BYCU
It was the Week of Michael: Away track meet on Tuesday. On Wednesday, we attended scholarship night at the drinking club where Michael received an award named after a deceased friend of mine (a fitting scholarship, since my friend was one of the funniest guys I knew and Michael is considered, with some dissent from the politically-correct students, one of the funniest guys at the high school). Thursday was Senior Night, where mounds of scholarships were handed out. Michael was this year's speaker, so that was fun to see.
Now it's the weekend of drinking. All the kid extracurriculars wear me out. They're good things and I'm thankful for them, but they wear me out. So tonight I'm going to kick back with a drink or two.
But I'm going to cap it at two. Alex is coming home tomorrow to celebrate his birthday, so I need to be "liver ready." We don't get drunk, but neither do we stop at two. If I'm at all hungover, I won't feel like drinking, which wouldn't be fair to Alex.
So what am I drinking? I'm going summer: The Mojito: freshly-squeezed lime juice, simple syrup, muddled mint leaves (which will be plucked fresh from my garden), white rum, and club soda. I'll have to play with the ingredients, but I'll probably shake an ounce of simple syrup, an ounce of lime juice, and two or three ounces of good rum together with a few mint leaves, pour over a Collins glass of ice, then top off with club soda.
Here's an interesting and succinct history of the Mojito. It rings accurate with me, but I haven't verified it:
The mojito was born on the island of Cuba and is one of the nation's oldest cocktails. The drink has a disputed history. Some say the drink was developed in the 1500's when the famed explorer Sir Francis Drake landed in the city of Havana, in order to sack the city of its gold. While the invasion was unsuccessful, an associate of Sir Francis Drake, named Richard Drake, created an early version of the mojito called " El Draque " out of aguardiente ( a crude form of rum,) sugar, lime, and mint. Others say the drink was invented by African slaves working in the Cuban sugar cane fields. The name " mojito " stems from the African word of " mojo " which means to place a little spell. In the mid-1800's the creation of the Bacardi company bolstered the popularity of the mojito. The mojito rose to prominence to the international world when renowned writer Ernest Hemingway became a fan of the beverage after visiting a local Cuban bar called the " La Bodeguita del Medio " and also consumed the drink in Key West, Florida. While we may never know the true origin of the drink, the tasty combination of lime and mint is sure to stick around for years to come.
