Sweet Memories

The first time I tried Laudanum was with Neil Diamond(the singer). I met him waiting for a flight at the Anchorage airport in 1993. He was returning from a fishing trip and I was going back home after spending 5 weeks on Denali. My stink and 3rd degree sun burnt face caught his attention. I was putting some cream on my scabbed up face when he just walked up to me and said, "Hey son, I've got something that will take your mind off your face". He then open up his cape and reached in his vest and pulled out a bottle that turned out to be Laudanum. He put his arm around me and said he had always wanted to be friends with a real mountain climber. We sat down, waiting for our respective flights, swapping war stories. We arm wrestled for the last shooter of Laudanum. He won, of course, he has gorilla arms, as you know. The next thing I knew, someone was pulling my bleeding head, out of a cigarette machine and Mr Diamond had vanished.