G-Man Back in the Cuse

Friends since childhood, G-man and I had let time and distance keep us apart. We still met at Andy’s each summer, and still attended each other’s life cycle events. But no more canot camping; no more bike rides into the wilds of Nedrow and Jamesville. Until Jon died last spring, almost a year ago. And since then, we’ve been in much closer contact - e-mailing, blogging, speaking by phone, visiting. It’s the only good thing I know of that came from Jon’s passing. And during this past year we discovered that, quite independently, we had each developed a love for good malt whiskies. So it was only natural that we found a time to meet last weekend where we could not only renew our friendship, but also partake of a glass or two, or perhaps slightly more than that.

The ostensible purpose for meeting in Syracuse was to watch the Cuse play DePaul. And although that’s not the topic of this posting, I’ll digress for a moment and mention that it was a typical outing for this year’s team. Great play for the first twenty-five or so minutes, and then poof, all that great play disappeared, as did the twenty point lead, and the team struggled to eke out a slender win. Devendorf and Rautins had been draining threes in the first half, but the team inferred that it didn’t have to work hard for the rest of the game; they could just let these guys hit their shots, and then walk off with a W. So there was no inside play; and with the intensity level turned down, the defense let DePaul begin to gain some confidence. Afterward the coach was critical of the fans, accusing them of booing the players. I don’t recall any of that; although I know there was much dissatisfaction with the selfish play of some, especially Josh Wright. Beyond that, I think the coach was wrong to reprimand the fans, after 24,500 of them came out on a freezing Saturday, to watch an unranked Cuse beat a mediocre opponent; especially since there is no particular history between Cuse and DePaul. And also because the team is 2-4 over its past six games, the two wins being largely unsatisfying, after the Orange had surrendered 20 point leads, and barely managed to walk off with the win each time. Check out some Saturday game between two other unranked teams with slim post-season chances, and see if there are 24,500 fans sitting in the stands. 2,500 would be more like it.

But back to the real purpose for meeting in Syracuse – I wanted to take G to Kitty Hoyne’s. And when we weren’t in the dome, we practically lived at Kitty’s that Saturday. First for lunch, sitting in the bar and drinking Irish malts: Red Breast, Black Bush (an interesting combination there), Jameson 12, Knappoque, and of course, Connemara. Every one of them was well received. (Did I mention that we had a taste of Talisker 175 and G-man’s special Caol Ila, cask strength, back at the hotel?) After the game we met up with cousins Bruce and Alan, and their respective spousal units, and then headed back to Kitty’s for an evening of fine food, and malted scotch whiskies. I can’t recall all the malts we had that night, other than a delicious glass of Aberlour A’Bunadh (outstanding), and perhaps some Cragganmore, certainly a glass of Lagavulin, and who knows what else? G was still recuperating from a bout of pneumonia, so we skipped going to the Blue Tusk for a nightcap. That will have to wait until the next time. And for sure, there will be a next time, not to mention further excursions for purposes of renewing friendship and drinking malts in the Big Apple, in Rochester, perhaps in Ithaca, and other points presently unknown. That’s the plan. Drink whisky for the foreseeable future. Do I have any other takers?