Guess which Southern Hemisphere region is manufacturing a popular vodka — so popular they’re exporting 50,000 bottles a year to Russia?  Hint:  region’s most famous citizen appears above. (Here’s a link to the distillery. Good luck, mates!)

The Baltimore Sun asks, “Who is Osima?” Hell if we know. But if you want to know where vodka was invented, just visit our “Legend” page. Na Zdorovye!

First, he plastered Times Square with billboards.  Then he offered every New Yorker a cab ride home on New Year’s Eve.  But that wasn’t enough PR for Sean (”P. Diddy”) Combs, whose Ciroc vodka is not made in Russia although some people like it anyway.  Combs also asked New York City to name Ciroc as the “Official Vodka of New Year’s Eve” and paint the Times Square ball blue in its honor.  Mayor Michael Bloomberg, though no doubt tempted by Combs’s invitation to assume proprietorship of an entire holiday, said no dice, and that was that. 

In Russia, it is the holiday.  We refer, of course, to New Year’s, which has an aura of family, festivities, wishes, and nostalgia which is like Western New Year’s squared.  During the Communist era, both Christmas and New Year’s were suppressed as holidays, but New Year’s, which lacked the religious meaning of Christmas, lived on, as generations of Russians treated it as the emotional focal point of winter. The holiday has centuries of tradition. Happy New Year from White Birch and Old Russian Vodkas! Drink well. 

The owner of Swedish vodka brand Absolut has launched legal proceedings against Absolute Radio, for infringement of its trademark.

A spokeswoman for Absolut said:

“The reason for this is that we consider there is a risk of confusion,” she said. “We have a well known brand and there is an obvious risk of confusion between Absolut vodka and Absolute Radio.”

In a related action, Absolut vodka has also announced a lawsuit against the International Bureau of Weights and Measures for its use of the term “absolute zero” to refer to the temperature 0 Kelvin.

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If you know what 5-star restaurant we’re referring to, fill out our online survey (it’s on our website). Include the name of the restaurant in the “Name” field and fill in your e-mail address. We’ll contact you to let you know whether you were right. All correct entries will win a White Birch tank top or deck of playing cards. Entries must be received by  midnight November 13, 2008.

The scene:  Narva, Estonia, across the Narva River from Ivangorod, Russia:

The problem:  Local taxes make Estonian vodka three times costlier than imported vodka.

The solution:  Run a secret vodka pipeline under the river from Russia to Narva.

The end:  Smugglers arrested, pipeline dredged.  The vodka was just moonshine anyway.

The moral of the story:  Only authentic Russian vodka is worth smuggling drinking.

P.S. If this is your coat of arms, fighting for your food is in your blood:

We’re seeing this a lot — you buy a vodka martini, and it comes with a diamond inside.  The cocktail in the photo, in the process of being mixed at Harvilles Cocktail Lounge in York, England, costs 5,000 British pounds (that’s $12,736) and contains an individually cut diamond.

No doubt, this is one surefire way to impress a date. We do recommend that extra caution be used, lest the diamond, with the vodka, go down the hatch. The owner of Harvilles, David Hattersley, put it best when he said that he is impressed by the Diamond Martini, but a little wary of it. “I am trying to keep Mrs. Hattersley out of there because knowing her she would order it as a chaser,” he said.

El Caminito del Rey (”The King’s Pathway”), is a narrow walkway clinging to the sides of a steep gorge in the Andalusia province of Spain. Seven hundred feet above ground, the walkway winds along limestone rock formations, leading to a base popular with climbing. It was built between 1901 and 1905, as a path for workers at a nearby dam. The concrete and steel platform, never more than one meter wide, sinks deeper into decrepitude with each passing year. Wikipedia:

“Some parts of the concrete walkway have completely collapsed and all that is remaining is the steel beam originally in place to hold it up and the wire that follows most the path. One can latch onto the wire to keep from falling. Many people have lost their lives on the walkway in recent years. After four people died in two accidents in 1999 and 2000, the local government closed the entrances; however, adventurous tourists still find their way into the walkway.”

A different video, which travels further along the same path, is here.

Awesome!

If you agree that the current statewide ban on Sunday alcohol sales is an inappropriate intrusion into the lives of Georgians, and want to help change it, please consider signing this online petition urging the General Assembly to pass S.B. 138 and Governor Sonny Perdue to sign it. You might also consider contacting your Georgia state senator to let him or her know you support the bill, want your right to drink free of state interference, and don’t want to live in a nanny state. Finally, consider a telephone call to Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle’s office at 404-656-5030. More information on the Vote Sunday Sales website as well as this group on Facebook.