A Drinker's Guide to USF Journalism

Your first drink should always be something familiar, something simple and reliable. You want a drink any adjunct bartender can make palatable given only basic tools and ingredients. In that regard, Peterson fits the bill. A somewhat portly and barrel chested gentlemen of short stature, he is hardly intimidating. His lectures are simple and easy to swallow. They go down smoother than a light beer at a ball game, refreshing if not somewhat bland. He is always there for students when they need him, peeking out of his open office door like a leftover tallboy in the back of the fridge. He has an aura like a warm inviting hipster distillery filled with Associated Press nerds drinking PBR spiked with sadness.

    You down your first pitcher of Peterson...fast. He’s like an old friend egging you to do a shot just so he can watch the ensuing madness. Now you’re hungry for the buzz. Before you set your last assignment down on the bar you’re already cruising the class menu. Peterson has given you the taste for journalism and you want something stronger. Your eye catches a brightly colored Keeler cocktail and you figure it’s the natural progression.

    By the time she quits chopping fruits and mixing juices you’ve already forgot what you ordered. She slides you a crazy looking concoction made out of pineapple tops and fruit slivers served in a superfluous half coconut meant to justify the price. She looks like your old elementary school teacher, so you smile and accept the offering graciously, yet confused. You go to get a drink of information but can’t figure out whether the myriad of guest speaker fruit wedges nestled along the rim of the cup are there for you to chew on or just for decoration. One sip and you know you’ve been had. What appeared to be a high class tropical beverage is muddled with bitters and weak bottom-shelf discourse. The fruit is plastic and wreaks of chemical imitation flavors. You’re noticeably disappointed, but everyone seems to be happy with theirs so you figure, “maybe it’s me,” and choke it down anyway.

    You get a text on your cell phone about a hip new surreptitious popup class called “Fresch Camp.” There’s a zany mixologist and his partner making molecular gastro-pub cocktails somewhere in the PRW building. Your schedule is already full, but you sign up anyway because you know it won’t be there next semester. Best to just take advantage of the opportunity rather than miss out.

    You show up at an undisclosed location to find a trendy looking lanky blonde and Indiana Jones wearing Birkenstocks and socks. The duo are cranking out vapory neon-colored bubbling libations you’re supposed to insufflate somehow. With one whiff you’re shitfaced and stumbling over your own incompetence. You thought you knew alcohol. You were wrong. The pair swears that anyone can make the stuff at home and offer up their Breaking Bad recipes to anyone who asks. It seems a little expensive, but you give it a shot anyway. You buy yourself a Nikon blender, a Zoom Co2 injector and a stainless steel 50mm shaker but it never seems to turn out the same when you make one.

    Before you can brush off your drunken stupor, the popup is over and your left standing in an abandoned classroom on the wrong side of campus with a hangover. You look around and find a pamphlet lying on the ground with big graffiti letters that spell out the word “MOTTA”. Apparently it’s some kind of new-age experimental community run joint. Perusing the inner leaves raises more questions than answers, so you decide to give it a go.

    You find yourself standing among a group of bewildered children holding up potent glasses full of curiously layered worldviews in a fluid suspension. Observing the rainbow colored cup in your hands is so beautiful you want to drink it up immediately, yet you pause when you get the feeling this is some kind of communion ritual. You decide you’d better wait, so as not to look stupid. There’s a freewheeling stoner ambiance to the place that’s somehow simultaneously rigid and authoritarian.

Motta gives a sermon about how the drink your holding isn’t really a drink, but the idea of a drink that represents a greater bar, more important than any individual drink, and not meant to be drank as you would drink any other drink. Unsure how to proceed, you gaze around the room hoping someone else will show you how to take the first sip. You find nothing but mystified stares on astonished faces. Silence washes the room as Motta’s sermon comes to an end and everyone cautiously contemplates what to do next. Too late; time’s up. A collection plate starts circling the room. A covenant promising jobs in exchange for magazine subscriptions is implied. The congregation is ending. Looking at the clock you find hours have passed without your consent. You’re still holding the rainbow colored communion cup, but you’re not sure what to do with it. Somehow, you leave feeling enlightened and connected to some greater power.

As you aimless wander off across campus, you start to feel like a sinner leaving church. You’ve failed your fellow man with poor narratives and a distinct lack of community knowledge. You smell cigarette smoke and sour whiskey wafting from somewhere. Tired of the cocktail scene, you consider the hard stuff and decide on a big bottle of ethics.

Silvia grins ominously as he brushes away cobwebs and reaches for the oldest vintage you’ve ever seen. It looks like it must have been salvage from the wreckage of some racist pirate ship. It’s jet black and covered in barnacles with a smell like opium mixed with bigotry. He pours you a low ball of straight-talk, then gestures profanely for you to drink it. As you sit eyeballing the oily looking substance a mutated salamander with one eye crawls out and tries to pick a fight with you. The vile beast snaps its jaws and wheezes as it coughs up slew of dated hate speech. It’s covered in festering stereotypes and sores. Incognizant slime oozes from every orifice. You grab the slippery bastard and slam him back into the glass as he desperately screams gendered profanity and racial slurs. In one motion you slurp down the glass, salamander and all. Your pupils begin to dilate. The sludge courses through your veins, creeping up your spine like hot water, surging upward and crashing into the base of your skull. Zang! Some kind of synaptic misfire sends you rocketing for the door. Enraged, you kick the door open wide and wince at the sun as you angrily stride off into the distance to destroy the patriarchy.

…to be continued