Well, it looks like it’s finally going to be legal to smoke weed for funsies in Minnesota, which is terrific news for all of the people languishing in jail for smoking or dealing weed for funsies in Minnesota. Law is the ultimate example of the abject arbitrariness of reality: we have an entire system of rules and consequences established around the specious assertion that smoking weed, and all practices associated with it are, well, objectively bad. And not just rules and consequences, an elaborate — and until very recently, shared — ethos that avers a deep and persistent truth: using marijuana is dangerous and wrong. What a hoot.

Being a human is such absurdity, most of the time — how does anyone keep a straight face? Like so many of you, I have struggled with some of the more frittersome or idiosyncratic morae introduced as inalienable verities: men do this, women are that, and you’re either one or the other; these are the ways we cover our bodies with cloth, but these ways are terrible and wrong; these animals are great to eat, but these ones are friends … Sometimes, the whole world seems like a very elaborate game of make believe we’re all playing together. Through the right lens, even the houses we live in, with two sinks in the bathrooms, secret refrigerators, walk-in closets — it’s all like some fantastical fever dream.

[Editor’s note: For this week’s essay we’ve once again pulled out a relic from the archive of Slim Goodbuzz, who served as Duluth’s “booze connoisseur” from 1999 to 2009. Twenty years ago the Sultan of Sot visited C’s Lounge, 1419 Banks Ave. in Superior, which today is the location of a Kwik Trip convenience store. The article below appeared in the April 16, 2003 issue of the Ripsaw newspaper.]

Whenever I go to C’s Lounge — and I’ve been known to do that from time to time — I find myself baffled that I’m in Superior, Wis. Hell, I’m baffled that I’m in the 21st century. Walk into C’s and it’s like walking into Hibbing in the 1970s, not that I have any idea what that would be like. Nonetheless, that’s the feel.

The place is dark, in a good way, with amber and red lights hanging from the glittery ceiling. Everything else is either red or the color of wood. In fact, it looks and feels a lot like the Regal Beagle from Three’s Company, except that instead of spotting Jack Tripper and Larry, you’re more likely to spot middle-aged white trash.

The best thing about C’s is that the drinks are cheap and strong. It’s not uncommon for the drink specials to be something different and surprising, such as $2 Manhattans. For the domestically inclined, beer comes in big mugs for under $3. And, for folks like you and me, tap Busch Light is always 65 cents a glass. That is information to be treasured.