Ask LemmyKilmister!

2/2/21 LemmyKilmister 40

It’s a snow day from work and I’m bored. I’ve lived in five states. I’ve got a PhD in social science. I’ve worked twenty years in corrections, fifteen with the mentally ill. My kids have played baseball, softball, football (men’s and women’s), field hockey, and rugby (men’s and women’s). I am a heavy metal aficionado and Baltimore Orioles fan. I drink more beer and inexpensive whiskey than I should. Ask me a question!

avataravataravataravataravataravataravataravatar

40 Comments

  3. …when you say “inexpensive whiskey”…how cheap is too cheap?

    …also…what would say is a happy medium of good value & good tasting?

    …& if someone else was picking up the tab is there a not-so-inexpensive option you could be tempted into ordering that isn’t the fabled pappy van winkle?

    • My upper limit is around $30.  I try to buy stuff on sale.  I’m dipping into a bottle of Bushmill’s as we speak.  I don’t mind a $12 bottle of Evan Williams.  Haven’t tried much else in that really low price range.  I wouldn’t mind trying something like a Glenmorangie 18.

      • …guess I wasn’t expecting what I think of as whisky-without-the-e outnumbering the other sort but cheers for that

        …back in the hazy mists of time there were a few I remember being around the £30 mark in the UK that I fear are well over the $30 mark these days

        …but I liked the balvenie doublewood a fair bit…I used to get things with various “finishes” to sort of compensate for the fact I couldn’t afford to drink single malts that were old enough to vote…or better still old enough to drink in the US…& they also did a 21yr old with a port finish (the doublewood spends time in sherry casks instead) that I did get to try & was lovely if not necessarily worth the price that’s asked for it?

        …bushmills is tasty, too…& I quite liked the redbreast “single pot still” irish whisky but don’t know what that goes for

        …don’t know as I’ve got around to trying evan williams so I’ll have to see about acquiring myself a bottle of that…thank you kindly

        • Redbreast is upwards of $50 where I live, but would love to try it if you’re buying.
           
          If you don’t like the Evan Williams neat, it works well in Coke with a lime wedge.  Or, over ice with a splash of Rose’s lime juice.

          • …honestly, when I tried the redbreast I wasn’t buying either which is why I didn’t know what it cost…I was in ireland for a wedding so it was flowing fairly freely at the time

            …but along with all the other things that make brexit suck it seems like a beef with the EU over airplane parts caused the previous administration to slap a 25% tariff on whisky which makes it more expensive in the US…& has cost the scottish end of that industry tens (if not hundreds) of millions at this point in lost saleseeven now that they aren’t (much to their irritation) even part of the EU any more

            …either way in the event that such things are one day plausible again I’d be happy to stand you at least a round of the good stuff…whether I can afford a whole bottle at that point is anybody’s guess…but at the very least I’d be prepared to share?

        • The Redbreast is $65.99 at the state store. The Balvenie Single Malt Scotch Doublewood 17 Year Old runs $154.99. Just got a bottle of Russell’s Reserve Bourbon 10 Year Old 90 Proof for $39.99 – not as good as the no longer available BSB (sigh). PA state stores are a terrible racket.

          • …I was thinking of the 12yr old for the doublewood…which the masterofmalt website claims is around that $55 level

            …if I could have thrown upwards of $100 at a single bottle back at the time I was thinking of I might actually have been able to skip the different finish thing & just drink scotch that had a shot at being over 20yrs old

            …sadly these days I’m not sure I could manage that even if I could spend three figures on a bottle?

    • I dunno.  I try not to waste my time hating bands for whatever reason anymore.  The best metal is whatever you like listening to, where and when you like to listen to it.  I don’t have time for genre snobbery, and I can’t even muster up the energy to give my kid shit for liking Dance Gavin Dance.

  7. I’ve fortunately never been in the criminal justice system but I’m curious — how scary is the US penal system? How is it compared to the serious mental health system? Have things gotten better or worse or both?

    • Convict culture is real, dangerous, and also a bit overblown.  Plenty of people manage to navigate prison and come out better people.  A lot of them never go back.  But that’s not a very sexy story to tell.  We do need to get better at sorting inmates out and making prison a safer place for people who want to be better.
       
      The mental health system where I live is a mess.  Weak commitment laws, a serious lack of hospital beds, and insufficient community resources.  “Civil rights” have trumped human dignity in the courts.  I’ve hated pretty much every minute of working in it.

      • One of the best arguments for national health care is to treat mental health issues before they get to a bad state, which isn’t always possible but often is.
         
        For that matter, not just mental health but dental health, but that’s for someone else’s Q&A.

        • Often people with serious illness like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder don’t think there’s anything wrong with them and see no reason for treatment or medicine.  That’s one of the areas where we need stronger laws, to leverage them into treatment before they become dangerous.

          • Oh sure. I think there are a lot of parallels to addiction treatment (and there’s certainly overlap between the populations) where early intervention isn’t 100% but it helps cut down on the number of people involved. Which then frees up resources for people with more serious longterm problems.
             
            There’s a lot of stigma to both which blocks a lot of early treatment, followup is really weak, and there isn’t much outreach to the support networks which can keep people on their meds or away from addictive drugs.
             
            And of course with such a lousy health care system, it’s asking a lot of people with developing issues to navigate their way through whatever opportunities might exist. It’s awfully hard to develop consistent self care when it’s such a struggle to find care in the first place.

      • Can you expand on the thing about “civil rights” trumping human dignity?  Is that about, for example, allowing someone to stay off their meds and go into a downward spiral because freedumb, or is it something else?

        • Yeah, that’s pretty much it.  Civil rights attorneys have helped established laws so that people can’t be involuntarily committed until they actually start swinging a knife at somebody.  They have created a “right to be mentally ill,” so that you walk down the street and see people yelling at nothing, wearing the same clothes for a month, homeless, and eating out of trash cans.  Their so-called “right to be ill” trumps out ability to give them some of their dignity back.  We literally have people naked, screaming, and smearing shit on the wall of their jail cells for days and weeks, because the laws don’t allow jails to force medications on people like they can in a hospital.

Leave a Reply