|
| Kishore Singh: Tipsy-turvey |
| Kishore Singh / New Delhi Oct 24, 2009, 00:43 IST |
|
You’d think most people would exaggerate only about things that can’t otherwise be easily disproved — how many kilometers they hiked in one day, how many pushups they did at the gym, the standing ovation their presentation got at an international conference — but about how little as opposed to how much they drink? Perhaps it is inevitable they will lie to the policemen on duty on the roads at night, looking out not just for tipsy revellers but for those who’ve had even a chhota peg or two, but at home? In the neighbourhood? Among friends?
There was a time when the raddiwallah was particularly friendly with us for the weekly collection of empties that we earned him. For some reason, my wife’s housekeeping consisted of placing the empty bottles outside the front door and in full view of our neighbours, leading to not a little speculation (and despair) about the binges in our home. True, this was when we were younger, and the neighbours complained about everything from loud laughter to louder music, smothered only in the presence of cops who left after a friendly warning and a swiftly pocketed tip.
There was no point telling the neighbours that we were more sinned against than sinning, keepers of an open house that implied custom for the bar not so much from us as from our visitors. But in a turnaround now, our friends, sloshed to their gills, are more likely to say, “I’ve had only two” implying pegs when they should probably mean bottles. Spouses, and children, both wielding the baton of guilt, have brought a secretive quality to their daily peg or three, turning the sundowner that pleases into a war zone.
You’d think that with our friends claiming a diminished capacity to drink, the alcohol consumed in the house would show a decline, but the reverse seems to be truer. True, some of our son’s friends have proved to be kleptomaniacs of all substances alcoholic, for which reason my wife has made body (and bag) searches for departing guests mandatory, but since he’s mostly away from Delhi, that can hardly be an indicator of mean consumption. Besides, when a friend says, loudly so his wife will hear, “I had just three drinks at your house,” I have yet to learn to restrain myself from retorting, “Six, more likely — why, I made you five drinks myself!”
In all the conversation about malts and scotches, vintages and years, my wife and I didn’t even realise when our daughter entered the conversation. “Beer is horrible,” she said at some point, but having grown up using leftover beer as hair conditioner, that was understandable. “Vodka has no taste,” she attributed, a point on which you could hardly argue, unless it was infused with flavours. “Whisky,” she sighed, “now that’s a smooth drink that I like,” her first signal that she was all grown up and unlikely to be fobbed off with orange juice at parties any longer.
Still, it was a bill from a Goa pub that alerted us to her grown-up status. A group of seven of them had been to Goa, and the bill — several pages long — was for, ahem, fifty-seven shots, cocktails and beers consumed over one evening. “Some,” she nodded, when faced with the evidence, “had more than others,” her own claim being to have “tasted” an alcoholic beverage or two. And though he was never himself good at math, our son proved adept at solving the number of drinks per head that averaged out to. No wonder he wants to be back from college for her last-of-the-teens birthday: “You’ll allow them drinks, I hope,” he said, more concerned about the party than his exams, “I want to see my sister’s friends drink more even than your friends do!”
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Read Business news in |  |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Advertisements |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Content Guide
