were crossing the Atlantic, Debby had become a tropical depression and then petered out.  So the ocean we saw?  Just big and blue.


Cruise ships drop anchor at the Royal Naval Dockyard in Bermuda.  Our first day, we left the Dockyard and headed to Horseshoe Bay.  We'd been told it was one of Bermuda's most beautiful beaches.

The girls agreed.


My memories of Bermuda are many:

Kristina running up and down the beach, joyful.  So joyful.

Looking for sea creatures hiding in the volcanic crags along the water with Elizabeth.

Chickens on sidewalks.

All the pastel homes along Middle Road between the Dockyard and Hamilton.

The Caipirinha I drank at the restaurant on the way to the beach.

Caipirinha

 
1 lime

2 oz cachaça (Brazilian white rum)

sugar

ice


Roll the lime between your palm and the counter to release the juices inside.  Cut the lime into pieces, drop in your shaker, sprinkle with sugar - then muddle.  Add the cachaça and ice.  Shake until frosted.  Pour into a rocks glass, over.



Other memories - like meeting Anthony Pettit, dealer of Bermuda arcana, and buying two antique soda bottles from him.

The blue water.

The red burn on my shoulders from that first beach day.

Stacy and Allison calling out from their carriage as it horse-trotted past us.

Watching Kristina and Karen in a yellow paddle boat, on the ocean.


But what I'll remember most is from our second day - what I'll remember most is snorkeling with Elizabeth and Kristina.


The warm water lapping around my shoulders, my sunburn forgotten because there I was surrounded by all that gorgeous blue with both my girls, Karen picture snapping away inside the paddle boat.

We'd initially divided and conquered - Karen took Kristina in the boat and I went into the water with Elizabeth.

After a bit, Kristina decided maybe, just maybe, she'd like to give snorkeling a shot.

Oh, that Kristina.  She talks a good game.

And she certainly looked fabulous duded out in her snorkeling gear - but she wasn't quite sure about actually putting her head under the water.

I leaned close, whispered it was ok.  That I'd hold her the entire time.  She considered that.  For about three seconds before she started laughing.  No, Daddy - laughing - No.  I'll be all right with Mommy.  In our boat.

And she splashed, happy, when Karen paddled that boat our way.



So I went back to Elizabeth, back to what we'd been doing before.

We'd walked to the shore, past bikini girls and tattoo boys, shells and pebbles biting into our feet, me struggling with the flippers - Elizabeth slipping hers on with much more ease than Dad.

Finally getting my flippers on - then penguin-walking into the calm water.  Elizabeth splashing ahead, thrilled.  The girls never more elated than when they're in the water.  At home that means pools  - either the one at Grandma and Grandpa's or the one at the Harbor Bay Club.

But here, in Bermuda?  In the ocean?  The warm Atlantic ocean?  The girls were ecstatic.  Kristina in her boat with Karen, Elizabeth with me.

Elizabeth took no time getting used to the snorkel and mask.  Then getting used to letting herself float - all the better to look, to watch.

What I'll remember most is taking Elizabeth's hand, there in that water warmed by the Gulf Stream, and having Elizabeth give up all control.  Elizabeth letting herself float, face angled down, staring into the sea.  Letting me paddle my feet, with her small hand in mine, as we swam.  Just seeing blue water at first, feeling seaweed - sargassum - touch our shoulders as it floated by.  Shoal grass waving under us.  Elizabeth's other hand darting forward, pointing at a fish as it shot by.

Elizabeth letting go of my hand, trying to catch the fish with the assurance that eight-year-olds have.  Turning right and left, reaching reaching, certain the fish could be hers.

Both of us coming up for air, Elizabeth smiling so big.  So happy.  Daddy, daddy! she said.  Did you see it?  Did you?

Both of us laughing, draining our snorkels of sea water, ready to go again.

Elizabeth, thrilled, slipping her hand back into mine.  Floating on the water, her little body rising with the current.  Me kicking with flippered feet.  Ahead of us, a hundred slashes of silver.  A thousand.  Ten thousand.

Silversides.

One of the Bikini Girls on the beach had been talking to her Tattoo Boy about them, All those small, slim fish.  Everywhere, just everywhere, she said.  Yeah, Tattoo Boy said.  They're called Silversides.  And he said it with a smile because he knew the answer.  Not that Bikini Girl had asked a question, but still.

I kicked harder, squeezing Elizabeth's hand.  Elizabeth squeezing back.  Her mask turning toward the streaks, her free hand pointing--

Look dad!

*pointpoint*

Look!

Both of us swimming into the silver shoal, hand holding hand, moving as one - and thousands of tiny fish moving as one, too - down and right, fast, left and up, faster - Elizabeth's excitement being telegraphed to me through electric fingers.  Squeeze squeeze point!

Look dad look!  The fish enveloping us - in front, around, under and behind - so many fish, more fish than water.

Then - the shoal disappearing as quickly as it arrived, the water clear again, the seagrass waving.

That's what I'll remember from Bermuda.  Elizabeth and I, hand in hand, swimming through warm Atlantic waters.  Silversides all around.

All around.

Bermuda Postcards #1 - The colors of the island

We landed in Baltimore, late, and got up early the next day to board our ship and set sail for Bermuda.

Bermuda?  I thought Bermuda was in the Caribbean - clearly, I should've spent more time studying Geography.  More's the pity.

The island's by itself, lonely in the Atlantic Ocean, not the Caribbean Sea, making Bermuda a propitious location for rum-runners during our country's inglorious pursuit of Prohibition.

As much thoughtful consideration went into that pursuit as went into my studies of Geography.

And yes, we all thought it was peculiar that we were traveling into the Bermuda Triangle - willingly.  On a boat.  You scoff.  You say the Triangle is a myth.  To you I say, read about the USS Cyclops.  The single largest non-combat loss of life in the history of the US Navy?  When the Cyclops was lost in March of 1918.  Just lost - poof - the ship and its 306 crew members and passengers.  No wreckage ever found.

Yet you scoff?

I didn't scoff.  But I did drink.  Many Rob Roys.   I decided on Rob Roys when I saw that the ones mixed on board used Chivas.  My dad was an old Chivas man, so in his honor - lots of Rob Roys to make any thoughts of the Cyclops disappear, like a ship at sea.


The first thing you notice about Bermuda is the water - so turquoise, so blue.  And the further from shore, the deeper the hue.  The lines of demarcation, from blue to darker blue, are so straight as to appear fake, as if the sea has been photoshopped.

The blue of Bermuda isn't only found in its waters, the blue doesn't only surround the island with its shades--

--the blue seeps from those waters and runs down the undersides of bandstands.

Onto the island's walls.

From those walls back to the sky.  Of course, right?  Of course you'd want as much of that ocean blue to be with you on land.

The beaches are unbelievable, indeed - that's what you'll remember when you visit.  And you should.  Visit.  But the colors of the island?  The colors you'll pass as you travel to Horseshoe Bay?  Don't forget the colors.

And it's all just ridiculously beautiful.  But blue is only the beginning.  Yellow, more turquoise, green.  Pastels everywhere.

 

One of the islanders I met, Anthony Pettit, a seller of good things old - books, bottles, maps - laughed as we drove from the Dockyard to his house in Hamilton.  Yes, he said, we do like our buildings to be bright.  Some people think they can be too bright.

But they're - joyful, I said.  Joyful being the only word I could think of that encapsulated the glee and delight behind the paint choices.  It all reminded me of Greece - where they don't hide miscellaneous architectural details.  Is there a water pipe that incongruously runs up the outside of a wall?  Here in the states we'd paint the pipe the color of the wall to mask it.  In Greece?  On the islands?  That wall is going to be white, but the pipe they'll paint blue.  Bright blue.  Letting everyone know - here's a pipe!

The difference between Bermuda and Greece is, of course, the choice of color.  Or choices.  In Greece, most of the accents remain blue, whereas here in Bermuda, the houses look like different colored gems strewn amid its twenty square miles.

Did I mention how ridiculously beautiful it all is?  All the color?  Like that purple shirt, against the salmon wall?  How great is that?

If you lived in Bermuda, surrounded by turquoise water, where hibiscus grows wild, wouldn't you want your house or cottage to add to the surroundings?

It's lucky there isn't a Bermudan homeowners association dictating which shade of beige can be used to cover domiciles.

So let's end where we started.  With Bermuda blue.  If you're lucky, when you visit, you'll be accompanied by an eight-year-old who just so happens to bring her own blue with her wherever she goes.  And to see Bermuda blue reflected in her own?

 

I'd go back for that.  Wouldn't you?

New York Postcards #4 -- Two Views of Park Avenue

June 5th, 2012.  Twelve hours apart.

Manhattan, Park Avenue at 31st, 3:36 am

Manhattan, Park Avenue at 31st, 3:36 pm

Happy Father's Day - A memory of dad, but not my own (memory)

I had lunch this week with a friend from elementary school.  We hadn't seen each other in thirty years, but had reconnected online.  After finding out I sold books, he was kind enough to ask me to help him build a library for his management group - then he traveled to Alameda to say thanks for the list I had compiled when of course I should have been thanking him for his custom.

We spent lunch catching up, talking about our families.  We sounded like two old guys discussing how important family is - how important our families are.  I know he's still close to his mom - but he hadn't said much about his dad - not today, and not in the various messages we'd sent each other over the past few years.

High School Graduation, Hiawatha, Utah.  1950

With Father's Day coming up, though, my Dad was on my mind - even more than usual.  Aside from wishing I could tell him just once more how much I loved him, I had come to realize that, even with the passage of time, the ache of his death hadn't eased.  I thought it would - but there, as in so many things, I was wrong.

So I mentioned my Dad, talked about how my friends - especially the ones Karen and I have made who also have children in the range of our Elizabeth and Kristina - give me a bad time for having a father who never raised his voice.  It's something I've mentioned before, but continue to marvel at.  I try not to raise my voice - to yell - at my kids.  I'd prefer that I didn't.  Of course, right?  But - invariably - I do.

Karen had the girls make me Father's Day cards to mimic the ones the preschool prepares for Mother's Day.  I think it's a gyp that Moms get the card, but because school lets out a week and a half before Father's Day, we're overlooked.  Karen rectified that - even copied the font of the official Bayside Montessori Mother's Day Card.  Inside the card is a series of questions, and in answer to:  What do you like best about your dad? Kristina had responded, He still loves me even when I'm naughty.

So she knows that, even if I holler.  But I'd still like not to get exasperated - not to fume and raise my Greek voice.

Strive, strive, I'm striving, ok?

I mentioned that to my friend, though, my dad's equanimity, mentioned it while I divvied up the spring rolls, and he was quiet there for a minute inside the Thai restaurant across from the bookstore.  Quiet while he poked at his rice dish served inside an entire half of a pineapple.  Then he looked up and said, You know what my strongest memory is of your dad?

I didn't say anything.

Your brother Dean and I had just crossed the street from my house.  Your dad was outside watering the lawn.  The weekend, it must have been.  He was spraying the water from a hose back and forth across the grass.  God, it was hot.

And I sip from my Diet Coke remembering how hot those Modesto summers could be.

Right after we crossed the street, some kid - none of us knew who he was - also tried to cross Sherwood, but he didn't make it.  He got hit by a car.

And it was my turn to get real quiet.

The kid, he didn't die or anything - but it was bad.

What I remember most is how your dad didn't even look for other cars coming, he just threw the hose down and ran out in the middle of the street and picked up that little boy.  Picked him up and cradled him in his arms.  You know how big your dad was - and at that age, I don't know, I must've been eight?  Maybe nine?  Your dad was huge to me, to all of us.  But he held that little kid so gently, telling him he was going to be ok.  That he'd be ok.  Talking to that little boy so gently, holding him so gently for such a big man.

My friend hadn't been eating while he said this.  But at that point, he started cutting up one of the crab cakes that was left.  Halved it, then quartered it. 

That's the memory I have of your dad, when I think about your dad.

I'm just looking at my friend, because this is not a story I know.  How could I not have been told this story?  Or if I had heard it, when I was ten, or eleven - how had I forgotten?  I don't forget things, not usually.  Not things like that.


Later, when our plates had been taken away, he was talking about his mom again.  The love he has for his mom is palpable.  And he mentions his stepfather - something else I didn't know about.  Didn't know his parents got divorced.  Didn't know his mom remarried - happily - to someone who loved her back, hard.  That she was fortunate enough to be able to spend some good years with a good man.

And that's when I realized I didn't have a strong memory of his father, not really.  I see a man with dark hair, almost black.  Slicked back - with Brylcreem?  But even with Brylcreem in his hair, I have a sense that it was a little messy.  And that's it.  Nothing more.  A man in a t-shirt with messy black hair.

Still later, my friend mentions, just offhand - Well, you know my dad was an alcoholic - and the statement was apropos of nothing, yet it said so much in so little.  And I wish I could make some grand connection between the disparate elements of our conversation during lunch.  But I'm not one for grand connections.

I'm left knowing that it was good to see him again after so long - so easy to talk to him after three decades of not.  Talking to him.  And friends like that are select and rare, people you can just pick up with regardless of the time that has passed.

But it's Father's Day.  And I'm remembering.  I'm remembering, and reminding myself how lucky I am to have had the parents who raised me.  How lucky I was to have had my soft-spoken father in my life - my father often acting more than speaking.  Showing the world what he was about more through his deeds than his words.

My dad was a big, strong man. But he never abused that strength. He’d use it, sure, to easily pick up a small boy from the street, to hold that boy gently in his huge arms while calmly assuring him everything was going to be ok. And that’s the difference between use and abuse. Between showing and telling.

My dad never told me that story - why would he? Even though it is the defining image of my dad in my friend’s mind. Just another time when my father showed instead of told. 

We're different in that respect, my dad and I.  Too often I rely on words when actions are so much more important.

But I'm striving, have I mentioned that?  I'm striving.

Happy Father's Day, Dad.  Miss you.

New York Postcards #7 -- Booker and Dax

Momofuku Ando was a Japanese businessman who invented the Ramen noodle.  True story.  And the great New York restaurant, momofuku?  When David Chang opened it, many of his crazywonderful concoctions centered around that noodle - so that's where he found inspiration for the restaurant's name (that and the fact that it sounds a little bit like mutha$&@*#!  Another true story).  But then Mr. Chang went all DEFCON 1, took that beauty of a eatery to maximum readiness, and the rest is now an ongoing chapter in the book of Sweet Science.

When we arrived in New York with the rest of the Books Inc. crew, all that Andy knew was that a friend of his managed a bar in the city.  I'm game for bars, and we'd already hit a few, so we had of course decided that we'd check out the joint his friend ran.

Turns out the joint was Booker and Dax, the bar attached to momofuku ssäm.  This iteration of momofuku?  It's been named one of the 50 best restaurants in the world three years running.

Not a bad joint Andy's friend was associated with.

Andy texts Robby, let's him know we're headed over - 'we' being Andy, me, Jerry and Korje.  A more motley crew of booksellers would be hard to find - unless Book Expo America were taking place in the center of the known universe.

Oh, wait.  It was.

So we head over to East 13th, and being from San Francisco, we can't find it.  Until we do.  And when we open the door, I'm reminded that some of the greatest places in New York are small.  There are a couple other tables, but what you see is what you get - one six-top table there in the middle, a couple others off to the sides.

Image stolen from gothamist.com

And when we walked in?  Four of the six seats you see at that table?  They had been set aside for us - white napkins at each seat proclaiming, Taken.  As soon as we enter, Robby comes out from behind the bar and gives Andy a hug and shows us to our seats - and the two New York blondes already sitting at the table are checking us out, trying to figure how we rate such treatment.

Robby continues with the the gracious-host thing, and he doesn't steer us wrong inside his beautiful bar - this bar with fire on the walls and fire behind the counter.

The drinks?  Think nectar. 

nec·tar   n.   1.  Greek & Roman Mythology  The drink of the gods.

                   2.  A delicious or invigorating drink.

I started with a Manhattan because I started with a Manhattan everywhere I went in Manhattan.  Except for the Blarney Stone.

I think there are about a dozen Blarney Stones in Midtown, and I hit them all.  Some twice.  This one was on 9th at West 29th.  Andy had mentioned gin earlier in the evening, and it had sloshed around in my head ever since, so when we sat, I ordered a Martini.

Ok, hon, the bartender says. You can have a Martini - it's like only the second one I've made here - but you can't have olives. Only a twist. This is the freakin Blarney Stone, a'right?

Except for that Blarney, a Manhattan always started me off.  So I do that, order it from one of the three drinks listed under stirred - the others were lady of the night and laurel and hardy.

Robby's laughing when he brings the Manhattan.  Brings one to Jerry, one to me.  He asks if we'd like to know how they cool the glass that the Manhattan is served in.

Naturally, we do.

Nitrogen, Robby says.  Liquid nitrogen.

Which would explain the huge tank of the stuff right outside the front door.

It's true, then.  Dave Arnold - in collaboration with David Chang - has in fact brought science to the bar.  And in doing so, has raised that bar wonderfully.

The Manhattan is perfect.  Cold - thank your, Mr. Nitrogen - with the ideal balance between the rye, vermouth, and bitters.  I can get my balance off at home - but I only play a bartender on tv.  Robby and his crew are the real dealers.

Next up might be my favorite drink of the night, something they call the jenny & scott.  We're talking Yamazaki whisky that is - in the parlance of the bar - served on the rock.  They say rock, singular, because the rock in question is at least two inches square.

This?  This is a thing of beauty.  What sends the jenny & scott over the top?  The bitters mixed with the whisky - both mole and hellfire.  It's difficult to explain how exquisite the concoction is.  The mole bitters add a touch of earthy chocolate.  But the hellfire bitters?  Oh, lord.  The spicy habanero doesn't overpower the drink - it just magically adds heat.

Order jenny & scott if you're in the city.  Really.

The evening begins to haze just a bit around now, but it's a sure bet I next went with the sure bet because one of its ingredients, the lavender, reminded me of one of my favorite cocktails, the Aviation.  And I'm thinking about the Aviation because I just that day ran into a friend on the floor of the Javits Center.  Amber - another Aviation fan - this one's for you.

The sure bet has banks rum, lavender, crème de mure, toasted almond orgeat, lemon - and egg white to froth things up.

What's crème de mure? I ask Robby as he's walking by (that night, Robby was wearing many different hats and excelling under the brim of each).

He begins to explain but then stops and instead grabs a bottle from behind the bar and pours a finger of richly purple heaven into a glass.  It's easier to taste, Robby says.

So I do.

Crème de mure would then be a blackberry liqueur.  That and the rum and the lavender and almond make up the sure bet, and the sure bet is listed under the shaken portion of the drinks menu because you have to shake things up when you're dealing with egg whites.  It's served in a champagne flute, so it's a tall column of cool lavender cotton.

A sure bet?  Indeed.  One of the two New York Blondes sitting next to us oohs over the drink and asks if she can sip.  Everyone wants to sip, so she does and we do.  Wow, she says.  And her friend says, So who are you all anyway?  You walk in, the table's waiting, that guy - and she pouts over at Andy - gets a big hug.  What gives?

So I explain about Andy and Robby and New York Blonde Number Two is nodding her head as New York Blonde Number One is eying Korje's sure bet and Korje sees the eye and offers Number One another sip.

I thought New Yorkers were supposed to be cranky?

Robby stops by - the lights are even lower now that the sun has long since shuffled off its daily coil - and he wants to know how we're doing.

I have room for one more, I say, and I ask what he'd recommend.

Well, he says...one of our most popular drinks is the mustachi-ode.  It's going to be leaving the menu soon only because we like to keep things fresh.  It's got this pistachio syrup that we make ourselves.  I'd go with that.

Done.

When Erik Ellestad at the Savoy Stomp tweeted Booker and Dax for the recipe, he got this response:

1oz 101 bourbon .5 Becherovka .5 nardini .25 lemon 1 pistachio syrup (ours is centrifuged) ango decoration. Cheers!

So go on and centrifuge your own pistachio syrup and then recreate the mustachi-ode.

About now, as we're bidding goodbye to the New York Blondes - Robby shows up with my cocktail.  He places it on the table with a flourish. 

Yes, it's a handlebar.  Hence mustachi-ode.

Nick, Robby says.  Please enjoy the final mustachi-ode to be served at Booker and Dax.  We used the very last of our pistachio syrup to make yours.  Cheers!

I do enjoy my drink.  How could I not?  It's brilliant.  And I'm happy the evening here is ending with bourbon - I need energy for the rest of the night, after we drop Korje at the Larchmont and head back up towards Penn Station and our hotel.  Probably not headed to the hotel, not just yet.  Still.

Andy's picking up the tab, and while I try to throw money at him, all I can think is - bourbon and friends, old and new.  The beginning of a week in New York where books and more drinks await.

All in all, yes, a sure bet.

New York Postcards #3 - Well, this is awkward...

Book Expo America kicked off on Monday morning with feisty remarks by Richard Russo - Russo reminding us all about the 600 pound gorilla in the room.

That'd be the predatory Amazon, the oh so evil entity that everyone uses because, um, they're cheaper and for many, that is the only consideration. I'll rant more when I speak of Russo - that's Postcard #2, but Postcard #2 got swallowed in the electrical malfunctions of the Javitz Center.

New York, I love you, but my Apple products do not.

Anyway. After the Russo call to arms, there was a panel of editors telling us about the biggest Buzz Books of BEA. And I'm sitting there next to a cohort in the hall where the editors are about to buzz, and my cohort looks up at the huge screen there on the right, and emblazoned on the screen is 2012 Editor's Buzz. And then it says the name of the respected bookseller who will be moderating the panel.

That's when my cohort shakes his head. That guy? I hate that guy, he says.

I'm a little taken aback because while I don't know the Moderator well, our paths have crossed and our exchanges have always been courteous and professional - unlike some of my compadres. Booksellers? We can be a nasty bunch.

Why? I ask.

Why do I hate that guy? my cohort says. He's a jerk.

Really? I say.

Oh yeah. I've met him at a couple of author dinners, and he's just flat-out rude.

That guy? I say.

Yeah, that guy. He might not be rude to everyone, but to me? He can't remember my name. Ever. My cohort crosses and then recrosses his legs, agitated. The second time we met, I got the impression he felt I wasn't important enough to acknowledge.

I'm just shaking my head. Again, that description fits some people I can think of - buy me a few drinks and I'll spill, sister - but it doesn't fit my perception of That Guy.

My cohort wonders if he should even stay for the panel. Why would they have picked That Guy for such a high-profile gig?

And so right now? My cohort is good and worked up. He's preaching the Gospel and picking up speed.

Jerk, he says.

We both try to change the topic - try to talk about the week ahead, the many fabulous booksellers and authors and industry people who have gathered here in, yes, yes, the Center of the Universe. I never visited New York because I worried that I would like it too much, and do I. Do I ever.

But in the midst of this chatter words keep erupting from my cohort - jerk, fool, egotist - my cohort's become a bookseller with Tourette's.

But then, then! The editors take the stage. A heady bunch - Millicent Bennett, the very funny Millicent Bennett, to talk about the very serious Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan; or The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce, shepherded along by the amazing Kendra Harpster; Eli Horowitz, from San Francisco's own McSweeney's, will trumpet A Million Heavens by John Brandon. Have you read Brandon's Citrus County? Why not? Then there's Lauren Wein to tell us about Panorama City by Antoine Wilson. And when she's done talking, we all want this book in our hands. The People of Forever are Not Afraid by Shani Boianjiu?  This has none other than Alexis Washam to sing its praises.  That's like Ella doing your songbook. Be happy. Be very happy. Finally, there's the terrific Trish Todd who will speak about In the Shadow of the Banyan by Vaddey Ratner. I was lucky enough to have dinner (thanks for the invite, Cheri!) with Ms. Ratner, where we spoke long into a chilly Oakland night about her arduous journey from the Killing Fields to acclaimed debut author.

So there they all are, these amazing escorts of the Word. And following this great group onto the main stage? Of course it's That Guy, our moderator for the afternoon. And as That Guy takes his seat, my cohort says something that I don't quite catch.

What's that? I say.

Well, he says again, this is awkward.

What's awkward? I say.

That Guy? and my cohort points to our moderator as he sits down in front of the gathered bookies.

That Guy? he says. I've never seen That Guy in my life. I was totally mistaken. The name rang a bell, but the wrong bell.

That Guy? I say. You don't think That Guy's a jerk? I told you, this is awkward. I don't know who That Guy is.

So instead of continuing to hurl stones at That Guy, we instead listen to six impassioned editors tell us why their book should be championed - and it's refreshing after our momentary lapse of reason to be reminded why we're here. That it's the books that bring us together. And That Guy? Whomever That Guy is? We shoujldn't let That Guy get us down. Should instead focus on the words, fiction and non - should focus on those incredible scribes who keep us entertained and informed.

And then we'll have a drink.