- ABOUT THIS BLOG
- Everyone has done it – you’re in a bar, looking for a scrap of paper to write a woman's name and phone number on, or just want to make a note to yourself so you don’t forget something. You grab a cocktail napkin.
- (In the TV series The West Wing, a political consultant decides that Jed Bartlet – played by Martin Sheen – should run for President. He takes a cocktail napkin and writes down the slogan, “Bartlet for America.”)
- I work in bars. Over the years, I’ve accumulated enough of my own cocktail-napkin notes to fill six liquor bottle boxes.
- Here are the people and stories that wound up in those notes -- real-life characters like Jackie Rabbit and Maude the Broad, the narcotics cops Paul and Sonny, mafia guys, some shameless tramps and one suicidal young man. You'll meet an old-time boxer who wants to take me into the gym to teach me his trade, and a woman who thinks God is on the stool next to her, urging her to have one more whiskey and ginger. It's life behind the taps.
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- Life on a Cocktail Napkin has over 30,000 page views per month. Check out the stories you've been missing in our Archives (below). And my sincere thanks to all of you who have visited here!
Archives
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Blogroll
- Because we're not all there
- Behind The Stick
- Best Restaurant Blogs
- Hospitality Formula
- I'm your SERVER NOT your SERVANT
- Jeffrey Morgenthaler
- On the Rocks
- Restaurant Laughs
- Same Food For Every Day
- Squirrel Farts Drink Blog
- Tales From a Bar
- The Real Barman
- The Rogue Wino
- The Truth About Bartending
- These American Servers
- Waiters Today
- Wino on a Ramble
Author Archives: MikeQ
SUGAR PACKETS (More bits and pieces)
Most of the notes I’ve saved over the years are simply about what happened behind the bar — an interesting character I met, or a weird event that happened during the shift. Some of the notes tell a complete story … Continue reading
Posted in Life on a Cocktail Napkin
13 Comments
AFTER-HOURS at CINDY’S
(Image from www.dreamstime.com) (Ed. note: We found “Cindy!” We’d lost touch with the young woman in this story — real name Wendy LaHaye — when she left Fidelity Investments and moved to California. Now she’s back in the Boston area … Continue reading
Posted in Life on a Cocktail Napkin
6 Comments
A FEW GOOD MEN (Famous cocktail napkin notes)
The idea for this week’s post comes from comrade-in-arms Scribbler50, author of one of my favorite blogs, Behind the Stick. I got this email from Scribbler the other day: “Hey, Mike, I just read something in the New York Daily … Continue reading
Posted in Life on a Cocktail Napkin
11 Comments
BAR FIGHTS
I had to think it over before putting up this week’s post. Will anyone be interested in bar fights? “I’m certainly not,” Colleen said. (Colleen is my best friend. She looks over everything I write and I often rely on … Continue reading
Posted in Life on a Cocktail Napkin
12 Comments
MY FAVORITE BLOGS
From time to time as I’m writing these post, I take a break and check out other blogs. There are millions of them. Seriously, I mean there are literally millions of blogs to choose from (and I have to thank … Continue reading
Posted in Life on a Cocktail Napkin
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