Here’s mud in your eye

by David Benjamin

“I can’t believe I have to say this. But please don’t drink bleach.” 

— Joe Biden

MADISON, Wis. — I can’t believe I’m saying this but Joe Biden, bless his heart, must be wrong. After all, the White House’s crack medical team — led by Jared “Doc” Kushner and his faithful sidekick Ivanka, with strong, beautiful expertise from Peter “Ron Vara” Navarro, Hope Hicks, Kayleigh McEnany and Brian “Labradoodle” Harrison — has not issued a word contradicting the president’s belief that various disinfectants can be pumped into the human body to cure the pesky coronavirus.

Despite cautionary remarks from press-room groupies Tony Fauci and Debbie Birx about possible side-effects from ingesting bleach, anti-freeze, drain-cleaner and nail polish remover, the real issue, according to established experts like Hicks and Harrison, is not toxicity, per se, but the delivery system for these life-saving chemicals. In short, how to use them safely. 

And there is a way! Many ways, actually. Strong, beautiful, tremendous ways.

In that vein, with the sort of speed appropriate to a national outbreak of the affectionately named “Wuhan flu,” the West Wing last weekend assembled a Blue Ribbon Covid-19 Mixology Task Force (BRCMTF) composed of idled bartenders from the Trump International Hotel, the Mar-a-Lago Winter White House and the Ritz Bar. In a matter of hours, this elite group determined that virtually any toxic disinfectant, combined with the right ingredients, can be delivered to covid-positive patients not only harmlessly but pleasantly, in the form of tasty cocktails.

The BRCMTF, writing under the modest nom de plume “John Barleycorn,” has compiled a recipe book cleverly entitled “Cocktails for Flu,” using ingredients — usually regarded as fatal if consumed by humans — that the president ingeniously proposed as atomic weapons in the war against the Invisible Enemy. Speaking bashfully on condition of anonymity, these “masters of moonshine” issued a cautious assurance that none of these yummy alcoholic treats, consumed in moderation, will kill most people. A spokesman for the team suggested that several of these mixtures might also be effective as “off-prescription” remedies for a range of other ills, among them tinnitus, whooping cough, mumps, shingles, eavestroughs, bleeding gums, the Black Death and the galloping heebie-jeebies.

According to a BRCMTF spokesman, “Any one of these toothsome formulas will pretty safely scour your innards, from uvula to sphincter, like a steam-cleaner in a beer vat. Plus, afterwards, you’ll have that little buzz we all love.”

Concoctions listed in “Cocktails for Flu” will ring familiar to seasoned tipplers, but each features an inventive twist or two. Among the drinks likely to be most popular are variations on simple blue-collar classics. The Isopropyl Boilermaker, for example, consists of a six-ounce draught of rubbing alcohol swallowed in one brave gulp, followed by a large and hasty beer chaser. In the same vein, the Tide-Pod Depth Charge is simply a pint of Guinness stout into which the drinker plops a colorful capsule of laundry detergent. This therapeutic bracer is ideally consumed in the “chug-a-lug” fashion favored by fraternities and “girls gone wild.” 

The presidential BRCMTF “emergency cocktail” guide, already in print and online, offers full instructions and the usual prudent warnings about excessive consumption and driving heavy equipment. But even with these caveats, light drinkers and lounge lizards alike will find hard to resist a tantalizing drink me nu that includes the venerable “Peroxide Manhattan,” the tangy “Citric Acid Screwdriver,” the always reliable “Ammonia and Tonic” (with a twist), the “Miracle Mineral Mojito” (with a cleansing dose of chlorine dioxide), the refreshing “Hydroxychloroquine Strawberry Frozen Daiquiri” and the exotic “Pine-Sol Piña Colada.” Perhaps the most surprising recipe in “Cocktails for Flu,” is the “Sterno Wallbanger,” inspired by the cure for the deadly extraterrestrial microorganism in Michael Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain. 

Here are a couple of recipes from “Cocktails for Flu” that can be mixed up right at home, with ingredients from the wet bar in your rumpus room and the child-proof plastic bottles beneath your kitchen sink.

Have fun, drink hearty and keep the number of your local poison prevention hotline handy — just in case the cure turns out to be worse than the disease (LOL). 

The Lysol Sea Breeze

2 ounces vodka

2 ounces grapefruit juice

2 ounces cranberry juice

4 ounces Lysol 

Salt-and-chili-powder, for rim

Tabasco sauce

Lime wedge

Combine vodka, grapefruit juice and cranberry juice in a pitcher. Separately, mix Lysol with an equal amount of Tabasco. Gently blend all ingredients, then drop in the lime wedge. If it explodes, shrivels up or gives off a puff of acrid smoke, throw the whole mess away and start over. When you’ve perfected the mixture, pour and drink as fast as possible. Stay near the toilet in case of “reflux.” Cheers!

The Horseradish Pomegranate Moldex Margarita

1/3 cup fresh horseradish, peeled and chopped

1 cup fresh (blanco) tequila

1 cup extra virgin Moldex

3/4 ounce fresh lime juice

1 ounce fresh pomegranate juice

1/2 ounce sugar syrup

1. In a bowl, mix horseradish with tequila and let sit for 24 hours. Strain through an old pair of pantyhose (preferably laundered).

2. Pour 1 1/2 ounces horseradish-infused tequila and all other ingredients into a large cocktail shaker. Fill to the brim with Moldex and ice. Save leftover tequila and Moldex for a festive “second round.” Shake vigorously for six seconds.

3. Add ice cubes to an Old-Fashioned glass and pour drink over them. 

4. Enjoy! Heal! Keep America Great!

The James Bond Clorox Martini

1 ounce Smirnoff vodka

1 ounce Tanqueray gin

1 ounce Clorox scented bleach

1/2 ounce Lillet blanc

1/2 ounce Martini & Rossi extra-dry vermouth

Twist of lemon peel

1. Combine vodka, gin, Clorox, vermouth and Lillet in a cocktail shaker partly filled with ice. Shake stylishly while flirting with a girl with a suggestive name (e.g., Cherry Willingly).

2. Strain into a chilled martini glass, garnish with lemon peel. 

3. Pinch your nose.

4. Suck it all down.

5. Tuck your head between your legs.

6. Kiss your ass goodbye.