The wind was making it real cold. Managed to avoid the rain though. We need to get spring here quickly.
One full week of back to minimalist shoes. Left knee still under observation. Strangely the pain is far less if I increase my speed – not decrease. All that is fine and dandy – but that merely shifts the problem from my knees to the heart and lungs 🙂
Made with lime juice, Smirnoff vodka and ginger beer. Garnishes can include wedge of lime or even mint sprig but I have none 🙂
I did make up for the lack of proper garnishes by serving in the proper glass for this drink – a copper mug!
This cocktail has an unique history. There was a Martin in the 30s who was struggling to sell vodka in USA (he had bought this business from a Kunett who had fled Russia a few years back). Whiskey was the drink of choice in US. Vodka was little appreciated those days. He was a great sales guy though. He even sold it illegally as “White Whiskey – no smell no taste”!! One day while commiserating with a Morgan who was himself struggling to sell something he had started brewing – ginger beer in his Cock-’n-Bull store, they concocted this drink – by essentially mixing two failed drinks. To add to the aura, they added another element – it had to be had in a copper mug only – which by the way was a failing business for another friend of theirs.
Professional bartenders hated it. The people loved it! It became – especially in LA – in the early forties, the most popular cocktail. And thus Smirnoff vodka got a boost in this country. So three failed businesses added up to an outstanding success!
There are stories of Martin’s legendary selling skills. Evidently, he would get a bartender to mix a Moscow Mule for him and then request a picture to be taken with him. Promptly he would fish out his Polaroid camera that he had invested in for this purpose and have a picture of the bartender with the drink. And then he would simply finish the drink and walk to the next bar and tell the bartender there that this drink was the biggest hit in the previous bar. And show the picture as a proof. And kept repeating it!!!
It is starting to warm up. Had a good run with the Bengali group. Our youngest member Eleena showed up again today!! Manas showed up with some delicious “kalo jaam” (an outstanding Bengali sweet). We think he is starting to worry we are dropping too many calories during our run 🙂 The sweets were very popular during our coffee break.
Speaking of coffee, when I went to order my coffee and Niki and Tasha’s drink, as you can see, they remembered my name 🙂
Sharmila and the kids are at the Demi Lovato show. I got the whole house and evening to myself! So I decided to kick up my own cacophony at home 🙂
This being the World Mother Language day [the origin goes back to a very unfortunate incident. When the British, in their infinite wisdom, divided India along religious lines before they left in 1947, Pakistan was born as two large noncontiguous landmasses – one is what is today known as Pakistan and the other one is what is today known as Bangladesh. It was originally called East Bengal – because the dividing line broke apart a state that had Bengali speaking guys like me into East Bengal (as part of Pakistan) and West Bengal (as part of contiguous India – where I was born)].
Later East Bengal was renamed East Pakistan and then after its war of independence (Pakistan has a different view on this), it became Bangladesh. In between, there was a move by Pakistan to have a common language – Urdu as the national language. East Pakistan revolted against this – as they wished to keep their language Bengali as their official language – and the protest turned deadly with four students being shot dead.
Much later, UN recognized this day as the World Mother Language day to celebrate diversity in this world.
To celebrate that, spent a couple of hours listening to Bengali songs by singers from Bangladesh – some really young and upcoming talent like Dina, Saju, Liza, Shadhona… My absolute favorites are Chanchal Chowdhury and Momotaj!
Speaking of cacophony, I experimented with a combination of tabla and cajon to those tunes. I had a very faithful and appreciative listener as you can see in the picture 🙂
Also, I do not think UN sanctioned wine as part of the World Mother Language day, but I threw that in for free 🙂
Morning (long) meetings with customer in Maryland, followed by an energizing lunch with a colleague and then a three hour drive to New Jersey for a customer dinner. I was exhausted last night after this. And my hotel was still over an hour drive away (I stayed next to the airport so as to catch an early flight today).
However, on the way, I knew was a very very old friend of mine and his wife – who I also knew independently. So, sure enough – never a person to miss an intersection point, I showed up at their house pretty late at 8:30.
And I am glad I did. It was two hours of non stop laughter and talking about common friends we knew. I have not laughed that much in a long time…. or had such great a time. Even their daughter got caught up in the action and stayed with us the whole time (which Jayeeta explained later has never happened before). In fact, the only reason the party broke up was that she still had some homework to finish for the next day!!!
You see the picture of the idol? That is an wooden idol carved by Partha. He has got this whole set up in the basement where he does wood work to relax. You see the table we are all sitting at? That is a production from his relaxation.
Still cannot believe how much fun I had in those two hours. And then on my drive back, I realized something. The three of us have had a lot of common friends … we have talked so many times over the phone… we almost lived in the same city some time back…. Found out that my close fiend and Chalupa member Sid’s grandpa’s sister’s granddaughter is Jayeeta!
And yet… till last night… Partha and I had ever met each other only ONCE – for about five minutes … in Durgapur station waiting for Bidhan Express in October 1983 … we were introduced by either Subrata Kolay or Debotosh Paul, I cannot remember!
And Jayeeta? This is the second time I met her in my life – first time when she and her parents came to visit my roommate Pratik Pal in my residential school days in 1984 and then a couple of years later at the same roommates’ house in Durgapur where I had gone to visit his dad Dr. Dilip Pal who had recently broken his leg…
Over 31 years later… meeting somebody only the second or third time in your life…. there was no way you could have guessed it from the amount of fun we had together!!!
