Lou's Official Testimony on Why You Are Paying for the Bartender's Personality (And He Does Not Have One)
I am going to tell you about the old fashioned THC drink sitting in my refrigerator right now, but first I need to get something off my chest, and it is going to take a minute, so sit down and stop looking at your phone.
Last Saturday I paid forty-seven dollars for two old fashioneds at a bar that had a "curated bitters program." I want you to think about that phrase. Curated bitters program. They have a program. For bitters. I have been drinking old fashioneds since before the bartender was born, and I will tell you exactly what a bitters program is: it is a reason to charge you twenty-three dollars for a drink that costs four dollars to make, served by a man with opinions he has not earned.
This is Lou's Official Testimony. I am under oath.
The Bartender Had a Lot to Say About Nothing
He came over. He had a vest on. Not a full suit, mind you. Just a vest. Over a flannel shirt. I do not know what that is. I do not want to know what that is.
He asked me what I was "thinking." I was thinking about whether I left the garage light on, but I said I would have an old fashioned. He nodded like I had said something that required processing. Then he said, and I am quoting directly because I wrote this down on a napkin: "I like to do mine with a Oaxacan split and black walnut bitters, really opens up the smoke notes."
I did not ask for smoke notes. I did not ask what he likes. I asked for an old fashioned. An old fashioned has whiskey, sugar, bitters, an orange peel, and some ice, which is frozen weather and should not cost money but that is a separate complaint I am already filing. That is the drink. It has been the drink. Nobody needed to open it up.
He put a smoked piece of wood in mine. On the rim. For the visual. I sat there watching the wood smoke and I thought: I am a grown man. I am being punished for leaving the house.
What You Are Actually Paying For (Since Nobody Will Say It)
You are paying for the lighting. You are paying for the playlist, which is too loud for conversation but not loud enough to dance to, which means it is loud for no reason, which means you are paying for nothing. You are paying for the font on the menu. You are paying for the bartender's personality, which, as I have established, does not exist. He has techniques. He does not have a personality. There is a difference. Techniques are things you do to impress people. Personality is what you have when nobody is watching. He is always watching. He is the one being watched. He is his own audience.
The old fashioned arrived. It had a large cube in it. Not regular ice, which is already frozen weather, but a special large cube, which I can only assume is weather they aged somewhere. The cube cost extra. I know it cost extra because the drink cost twenty-three dollars, and the whiskey in it costs twelve dollars a bottle at the grocery store. I have done the math. I am an adult. I know what I am looking at.
I drank it. It tasted fine. It tasted like an old fashioned with a piece of wood on it. The wood did not help. The wood never helps. Nobody in history has finished a drink and said, "Good, but I wish there had been more wood involved."
The Correction (This Is Where I Tell You About the Old Fashioned THC Drink)
I am going to tell you about Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned. Eight milligrams of THC. Bitters, orange, oak. No vest. No smoke program. No bartender explaining what he likes. You open it and you drink it, and it tastes like a real old fashioned, which is the point, because the old fashioned is already perfect and did not need anyone's help.
It is an old fashioned THC drink, which means you get the drink and you get the lift, and you do not get the receipt. You do not get the hour you spent listening to a man in a vest describe his process. You do not get the valet parking validation you forgot to get and now it is eleven dollars. You get the drink. That is it. That is the whole proposition. I should not have to explain why this is better, but I will, because apparently we live in a world where people need things explained to them very slowly.
The nano-emulsification means it hits in minutes, not two hours from now when you are already home and in bed. Eight milligrams is the right amount. Enough to take the edge off the evening, loosen up the room, make the conversation go somewhere. Not enough to turn you into a person who cannot find their keys or needs to explain their feelings. The edge comes off. You get funnier. The night gets better. That is it. That is the whole thing.
I am not a scientist. Herb is the scientist. Herb will tell you about the terpenes for forty-five minutes if you let him, and you should not let him, but the short version is: they put specific terpenes in this can so that the social part kicks in, not the stare-at-the-ceiling part. It is engineered for the good night. I did not understand all of it, but Herb explained it once while I was trying to watch the Mets game, and I retained enough to know it works.
A Note on What the Bar Gets Right (There Is Nothing on This List)
I tried to think of something. I sat here for three minutes. The bar has a bathroom. I will give them the bathroom. Everything else is theater with a markup.
If you want to go out, go out. I am not telling you to sit home alone. I am telling you that the next time a bartender asks what you are "thinking," you are allowed to say "an old fashioned" without a follow-up, and if he describes his bitters program, you are allowed to look at the wall until he stops. You are the customer. You have rights. One of those rights is a drink that is not a project.
Or you crack a Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned before you go, show up already in a good mood, and let the bar be the bar without expecting it to also be worth forty-seven dollars. You can also just stay in. I am not judging. I am in the parking lot of a grocery store right now and I am fine.
It is in the fridge. Eight milligrams. No wood. No program. The Variety Pack is there too if you want to try all four before you commit, which is the reasonable thing to do, or you can go straight to the old fashioned like a person who already knows what they want, which is also acceptable. I respect both choices. I barely respect anything, so take that seriously.
One more thing. The watch on my wrist stopped in 2009. Still right twice a day. Better than the curated bitters program, better than the vest, better than the smoke, and better than the twenty-three dollar drink. Some things are correct from the beginning, and you do not improve them. You just drink them.
Damn right.
Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned contains 8mg hemp-derived THC per can. For adults 21 and older only. Hemp-derived THC products are not FDA approved or evaluated to treat, cure, or prevent any disease or condition. Available where legal. Drink responsibly.
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