{Warning: The following post has nothing to do with Tiki. While I realize that I have standards to uphold, cranky rants wait for no calendar}

The Times of London has a column up right now by some rocket scientist named Alex Renton entitled: Martini: the adulterer’s cocktail of choice (How to make a perfect 1950s dry Martini, as enjoyed by Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio in ‘Revolutionary Road’). (H/T: Jacob Grier) How do I hate this article? Let me count the ways:

1. The headline writer needs to get his shift key fixed.
2. It pads its column length with a lazy recitation of mildly humorous ways people talk about not putting vermouth in their Martinis.
3. The column appears to be just an excuse to put drinks and tickets to Revolutionary Road on the old expense account. I’m not sure which angers me more, some yob burdening the already beleaguered print newspaper industry with an unneccesary bill for several(!) rounds of Martinis and two overpriced movie tickets, or being forced to remember that Kate and Leo exist.
4. He fails to properly disclose whether the date he was putting on the Times’ tab was adulterous in nature or not. What has happened to journalistic standards?
5. He muddles his movie references, melding Dr. No with The Thin Man (without crediting the latter), while simultaneously conflating the Martini and Vodka Martini. Oh, and his dad is apparently Judge Bork…. All this in one paragraph.
6. I don’t know what bars this yahoo frequents, but I’d like a list. That way there will be no danger at all that I’ll stumble into one of them. Cocktailians of the world, read this paragraph and….
   

   The Martini may be back, but it will never dominate the bar as it did. It’s not a natural binge drink (though the effect is powerful if you drop them fast) and it looks uncomfortable on a modern cocktail menu alongside “Between the Sheets” and “Sex on the Beach”.

   Seriously? Between the Sheets is a great classic cocktail with a now silly sounding name. Sex on the Beach…. What kind of modern cocktail menu has Sex on the Beach on it, much less these two side by side? And since when does a drink have to be a binge drink to be popular? Or is this just further evidence that the Death of Britain has been greatly underreported? Finally, since when can’t you binge on Martinis?

7. I could do an entire post on how the last paragraph gets Daniel Craig’s Bond completely ass backwards, but I’m too disgusted to try.

Seriously Britain, this is what passes for a cocktail writer in The Freakin’ Times? Someone send them Jay’s resume, while there is still some hope left for the empire….