The man in the wrinkled, short-sleeve button-up sighs over his beer. It’s been a hell of a week, he says. The boss man, a real task master, has been riding him like a chairlift since Tuesday. TGIF, and plus it’s an especially tense time, what with the holidays coming up and all. Budgets never take a vacation, but such is the life of an accountant. Numbers, his father warned, they make a cruel mistress. The three-day weekend, at least, will give him a chance to bottle the beer he’s been fermenting for the last four months. A golden ale, fairly standard, he says, only he added a touch of honey his brother brought back from his Greek honeymoon. Honey, it turns out, has very distinct flavors depending on where it was produced. Bees collect pollen from flowers within only a few square miles, so local horticulture plays a big role. Purple coneflowers, for instance, add a slight tangy flair to any batch, though these aren’t necessarily common in the Greek isles. Cretan honey tends to originate from thyme – not parsley, sage, or rosemary, don’t listen to Garfunkel; a joke. He has his own bottle labels printed up as well. Bee My Honey BaBee Ale, though for the price he paid he’s not sure if the glue will hold. One can hope. One can hope it will hold. But he still plans to drink his fair share, especially after a week like this. Sweet Lord – sweet honey, he guesses he should say – what a week it’s been for an accountant.
“Anyway, what is it you do?” he asks.
“Oh, nothing exciting. I found an old photo of Billy the Kid at a garage sale which sold for $10 million.”
He nods and we continue standing together because neither one of us has anywhere to go.
