My favorite drinks

 I started drinking coffee when I was sitting nuclear alert. We were out there for 7 straight days, ready to jump in the B-52 at the sound of a klaxon horn. So… lots of sitting around, solving the world’s problems. We did lots of other things: sometimes you had to go to training sessions at the squadron. Some guys had masters classes to attend or study for, others worked on their professional military education (PME). Alert was a great place to study because the distractions and requirements on your time was so limited. There was a kitchen staff in the facility, and while they worked on our three meals a day (07:30, 11:30 & 4:30), there was always a couple of pots of coffee on the brewer.

My Mom was a tea drinker, so we’d have tea at home a lot. All kinds, but she really enjoyed english-style, strong and dark, with spices, like Constant Comment and Earl Gray. She always took it the way they did in England: with milk and sugar.

Like almost every kid in 1960s America, we grew up on Kool-aid. There was always a pitcher of it in the fridge. To make it fancy, Mom would add a can of Coke to it to ‘fizz it up.’ Delicious!

Coke and Pepsi were staples in the 70s. They were everywhere. McDonalds, school cafeterias, home, 7-11, the movies, etc. Then diet versions came out. Tab was the first one. Sold like crazy, but it tasted terrible. I migrated to Diet Pepsi, because it didnt taste as sweet/sugary as Coke or Diet Coke. Was never a fan of Pepsi. Never got into Mt. Dew, Dr. Pepper, 7-Up, or Sprite.

When I started drinking alcohol (of legal age) I was at the Academy. On Friday or Saturday nights, Bob Devaney and I would drive down to Black Angus and enjoy a nice dinner and Amareto Sours. We thought we were very sophisticated!

Attending Undergraduate Navigator Training, we’d all go to the Officer’s Club on Friday nights and sit around telling Nav stories about time control, Polaris, moon shots, or being blinded by the sun because we forgot about putting in the sextant filters. I drank Michelob beer and tipped the bar lady liberally, so that by the time I graduated she had the top off the bottle by the time I reached the bar. That was fun.

I don’t remember drinking much more than beer or rum & coke for years after college. Captain Morgan’s spiced rum with coke was always a solid go-to.

When Laura and I were first dating, we lived in South Dakota, so the wine selection at the  Class VI was pretty slim. We liked whites, like Blue Nun, and blushes. When I got into C-130s the travel and experimentation increased. I got sophisticated and tried different wines, and different mixed drinks. I graduated to red wines from California. Numerous visits to see my parents and sister really allowed us to do some wine tastings, so I’ve found some really good red wines, especially from the foothills east of Lodi. Michael David has become one of our favorites. I don’t think we’ve found anything of theirs we don’t like, and Laura actually signed us up for their wine club.

When I first met Laura, when she did drink, she ordered scotch. That was a shocker, because to me it tasted like asphalt (I think  she did it mostly to make it last longer). As the years have gone by, I’ve tried more than house pours and my palate has evolved to enjoying both  bourbon and scotch. My favorite Bourbons are very smooth, like Jefferson’s Ocean and Angel’s Envy. Stew Griest took a scotch class at Pitt, and introduced me to single malts from the islands, and I really enjoy those too.

But those rum & cokes from college parties…  They never leave you.