After the Big Event

Being out in the country, with true country Latvians, or at least city Latvians acting like country Latvians, we had to finish the day off right. And what better way to cap off a day of standing around in snowbanks and drinking than spending the evening standing around in the snow along the side of the road, drinking, and roasting weenies on sticks over an open fire? To complete the deal, and building on his vodka-swilling experience from earlier in the week, your correspondent briefly transitioned from cheap beer to the cheapest of cheap vodka, alternating each swig with fruit juice straight from a carton. Some elements of country living are the same all over the world. In fact, we even saw one roadside good Samaritan repaid with a healthy swig of Jim Beam and a coke chaser, which I believe would be considered a fair swap in many parts of our own country.

For further research someday: The Latvians have a mind-boggling array of packaged hot-dog-quality sausages available in their grocery stores. We sampled several. They mostly tasted like hot dog, but the vodka may have had something to do with that.