Bloody Good News: Mary celebrates her 75th. Yet another good reason to drink alcohol first thing in the morning.

Those of you who, for some tortured reason, have been around this site for a while will quickly recognize yet another alcohol-related story on a supposed travel blog.

But the excuse for this reoccurring theme is somewhat based on justifiable reasons–which I’m sure the counselors at A.A. would attribute to just plain old rationalization of another bad habit.

I certainly don’t have the literary writing chops of the good bloggers out there, and while I may aspire to such lofty goals, I certainly don’t allege to be anywhere close yet.

But, alcohol and great writers have gone hand-in-hand (or more accurately, hand-to-mouth) for more years than I have been alive, and that is going back a loooooong way.

Maybe the problem is, I just don’t drink enough to make the Dean’s List of the really great writers.

I guess I am just going to have to work a lot harder at it.

As to how the travel aspect relates to alcohol, beyond the chance to make a complete fool of yourself far away from home (although cell phone cameras and You Tube have greatly reduced your anonymity) the rationalizations reasons to drink while we travel abound.

Thanks to one of my virtual travel writing BFF’s, I have recently acquired the taste for yet another form of libation, namely Strongbow.

Thanks Leif. No really, thanks, Leif.

So as you can see, when I looked for a career path to make my adult beverage consumption habits appear to fit the job at hand, travel and writing seemed like a natural fit.

I had briefly considered residential roofing, based on the beer binging I had witnessed when our home needed a new roof, but my balance ain’t all that good BEFORE I start drinking.

All this brings me to the birthday, yesterday, of the iconic breakfast drink, the Bloody Mary.

This morning I heard a short bit on NPR that gave one version of the origination of the drink.

Apparently, there are no lack of alternative stories.

Whatever the truth may be, I have certainly appreciated the existence of my form of a pre-flight checklist, albeit at the greatly inflated airport bar prices.

And let’s not forget it makes a great way to loosen up after sleeping on the ground, while camping out under the stars.

But the real question remains: exactly how much alcohol will it take to make me a real gooder writer person?