A good pub feels a bit like a living room: a familiar, informal space where you can have a pint with friends and strangers… Enjoying a drink in a room that has been used for the same purpose for hundreds of years is an anchoring experience you are unlikely to get from your sofa.

(Eleanor Salter, “Will Britain’s Pubs Survive the Coronavirus?” NYTimes, 5-15-20)

I give high marks to this article’s illustration for its clever spookiness and skillful draughtsmanship.

The encomium to the British pub makes me realize how alcohol-centric my own relationship with booze is. Wherever I find myself, a bottle alone endears that spot to me; anchors me there; lends beauty to the moment; wraps me in fuzzy contentment.

My sofa is the ideal spot to “have a pint.” If I’m caught outside the house, any perch that’s friend-and-stranger-free will do for a swig. The alcohol completes it — a boosting and buffering companionable consolation.

Mine is not a commended orientation, I grant, which is why I corked the bottle.

(c) 2020 JMN