Ghost of a flea

Flea: Is Mondo Cocktail a great short-cut for people who want to make clever conversation at cocktail parties? Or do they have to drink several cocktails before they will truly grasp the subject? (If so, how many?)

CS: Clever cocktail party conversation is really rare these days. Unfortunately, there are no short-cuts and the only advice I can give is that people have to shirk all other responsibilities and devote themselves to going to parties (or at least very good bars) every single day and practicing. However, several cocktails (as in, all of them) may speed up the arduous process.

Flea: Will upstanding community members think Mondo Cocktail readers are alcoholics? Also, why do we care what upstanding community members think?

CS: Exactly. Why, a girl can't have eight or ten cocktails before dinner anymore these days without eyebrows being raised.

Flea: Is this the sort of book Flea-readers can safely buy for their enemies? Or should they only purchase copies for themselves and trusted friends so as to hoard their cocktail lore?

CS: You wouldn't want this getting in the hands of any moral reformers, if that's what you mean. Although, in my experience when you give interesting books to dull people, they rarely have the good sense to read them anyhow. That's how they got dull in the first place.

Flea: Gin-soaked popinjay, Christopher Hitchens is akin to God. Discuss.

CS: Hitchens is one of the very few people to go on record against the smoking ban in bars. It takes guts to fight for an unfashionable cause. I see in Hitchens the spirit of H.L. Mencken and, as everyone who knows me has heard (ad nauseum, perhaps), I love Mencken.