Tag, I'm IT! Now where's the bar?
I usually don't do tags, but this one cut right to the core of Sophie's intellect. You know, she is always reading. Reading, reading, reading. She is like the literati of the canine world, and often contracts herself out to write dissertations for distraught and distracted academics. (Distraught and distracted academics take note.)
Asta from New York wanted to know what the beast was reading, and more than that, she was being incredibly nosy about page 123. I'm sure it's some strange plot to take over the world. Has to be. You know those terriers.
Anyway, the book closest to Sophie at the time of this strange request was appropriately, Paul Auster's The New York Trilogy.
Appropriate, of course, because Asta is a Manhattan girl. It's also possible that Asta's been drinking a few too many Manhattans of late.
For those of you interested in imbibing, a Manhattan is:
5 cl Whiskey
2 cl Sweet red vermouth
Dash Angostura bitters
Stirred over ice and served straight up and garnished with a cherry.
If you don't have one of those saxophone stir sticks, you're out of luck. You might as well just have a rye and coke.
This reminds me of a bar at a lake in Saskatchewan that serves rye and coke by the pitcher, but that's another story, and I don't like rye or coke, so on to the book.
By order of Asta, the very short, page 123 of Paul Auster's City of Glass, the first of the New York Trilogies:
"Yes," said Quinn. "The only one."
"If you need me for anything," said Auster, 'just call. I'll be happy to help."
Auster reached out to shake hands with him, and Quinn realized that he was still holding the yoyo. He placed it in Auster's right hand, patted him gently on the shoulder, and left.
Always with the editor's eye, Sophie thinks this book would have been far more successful had Quinn handed Auster a pink tennis ball.
