Eat the Worm

Happy Cinco de Mayo! The Mexican holiday falls on Monday this year, so I celebrated it on Cuatro de Mayo; yesterday, aka, May 4th.

Esquire Magazine had an article about how to hit a piñata, paying tribute to the holiday, I suppose. As obscure as that might sound to some, I actually grew up in a place where I frequently attended parties with piñatas. There’s a real science to finding the paper Mache’s sweet spot; whacking the shit out of its bowels until the candy treats inside spill onto the ground for everyone to enjoy.

As I got older, parties with piñatas were stuffed with other types of treats inside for the party goers to enjoy: Uppers, downers, vials of coke and marijuana, to name a few. Funny, I can’t remember if I actually attended one of those types of parties though. It’s either brain cell damage, and or I was living vicariously through someone else’s memory. I can’t be sure.

When I think of Cinco de Mayo, I don’t think about piñatas too much anymore. It’s more about the tequila for me. I have a love/hate relationship with the mind alternating potion. It’s sort of like loving a really bad boy. You love the way he fucks you, but you hate the way he fucks you, over; the next morning. Head in the toilet, swearing you’ll never lay eyes on him again, but damn was that a good time; one hell of good time.

Back in my less responsible days, I used to take road trips down to Mexico and go surfing. It was a doable weekend getaway, and super cheap. Gasoline was a lot less expensive back then too, and a group of us would head south on a late Friday afternoon; surf boards tied to the top of our cars; it was a Mexico Surfing Trip Caravan.

After a long day of surfing at a place called Calafia, we’d head back to the hotel for showers, following a quick jaunt to Puerto Nuevo looking for the perfect Mexican dinner. Mexico is known for its lobsters; smaller than its east coast rival, but delicious in their own special way. It makes my mouth water just thinking about my traditional lobster dinner of piping, hot, rice and beans, warm tortillas with butter and a freshly caught Mexican lobster. We’d drink a Mexican beer called Tecate and lots and lots, and lots of tequila.

…suddenly, I’m Alice in Wonderland, chasing a rabbit down a hole; landing in some other world…dancing topless on top of the bar at the Rosarito Beach Hotel; Goddamn tequila!

There are tequila aficionados, like wine connoisseurs. Mescal is the tequila with the worm, and it’s not my personal preference. I don’t have anything against worms per se’, but I’d rather not see it marinating in the bottle that I’m drinking from. Tequila is crazy-ass stuff all by itself; it doesn’t need props, like worms.

I’m not sure if I have favorite name brand of tequila. Some people swear that a smoother tasting tequila produces less of a hangover, unfortunately, the smoother the taste, the higher the price tag on the bottle too. I’m not sure about smoothing over a hangover, because I think tequila is inherently just a bad, bad, bad-ass boy. You know how bad boys are, don’t you? You can dress them up in Armani, or Karl Lagerfeld, but they’re still bad to the bone when their clothes come off, and you’ll be swearing once again; head in the toilet realizing that you just got fucked, but oh boy, you had the time of your life.

How did you celebrate the holiday?


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