Watering Hole: Linda’s Tavern (the kind with liquor), 707 E. Pine St., Capitol HillBooze Wrangler: Emily DentonPick Yer Poison: “I don’t drink.”Wait, wha….? “I’m like the only bartender that doesn’t drink. I could make you an Italian Soda.”Feeling admittedly a little disappointed, I offer to take her up on it. But then Denton blinks. Fearing that syrup and soda will be featured in this column, much to the chagrin of Linda’s owners, she comes back with a Mexi-Driver.”It’s our signature drink,” she explains, surmising that were she to drink, she would probably down one of these. It’s pretty straightforward: orange juice, pineapple juice, Hornitos and lime. Sitting on a bar stool next to a friend who hails from my teenage years, I observe: “It’s like high school.” Something about just combining booze with citrus always brings back a certain chemistry group project where the time spent waiting for the glue to dry on our baking-soda-powered vessel and an unlocked liquor cabinet led to my first encounter with a screw-driver. But I digress.Brendan and I then discussed the merits of tequila–he doesn’t like it, followed by him ordering a different cocktail from Melissa, a different barkeep who does drink, asking only that it not have tequila. She made him a pretty watery peach Stoli with muddled lime.Neither of the drinks was particularly impressive by any standards of cocktail excellence, but they both had a certain je ne sais quoi. Maybe it was the company–the tequila debate turned to a rousing dissection of religion. Or perhaps it was the moment of high school nostalgia. Or it may have been nothing more than the lark that is a bartender who doesn’t actually touch the stuff. Whatever it was, I left in a great mood. And given the choice between a great cocktail in a snooty bar and a Mexi-Driver at Linda’s, more often than not, I’ll take the latter.