hed probably spent a lot of hours learning how to make drinks which would send people into a state of complete insubordination and he probably envisioned himself working diligently behind a thirty-foot slab of polished mahogany made for the express purpose of sliding a flaming cocktail down its lacquered exterior to the waiting hands of an experienced sot but , instead , he got us ; sitting in barstools available because no one in their right mind would drink a concoction which would send them to sleep at the prime time of two in the afternoon .