Saturday evening we attended a performance of Urinetown: The Musical at Derby Dinner Playhouse in Clarksville, which is celebrating 50 years in existence; long may they prosper. The show runs until March 30.
Urinetown: The Musical is a satirical comedy musical that premiered in 2001, with music by Mark Hollmann, lyrics by Hollmann and Greg Kotis, and book by Kotis. It satirizes the legal system, capitalism, social irresponsibility, populism, bureaucracy, corporate mismanagement, and municipal politics. The show also parodies musicals such as The Threepenny Opera, The Cradle Will Rock and Les Misérables, and the Broadway musical itself as a form.
The performance was wonderful, the buffet fare better than I expected, and Derby Dinner offers 12-ounce bottles of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale for five bucks. All well and good, and we need to attend more often.
But in the final analysis, when ya gotta go, ya gotta go — especially if you’re a professional beer drinker. Here’s a previously published column in consideration of the pissoir, and other vital topics pertaining to the handling of beer rentals.
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“Let me tell you something about beer: You can never buy beer, you can only rent it.”
These words were famously uttered by Archie Bunker during Season 4 of All in the Family (circa 1973), although similar sentiments have a long history prior to the advent of the groundbreaking TV series.
Interestingly, the sequel to All in the Family was Archie Bunker’s Place, in which the title character became the owner of a bar, thus qualifying for the thankless (hopeless?) task of keeping the restrooms presentable.
It’s an indelicate proposition to be considered today, and the faint of heart may wish to turn away, but in the end old man Bunker was absolutely right. Beer is a rental, and beer drinkers have a vested interest in understanding the rules of the return policy.
My own upbringing focused on one such word to the exclusion of others, as derived in etymological terms from the French.
piss (v.)
late 13c., from Old French pissier “urinate” (12c.), from Vulgar Latin *pissiare, of imitative origin. To piss away (money, etc.) is from 1948. Related: Pissed; pissing. Pissing while (1550s) once meant “a short time.”
Hence “pissoir,” or a bare-bones outdoor public urinal for use by men, as I glimpsed just in the nick of time a few years ago as built into the exterior stone walls of an old church in Brussels, and still very much in use;...Read more
