Rémy Martin V.S.O.P. Fine Champagne Cognac

Nothing like sitting in an office late at night, all alone. Work. Screw it, you know? It's like, not only do you gotta give up your time, you also gotta work your intellect for The Man because you don't want to lose this gravy train, even if does suck sometimes. Beats retail or, heaven forbid, manual labor. You gotta keep your fingers soft, you know. Don't want to break a nail.

So, sure, you drink late at night at the office just to take the proverbial edge off the fact that you'd rather be wallowing in pig dung than sitting in this damn chair staring at this damn computer screen. The V.S.O.P. is a little payback to the He Who Oppresses the Oppressed.

You were headed down Manchester in Maplewood when you realized that tonight was a night for a half-pint, and once you've got a notion, it tends to get all sticky and sweet until satisfied. Sometimes the notion involves Ben & Jerry's, other times it involves the best homemade popcorn known to man, or a little lovin'. Maplewood Liquor, a utilitarian's wet dream, is the purest booze delivery system in Maplewood. It's all quite functionally spare -- a cashier behind Plexiglas and a doormat. But who's paying attention to the décor? Maplewood Liquor is for streamline enthusiasts, those who consume in pints and half-pints because they need a cheap fix now, and they don't feel like popping for a whole fifth. Maplewood Liquor is for those who prefer to get their drunk on in the privacy of their own basement, playing pool on a crooked table and French-kissing a Rémy V.S.O.P. Fine Champagne Cognac half-pint. Or perhaps in the privacy of the garage, hiding from the wife.

Because the fine people at Rémy are making the big bucks -- The Man pays us squat -- we'll let their marketing company do the heavy lifting: "Known by its frosted green bottle, Rémy Martin V.S.O.P. is the flagship of the brand. One bottle alone contains hundreds of blend components, ranging from four to fifteen years in age. The brand itself is a Fine Champagne Cognac taken from the two best crus. And with its golden amber color (old pale), smoothness, complexity and yet balanced, perfectly mature. Consider the fact that one of every three V.S.O.P.s sold in the world carries the name of Rémy Martin."

Wow. Nice work. Translation: V.S.O.P., a.k.a. Very Special Old Pale, is awesome. The good folks at Rémy throw a lot of stuff in it, some of it older than others, from good seed. It's orangish-yellow and tastes damn good. They sell a lot of it. And when they do, aimless workers, drunks, derelicts and do-gooders rejoice, because they'll be able to cope with being somewhere they may not want to be, doing some damn bullshit, or wasting time, or some combination thereof.