The Best Pleasures in Life

I'm curious what pleasure you take out of life, that you can talk about, I mean.For me, it's the following:Sports fan - Following World Cup football (soccer for the heathens), boxing, American football, and March Madness College basketball is a bit of a religion. It's a serious addiction and something that allows me to blow off steam. Boxing might be the most intense of these, in that I know how difficult the training can be and how much the fighters leave in the ring.Single malt whiskey/whisky - Nothing's better than an 18-year or even 30-year whiskey. It's hard to explain, especially because sometimes the conversation and company surrounding having one is as much part of it as the alcohol itself. I like, with a really excellent one, to have a single ice cube in the glass. It seems to bring out the flavor. A 30-year-old has an amazing flavor--on the front end, the middle, and the back of it. It changes in your mouth as you swallow.Cigars - A really good Partagas or Cohiba or Punch or, lately, Onyx, or any number of other great cigars (Connecticut leaf is important to me, or Central American), especially with a single malt, is an experience. First of all, you have to relax to smoke a cigar. You can't do it quickly, so you have to kind of chill out. Second, an excellent cigar is just plain heaven. It also brings you into contact with people you might not otherwise meet. I've had more than one incredibly great conversation standing outside of a bar with other cigar smokers.Beer - Excellent dark beers are better than anything in the world. Whether it's a Delirium Nocturnum on draft or a Leffe Brun, you have to try the Belgian beers. Nothing can really compete, although Aventinus comes close. Also good is a West Coast beer called Arrogant Bastard. (There are many others, but too many to name here.)Weightlifting - Ever since I've taken up weightlifting, I've found no substitute for it. It forces you to concentrate (because otherwise you hurt yourself), it makes you pull the last dregs of energy out of you to get that last rep in, and it makes you understand that you can sculpt your own body whatever way you want. Of course, some of the pleasures above intefer. But I find the gym to be a great place for meditation, while exercising.Hiking - Another great meditative maneuver, masquerading as exercise. When you're on a long hike far into the wilderness, you need to be concentrating on the here-and-now. You can't, or shouldn't, be thinking of anything else. Your mind has to exist in the present. Even an experienced hiker can become disoriented or lost without that concentration. But the end result of that concentration is that you appreciate and experience nature much more fully. It's a sense of calm, really, that settles over you. Except, of course, when encountering wild pigs, panthers, and other beasties. But that solicits the adrenaline spikes! (An aside: alligators are about as dangerous as scaly basset hounds.)Book as artifact - Although our collecting of Nabokov, Angela Carter, and others has taken a hit because freelancing doesn't allow for much disposable income, we still do collect rare and unusual books of all kinds. There's something about a well-made book that satisfies the soul. (Added to this is a love for art of all kinds--we have, for example, the original artwork from the Prime City of Saints & Madmen on our livingroom wall.)