1965-08-01 - Bar Updates
Summary: Elmo comes to the bar to work on the lighting. Doug introduces them both to new drinks.
Related: None
Theme Song: None
jebediah elmo douglas 


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Elmo's on a ladder, working on the overhead stage lighting. He tweaks something with a screwdriver, then touches the housing. The light comes on and starts cycling through colors, as he inflicts his will on it. He studies the way it falls on the stage, eyes narrow as if envisioning how it would look with Jay there.


The door jingles and Doug walks in, carrying a couple of grocery bags, which he sets on the bar for now. He looks up, and then squints at Elmo, before he says, "…D'you need a spotter on that ladder?" He leans one hand against the bar, watching, curiously.


"Ehhhh," Elmo says, not a yes or a no but just some kind of Jewish sound, as he adjusts the light. "That probably would be a good idea." He's pretty nonchalant about it. "Except, hang on, how do you think that looks from there?" Because that's the most important thing at the moment.


Doug forgets about the grocery bags for now, and he walks up and takes hold of the ladder with both hands. "It looked good. We don't use a lot of red lights, because they don't set off Jay's wings, so think about that when you're picking what colors we're putting up there." He shrugs his shoulders.


Jeb is literally always early for work, if he isn't, then Doug has cause to be concerned about the little punk. So, as always, Jebediah shows up early to start setting up the club and borrowing the atmosphere before everyone shows up to work on art, or studying for his test. The door jingles to alert the two to his arrival. He's dressed nice, as he usually is for the nights he works. He's carrying a bag on one shoulder, his kitten in the other hand. He peers up at Elmo on the ladder and looks down to Doug. "What y'all doin'?"


"Yeah. He'd look just, all red. It'd be weird." And making Jay look anything less than spectacular is not to be borne. Elmo just sets the light back to what it was. "Okay, I'm not gonna mess with it. Even though I was messing with it. I'm not gonna mess with it anymore." He stuffs things into his toolbelt and descends the ladder. "Thanks, Doug. How's it going?" he greets him, with a kind of workaday cheer. Being on tall ladders messing with equipment apparently makes him happy. "Hey Jebkha," he also greets the baby Guthrie.


Doug obligingly lets go of the ladder when Elmo is no longer in position to break his neck with a fall, and he says, "Elmo was just adjusting the lights for me." He walks over to the bags on the counter and starts taking out bottles, none of which have labels in English. "You're looking spiffy today Jeb, got a date tonight?"


Jeb looks down at his clothes, pulling the dress shirt out. "Yeah, Ah got a date, a date with the bar, gonna show her a real good time tonight." Jebediah says with a little shake of his head at Doug's suggestion. He nods at Elmo, still a little uneasy around the other electric mutant, "Hey Elmo," He says and comes over to him, offering him the kitten in his hands. "Ah think Buttermilk missed you."


Elmo cups his hands around the kitten's tiny head and nuzzles her, cooing to her about what a good and pretty cat she is, in Yiddish. "Gute sheyntshik katseleh! She's bigger already." Whatever differences he and Jeb have are put aside when it comes to tiny kittens. He lets her (and Jeb) go and leans on the counter, watching Doug's mystery bottles with interest. "What's those say?"


"Well this," Doug says, "Is slivovitz. Kosher for passover, apparently." He pushes the bottle across the bar. "This is a greek brandy, Metaxa, Lambert recommended it. I've never tried either." He shrugs and says, "But part of the bar business is selling what sells, and finding what nobody sells that WILL sell. And if it doesn't, well, I can use it to stock my liquor cabinet."


Jebediah doesn't seem to have any uneasiness when Elmo is giving his kitten attention. "Yeah, she has, she's finally over her little cold and got a real big appetite, drinking so much." Jeb lifts the kitten to kiss her on her little forehead before walking over to Doug. He sets Buttermilk on the counter so he can give the bossman a hug. "Where did you go to pick those up?"


Elmo picks up the bottle, investigating it because he can't keep his hands off any damn thing. "I think maybe I had this one time. On Passover, no less. This third cousin was visiting from the Old Country—" which is what he calls anywhere in Eastern Europe, or Russia, or a handful of other Jewish diaspora lands, "brought some. Burned like paint thinner. He said it was supposed to."


"Apparently it's made from prunes. It's usually kind of a rough fare, but this variety is apparently made by orthodox monks. Hard to get outside of the Iron Curtain." He taps the bottle, "But people find a way." Then he turns to give Jeb a brisk hug, before he moves to scratch the cat behind the ears. "Oh, all over. You just have to listen at the right time and follow the right signs."


"What makes a drink not Kosher, Elmo?" Jeb asks curiously, picking up one of the bottles himself, after realizing he can't read any of it, he quickly puts it back down. The kitten purrs loudly up at Doug and then wobbles her way down the counter to rub up against Elmo's hand and against the bottle he's holding. "All over, huh? Sounds like you're going to a back alley alcohol dealer." Jeb teases a little with a smile. "Ah think it's real cool that you find all this neat new stuff to bring to the bar."


"Actually yeah, that one I got from an old Hungarian woman running a street kiosk. She was sipping from her own bottle, and I asked her about it — and so she sold me one, and tipped me off where I could get more." Doug gives a tiny bit of a shrug and gets a few small glasses, before he cracks the stuff, and pours out a modest measure in each. He picks his up, and inhales, before he tips it back, swallows, and squeezes his mouth shut tight.


Elmo sets the bottle down far away from where it can get kitten germs on it. "That's not for you, katseleh." He pets her to keep her distracted. "Well, usually drinks are pareve, that means they're kinda kosher by default. But on Passover you gotta have a special kind of kosher, because you can't eat any kind of grain. So it's made so it doesn't touch grain, and a rabbi's gotta certify that it didn't." He picks up the glass Doug's poured him. "L'cheim," and knocks it back. And claps his hand over his mouth, turning red.


"Yeah, Buttermilk, you ain't seven yet, you not old enough to be drinking." Jeb chastises lightly. He reaches for one of the small glasses, picking it up to sniff it curiously as well. He watches Elmo knock his back and blush curiously with a little amused smile. "Keepin' Kosher sounds real hard, do you gotta do that all the time?" He asks before he tips his own back, trying to swallow it better than Elmo for some reason, as if to impress the two of them with it. He tries to keep the reaction off of his face but it's a bit pinched regardless.


"He can take it, I've got a few bottles of that stuff their cousin Temperance Guthrie makes down in his still down in the… uh… holler. Which is a forested valley in the hills." Doug says, before he goes back to stroking the cat.


Elmo wipes his watering eyes. "Yep. Paint thinner." He laughs and shakes his head. "Or maybe I'm just spoiled." He grins at the other two, amused. "Guthrie moonshine? Now that, I never need to try. Embarrass myself in front of the whole fam damily." He glances at Jeb, eyebrows up. "Yeah, I mean, I don't, but yeah, you pretty much have to. It's tough, but bein' a Jew is tough."


Jeb snorts a little at Elmo's 'fam damily'. "You'd take just one drink and be on your ass for sure, you're so little." Jeb teases a little. "Ray Jr and Ah, stole a little once when we were thirteen, ma didn't even have to tear our behinds up, we passed out after one shared shot, was the quietest we'd ever been, she said." He says, smiling fondly at the memory.


Doug thinks about that, and then says, "I went to school with a jewish girl. We were thick as thieves… I think she was Reform, though. We haven't spoken in a dog's age, anyway. Probably doesn't even remember that I'm alive." He pours himself another dram of that prune liquor, and tosses it back. "See, the nuances in the flavor really start to come out on the second drink," He says, with watering eyes.


"Yeah, yeah, 'little' this," Elmo grumbles, nonseriously. "You ain't much bigger." He takes another shot too, and winds up coughing into his sleeve. "Okay, it really does, though," he says, hoarsely.


"Bigger'n you." Jebediah teases back and rather them sounding like enemies, it comes out like a little brother bickering with his older one, amicable even as Jeb smiles when Elmo coughs, hiding a laugh behind his hand.


"Anyway," Doug says, "I've had a long day. Set up a tasting for some of our regulars, see what they'd be willing to pay for if we kept any of these on the regular." Doug pats Jeb on the head, and then moves to scoop the cat up — apparently he's taking care of her while Jeb is at work. "Have a good night, Elmo. I might be down later."


Elmo tips his empty glass at Doug. "See ya, pal. …Now I'm not gettin' back up on that ladder," he mutters, mostly to himself. "How's the math coming, Jebkha?"


Jeb frowns when Elmo mentions math which should be answer enough as he sets his bag down with somewhat of a huff. "Not well, my brain ain't wired for it, Ah don't think. Ah'm gonna run away with Buttermilk and live in the forrest where you ain't gotta know math."


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