The Hippopotamus Premium

December 18, 2008

Hippopotamus (2) I work as a waiter at Stage West on the weekends. It’s a good side-gig and a fun way to pick up a little cash, plus the people who come there, for the most part, are a pleasure to serve.

A glass of wine at Stage West is $5 – it’s a fair price, I think, and nobody I can think of has ever had a problem with it. The only people ever to mention the price was a couple that I see at the theatre all the time.

Let me preface this by saying that they’re great people, and not cheapskates at all – but, one day I was waiting on their table and she said, “Five dollars? Do you realize that I can get three bottles of wine at King’s Liquor for five dollars?”

I said, “No way.”

Be careful how you respond to people.

The next time I saw them she was carrying a paper bag. She handed me the bag and said, “Three bottles of wine that only cost five dollars.”

We had a good laugh about it and I took the wine home with me and put it into the wine rack, not knowing when, if ever, I might drink it.

Fast forward to last night. I got home and decided I wanted a drink. We were all out of beer and the only thing in the house was a bottle of chardonnay in the wine rack with a price sticker on it that said $1.62.

Even though Dana gave me that look, I decided to have a glass.

The headache kicked in after five minutes and this morning the hangover made it feel like I drank two bottles of Mad Dog. I felt like a hippopotamus had been wiping its butt with my face all night, and all of this after a 1/3 glass of cheap wine.

There’s a reason you pay five dollars for a glass of wine, and there’s a reason you pay five dollars for three bottles of the other stuff. It’s the same reason homeless winos buy bottles of original flavored Listerine: the Hippopotamus Premium.

Posted by flowersjustin | Filed Under blog