Subject: The Grinch Who Stole Drinking Group

FPs,

No drinking group this week, as Santa Claus has shut down Dylan's.

L.J.

Subject: An offer you can't refuse

FPs,

Never refuse to do a kindness unless the act would work great injury to yourself, and never refuse to take a drink, under any circumstances.

-- Mark Twain

You heard the man: 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, December 18, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Something Michael Moore missed?

FPs,

It's frightening how easy it is to commit murder in America. Just a drink too much. I can see myself doing it. In England, one feels all the social restraints holding one back. But here, anything can happen.

-- W.H. Auden

Thank god in America we're free from social restraints, unlike those limey bastards! Drink to that, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, December 11, at 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Humanity

fps,

Humanity i love you because
when you're hard up you pawn your
intelligence to buy a drink

-- e.e. cummings

no capitals allowed, at 8:30 p.m., wednesday, december 4, at dylan's, 19th & folsom.

l.j.

Thanksgiving Prayer

William S. Burroughs

Thanks for the wild turkey and the passenger pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts.

Thanks for a continent to despoil and poison.

Thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger.

Thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin, leaving the carcasses to rot.

Thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes.

Thanks for the American Dream -- to vulgarize and falsify until the bare lies shine through.

Thanks for the K.K.K.

For nigger-killing lawmen feeling their notches.

For decent, church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter evil faces.

Thanks for Kill A Queer For Christ stickers.

Thanks for laboratory AIDS.

Thanks for prohibition, and the war against drugs.

Thanks for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business.

Thanks for a nation of finks.

Yes, thanks for all the memories -- "All right, let's see your arms."

You always were a headache and you always were a bore.

Thanks, for the last and greatest betrayal, of the last and greatest of human dreams . . .

Subject: One nasty drink

FPs,

Apart from cheese and tulips, the main product of the country is advocaat, a drink made from lawyers.

-- Alan Coren, British editor, humorist, "All You Need to Know About Europe," The Sanity Inspector

But perhaps a fine solution. Don't worry, lawyers may be drunk, but you don't have to drink them, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, November 20, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Spirits

FPs,

It is meat and drink to me to see a clown. By my troth, we that have good wits have much to answer for . . .

-- William Shakespeare, As You Like It

Bring your own wit, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, November 13, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Resort

FPs,

And you're too tired to sleep, and you're too old to think, so you pour another drink, and you swear this one's your last.

-- The Handsome Family

What else at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, November 6, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Protection from water

FPs,

When the water of a place is bad it is safest to drink none that has not been filtered through either the berry of a grape, or else a tub of malt. These are the most reliable filters yet invented.

-- Samuel Butler

Drink the safe way, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, October 30, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Vice groups

FPs,

After all, what is reading but a vice, like drink or venery or any other form of excessive self-indulgence? One reads to tickle and amuse one’s mind; one reads, above all, to prevent oneself thinking.

-- Aldous Huxley, Crome Yellow

Wednesdays are for drinking, at 8:30 p.m., Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Pacifying fighters

FPs,

Drink, and be mad, then; 'tis your country bids! Gloriously drunk, obey th'important call!

-- William Cowper

Drink liquour, not blood, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, October 16, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Ingredients

FPs

There may be in the cup
A spider steeped, and one may drink, depart,
And yet partake no venom, for his knowledge
Is not infected; but if one present
Th’abhorred ingredient to his eye, make known
How he hath drunk, he cracks his gorge, his sides,
With violent hefts. I have drunk, and seen the spider.

-- William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale

Drink, but don't look, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, October 12, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Rose-colored glasses

FPs,

This is the way I look when I’m sober. That’s enough to make a person drink, wouldn’t you say?

-- J.P. (James Pinckney) Miller (said by Lee Remick as Kirsten in "Days of Wine and Roses")

You look mahvelous! So come have a drink, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, October 2, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: A shot of reality

FPs,

Sir Charles: Aren’t you drinking?
Princess Dala: I don’t drink.
Sir Charles: Never?
Princess Dala: I’m quite content with reality, I have no need for escape.
Sir Charles: Well, I enjoy reality as much as the next man, it’s just in my case, fortunately, reality includes a good stiff belt every now and then.

-- Blake Edwards, Maurice Richlin (said by David Niven as Sir Charles and Claudia Cardinale as Princess Dala in "The Pink Panther")

L.J.

Subject: Crisp talk

FPs,

Conversation did not flow with the drink, it drowned in it.

-- Quentin Crisp

Don't let that happen at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, September 18, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Drink for thought

FPs,

A little learning is a dang'rous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again.

-- Alexander Pope

Dabble in drink if not in learning, at 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, September 11, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Through the glass

FPs,

By the time a bartender knows what drink a man will have before he orders, there is little else about him worth knowing.

-- Don Marquis (creator of Archy and Mehitabel, among others)

So come often, but vary your drink. Next meeting is 8:30 p.m., Wednesday, September 4, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Something a bit stronger

FPs,

All that is necessary to do with this drink is to place it in an open saucer on the window sill and inhale deeply from across the room. In about eight seconds the top of the inhaler’s head rises slowly and in a dignified manner until it reaches the ceiling where it floats, bumping gently up and down. The teeth then drop out and arrange themselves on the floor to spell "Portage High School, 1930" the eyes roll upward and backward, and a strange odor of burning rubber fills the room.

-- Robert Benchley, (a description of the fictional alcoholic drink, "wheero") The Treasurer’s Report and Other Aspects of Community Singing, "Carnival Week in Sunny Las Los"

Or just have a whisky, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, August 28, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Imbibing as investing

FPs,

If you had bought $1000.00 worth of Nortel stock one year ago, it would now be worth $49.00. With Enron, you would have $16.50 of the original $1,000.00. With Worldcom, you would have less than $5.00 left. If you had bought $1,000.00 worth of Budweiser (the beer, not the stock) one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for the 10 cent deposit, you would have $214.00. Based on the above, it was best to drink heavily and recycle.

[Contributed by Cathryn B. from unknown source.]

Waste not, want not, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, August 21, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Getting talked about

FPs,

Mr. Edward Carson, QC: Do you drink champagne yourself?
Mr. Oscar Wilde: Yes; iced champagne is a favourite drink of mine—strongly against my doctor’s orders.
Mr. Edward Carson, QC: Never mind your doctor’s orders, sir!
Mr. Oscar Wilde: I never do.

-- Oscar Wilde [& Edward Carson, exchange, April 4, 1895, during Wilde’s prosecution of the Marquess of Queensberry for criminal libel, Regina (Wilde) v. Queensberry]

You don't have to file a suit to get talked about at 8 p.m., Wednesday, August 14, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Discretion

FPs,

You must be careful about giving any drink whatsoever to a bore. A lit-up bore is the worst in the world.

-- David Cecil

You can't say we didn't warn you: 8 p.m., Wednesday, August 7, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Measure for measure IV

FPs,

It's a great advantage not to drink among hard-drinking people. You can hold your tongue and, moreover, you can time any little irregularity of your own so that everybody else is so blind that they don't see or care.

-- F. Scott Fitzgerald (the character Jordon Baker in The Great Gatsby)

Of course that's of no use with Fighting Pacifists. Drink with the drinking weenies and be subjected to scrutiny, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, July 31, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: All in the family

FPs,

You have another little drink, and I'll have another little drink, and maybe we can work up some real family feeling here.

-- Irving Ravetch (screenwriter, in "Hud," said by Paul Newman as Hud to Brandon De Wilde as his nephew, Lon)

Little drinks at 8 p.m., Wednesday, July 24, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: 

FPs,

I perceive that you drink. (I am drinking with you. I am as drunk as you are.)

-- G.K. Chesterton

Doubt not your doubts, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, July 17, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Small pleasures

FPs,

Shut up, and drink your gin!

-- Vernon Harris, "Oliver!" (said by character Fagin (played by Ron Moody) to a young boy in his gang who complained of moldy sausages)

Consider yourself one of us, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, July 10, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Drinks overturned

FPs,

Bourbon’s the only drink. You can take all that champagne stuff and pour it down the English Channel. Well, why wait 80 years before you can drink the stuff? Great vineyards, huge barrels aging forever, poor little old monks running around testing it, just so some woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, can say it tickles her nose.

-- John Michael Hayes and Alfred Hitchcock (said by character, Mrs. Stevens, played by Jessie Royce Landis, in "To Catch a Thief")

Don't be like them Tulsans, be like us Oklahoma Cityans, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, July 3, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

LJ

Subject: A draught of thought

FPs,

They who drink beer will think beer.

-- Washington Irving

It's worth considering, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, June 26, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: À la francais

FPs,

Other countries drink to get drunk, and this is accepted by everyone; in France, drunkenness is a consequence, never an intention. A drink is felt as the spinning out of a pleasure, not as the necessary cause of an effect which is sought: wine is not only a philtre, it is also the leisurely act of drinking.

-- Roland Barthes, Mythologies

Let's drink as the French do. Until we get knocked out of the first round of the World Cup -- then we'll have an intention. Leisure time is 8 p.m., Wednesday, June 19th, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom. (This night will be the first break, since it started, in World Cup action , before the quarterfinals, which include the U.S.)

L.J.

Subject: Why it's a public house (pub)

FPs,

Don't drink alone . . . People always find out and it ruins your reputation.

-- Sydney Howard, "Gone with the Wind" (said by Rhett Butler [Clark Gable] to Scarlett O'Hara [Vivien Leigh])

Drink in company, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, June 12, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Bare necessity

FPs,

I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun.

-- Raymond Chandler, Farewell My Lovely

Why worry about the rest when you can have the first at 8 p.m., Wednesday, June 5, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom?

L.J.

Subject: Noses are red . . .

FPs,

Drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things . . . nose-painting, sleep and urine.

-- William Shakespeare, Macbeth

More fun at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 29, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Wining not whining

FPs,

Wahrhaftig, daß muß ich gestehen, es geht doch nichts über den Wein! Wein ist mir lieber, als Geld und Mädchen. Bin ich verdrießlich, mürrisch, launisch: hurtig nehm ich meine Zuflucht zur Flasche, und kaum seh ich den ersten Boden: weg ist all mein Verdruß! Meine Flasche macht mir kein schiefes Gesicht, wie mein Mädchen, wenn ihr der Kopf nicht auf dem rechten Fleck steht. Und schwatzt mir von Süßigkeiten der Liebe und des Ehestandes, was Ihr wollt: Wein auf der Zunge geht über alles!

[Truly, I must confess, still nothing is better than wine. Wine is dearer to me than money and women. If I am glum, grumpy, moody, I take swift refuge in the bottle, and before I see the bottom, all my annoyance is gone. My bottle makes no long face at me, as my girl does, if I don't put the cap on right. Nor chats to me of the sweetness of love and marriage, what it wants: Wine on the tongue is best of all!]

-- Johann Gottlieb Stephanie D.J., "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abuction from the Seraglio"), music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Take refuge at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 22, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Prodigal return

FPs,

We’ll teach you to drink deep ere you depart.

-- Shakespeare, Hamlet

I return from Europe, the training grounds. See you at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 15, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

And don't forget, Rico Bell and The Snake Handlers are playing at 9 p.m., no charge. Fighting Pacifists aren't born lucky -- they need handouts.

L.J.

Subject: Drinkometer

FPs

The first cup for thirst, the second for pleasure, the third for intemperance, and the rest for madness.

-- Anacharsis

Drink to scale, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 8, at Dylan's 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Guid for bluid

FPs,

Gie him strong drink until he wink,
That's sinking in despair;
An' liquor guid to fire his bluid,
That's prest wi' grief and care:
There let him bouse, an' deep carouse,
Wi' bumpers flowing o'er,
Till he forgets his loves or debts,
An' minds his griefs no more.

-- Robert Burns, Solomon's Proverbs

Ta! for that, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 1, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom. Celebrate International Workers' Day the Fighting Pacifist way: not working!

Cheers,
L.J.

Subject: [Notice omitted due to travel anxiety.]

Subject: Inspirational

FPs,

How solemn and beautiful is the thought that the earliest pioneer of civilization, the van-leader of civilization, is never the steamboat, never the Sabbath school, never the missionary -- but always whiskey.

-- Mark Twain

Let us reflect, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, April 17, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Confirmation

FPs

Yes, there is drinking group this week, same time, same channel: 8 p.m., Wednesday, April 10, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom. I've just been so busy with interior decorating.

L.J.

Subject: Outlook

FPs,

Let us drink and be merry, dance, joke and rejoice,
With claret and sherry, theorbo and voice!
The changeable world to our joy is unjust,

All treasure's uncertain,

Then down with your dust!

In frolics dispose your pounds, shillings and pence,
For we shall be nothing a hundred years hence.

-- Thomas Jordan, "Let Us Drink and Be Merry"

To oblivion, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, April 3, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Re-animation

FPs

Drink. Good.

-- The Monster, "Bride of Frankenstein"

Friends. Good. At 8 p.m., Wednesday, March 27, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Founding principles

FPs,

I have lived temperately, eating little animal food. Vegetables constitute my principal diet. I double, however, the doctor's glass and a half of wine, and even treble it with a friend!

-- Thomas Jefferson

Have two or three together, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, March 20, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Miracles

FPs

If, as some say, God spanked the town
For being over frisky,
Why did He burn the churches down,
And spare Hotaling's whisky?

-- Doggerel following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake

(That Doggerel, again.) Join in fellowship at 8:00 p.m., Wednesday, March 13, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Drink!

FPs,

Drink! for you know not whence you came nor why; Drink! for you know not why you go nor where.

-- Omar Khayyam

Escape from escapism, 8 p.m., Wednesday, March 6, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Aim taken

FPs

T’was Whisky that made me shoot at the landlord, and what is worse,
T’was Whisky that made me miss.

-- Doggerel

Learn responsible drinking and marksmanship (and more Doggerel) at 8:00 p.m., Wednesday, February 27, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Neither snow nor rain nor hairy beast . . .

FPs,

Very often warriors drunk with strong liquor vowed over the ale-cup that they would await with the terrors of swords Grendel's onslaught in the drinking-hall.

-- from Beowulf, 1000 A.D.

And you thought the Fighting Pacifists just sat around telling silly stories. Join us in battle at 8 p.m., Wednesday, February 20, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: A Fighting Pacifist kind of military

FPs,

The sergeant was describing a military life. It was all drinking, he said, except that there were frequent intervals of eating and love making.

-- Charles Dickens, Barnaby Rudge

Join up at 8 p.m., Wednesday, February 13, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom, intervals not necessarily on the premises. (This is also the Wednesday that Catholics remember they are from dust and shall return to dust, but that's something an FP can tell you any Wednesday.)

Cheers,
L.J.

Subject: Getting hilarious

FPs

Drink beer, the custom of the land! Beer he drank, seven goblets. His spirit was loosened, he became hilarious. His heart became glad and his face shone.

-- from The Epic of Gilgamesh, 3rd century B.C.

Let your face shine at 8 p.m., Wednesday, February 6, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: The fried batter perspective

FPs

Wine tastes like gasoline.

-- "Colonel" Harland Sanders, of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame

How did he know? Good thing, though, they have beer and liquor at Dylan's. Join us for fixins at 8 p.m., Wednesday, January 30, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: But not that remembered

FPs

I hate a drinking companion with a memory.

-- Martial, Roman epigrammist (1st century A.D.)

Drink and forget, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, January 23, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: That drunken lover sort of naiveté

FPs,

You study, you learn, but you guard the original naiveté. It has to be within you, as desire for drink is within the drunkard or love is within the lover.

-- Henri Matisse

Study the art at 8 p.m., January 16, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

Subject: Drunken, all too drunken

FPs,

What had happened? -- Wagner had been translated into German! The Wagnerian had become master over Wagner. -- German art. The German master. German beer.

-- Nietzsche, Ecce Homo

Lucky we're not in Bayreuth, but at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, January 9.

L.J.

Subject: The order of things

FPs,

A philosophy professor stood before his class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly he picked up a large empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks, rocks about 2" in diameter. He then asked the students if the jar was full? They agreed that it was.

So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course, rolled into the open areas between the rocks. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The students laughed. The professor picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. "Now," said the professor, "I want you to recognise that this is your life. The rocks are the important things -- your family, your partner, your health, your children -- things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

"The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, your car. The sand is everything else. The small stuff."

"If you put the sand into the jar first, there is no room for the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

"Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out dancing. There will always be time to go to work, clean the house, give a dinner party and fix the disposal.

"Take care of the rocks first -- the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand."

But . . . A student then took the jar which the other students and the professor agreed was full, and proceeded to pour in a glass of beer. Of course the beer filled the remaining spaces within the jar making the jar truly full.

The moral of this tale is: That no matter how full your life is, there is always room for BEER.

So fill your jar, at 8 p.m., Wednesday, January 2, 2002, at Dylan's, 19th & Folsom.

L.J.

P.S. Thanks to Neo.