Straight, on the rocks please.

The world is a small, small place when you're me. Turns out that my Aunt M. (mom's cousin) and I share a mutual friend in the sound business. D. used to golf with Aunt M.'s late husband, R.

For the longest time, we've been meaning to get together over a scotch, but it's been one of those things you always talk about and never do.

Until now.

A couple weeks ago I walked into D.'s office and placed a bottle on his desk. I said,

"This is to make you feel guilty enough that you'll actually call me and we'll sit down to a wee drahm."

Apparently it worked. Last week over the telephone, D. and I decided to include Aunt M. Calling her was easy - the conversation went something like this:

ME: "D and I were talking and figured we should invite ourselves over for a scotch. ...we'll bring the scotch."

M: "How's Monday?"

It was that simple. The rest went something like this:

The tradition, I didn't know until this week, is that it's called "Foursies". It's the act of having scotch, but it must be after 4PM. What we had was more like "Fivesies", but really it matters not, yes?

To my surprise, I was applauded for my apparently fine choice of Scotch - Glenmorangie Single Malt with a Sherry finish.

Smooth.

I didn't know this, but apparently those of my scotch drinking friends who started me out did me a favour. D. said,

"You started at the top, lad, and that's not a bad place to be from!"


Here we are, posing with the Golden Nectar


...ready to be poured


...it even looks good nestled over the rocks!

What was so very good about all this had *almost* nothing to do with the scotch. It was social time with family and a friend. You can't get that from a bottle, so don't even try, but the scotch was definitely a nice finish on a social occasion.