It’s that time of week when we answer the questions you’re to drunk or shy to ask…This question comes from Mark: Am I not supposed to drink out of the little straws that come with my gin and tonic? Does that mark me as a total doofus? Are they strictly for stirring? Am I supposed to remove them from my drink? Is it ok to take a few straw sips first, or can I just drink the whole thing by means of the straws? Or is it all just totally off-limits for any male with self-respect?I struggle with this all the time. OK, that’s overstating it. I think about it occasionally when I order certain drinks on the rocks that come with a straw or two. Drinking out of the short straws you receive with a highball generally classifies you as either slightly uncool or a sorority girl, be it on the innocuous level of eating the maraschino cherry or a guy ordering a pink drink. You’re supposed to use them to stir, and then remove them from the drink. I don’t know how many people judge you on this except for bartenders, and I don’t know which of us even actively does that, and should you really care? Watch people receive a drink on the rocks and you’ll see a definite low-level confusion and awkwardness these straws cause among patrons. Some people stir them obsessively the entire time a drink sits in front of them. Others absentmindedly get them stuck up their nose or stab their lip when they sip without looking. If I didn’t get one or two of these straws in my drink, however, I’d be upset.Technically, it may not be the urbane thing to do, to use these straws as intended, but I find they help me better taste certain drinks, especially one that’s more mixer than alcohol, like your gin and tonic. Take a screwdriver or bloody mary for example, stir it and drink off the top, and it always tastes watered down to me. I get too much mixer and melted ice. I keep stirring drinks like this as I drink them, to make sure I get the mix the bartender intended. I try to drink from the lip, but I usually end up using the straw to drink from the middle because when I order a margarita, I really want to be hit with that holy troika of the sharp, sweet lime, a bit of salt and the herbal heat of tequila. So I use the straw, and I don’t care what anyone thinks, and neither should you. Got a question for the bartender? Email me at mdutton@seattleweekly.com.