Saturday, February 18, 2006

WHAT A LONG STRANGE TRIP THAT WAS...

Last night was one of the more bizarre nights i've experienced in quite a while. The evening started out with a bang when during the course of a pretty busy happy hour we realized that our barback was a no-show. Of course, that naturally means all hands on deck, which worried me a bit. I had scheduled to work BLONDE CHATTERBOX, who (when focused), can ring a mean register but hates to get her nails wet; And BROOKLYN PAULIE, a relative newcomer to the staff. He's been filling in as a bouncer/bartender, depending on where he's needed on a specific day. So far he seems to be catching on well to the routine of our bar, but I couldn't help but to worry anyway. Without the barback to take care of the bussing duties, I was concerned that he wouldn't know where everything was.

Happy Hour was pretty steady until about 9pm when the bar suddenly cleared out. In a way it was cool because it gave us an opportunity to catch up on cleaning glasses, getting the bar set for the rest of the night, etc. It was at this point where the night began to take some interesting twists and turns.

First off, we had an issue with one of the toilets in the ladies room. We had to replace one of the toilet bowls because the old one somehow got a large crack in it, causing it to leak whenever someone flushed it. So we get the toilet replaced, only to still have a minor problem with the water pressure- thus causing the toilet to flood whenever you flushed it. Now mind you, when the plumber told me that the toilet would overflow if you flushed it, I didn't realize how much it would overflow until I decided (in my infinite wisdom) to demonstrate it with THE DON standing there. WOOSH!.. the water started cascading like a water fountain and both THE DON and I rolled our eyes. After about 15 minutes of swabbing the deck, I finally got the water cleaned up. We finally figured out (after some consulting with experts) what the problem was and should have it resolved sometime over the weekend.

If that wasn't enough, we get a visit from a group of Irish guys; you know the "genuine article" from the motherland; not the Americanized version. They kind of bum rushed their way into the bar as I was coming up the stairs, so I walked over to the group and asked for ID. Some of the lads were cooperative, the others.... not so much. A few of them began to make comments towards me about hassling them, which in turn, shifted to not-so-nice comments involving the dreaded "n-word". At that point, I'd had enough and asked them to leave. That of course didn't work as they began to get even more obnoxious. I said rather bluntly that if they didn't leave the bar immediately, the police would be called. Now keep in mind, there are about 6-7 of them, loud, obnoxious and drunk, and one of me; I ain't stupid enough to try to get into a physical match with them.

So I walk outside and ironically enough, there are about four police cars parked in front of the bars down the block. I calmly walked down the block and asked one of the policemen if they would assist me in getting out a group of drunk Irishmen. One of the cops turned to me and said "Did you say Irish?". I said yes and next thing you know, about ten cops took off towards the bar. They went inside and made the whole group come out of the bar and forced them to stand out in the cold for about 45 minutes while they checked out their ID's and passports. It turns out the same group of hooligans had just been kicked out of every bar on the block and they dipped into our place, probably to hide from the cops. They were seething with anger towards me as they waited to learn of their fate with the police. In essence, they were trying to blame us (namely me) for them getting into trouble. Meanwhile, had they simply left the bar when they were initially asked, they wouldn't have been in the shitstorm they created for themselves. I gotta be honest- It was all I could do to bite my tongue, I was that annoyed.

At the end of it all, they each got a summons from the cops and told to get out of the neighborhood or they'd be arrested. They left the area.... only to get pinched less than five minutes later for threatening another doorman at one of the other bars on the block. Oy vey....

The bar filled up again after midnight and pretty much stayed steady until closing time. Amongst the people who made it to the late shift: MADAME X. She came in, looking for a drink special (as she always does). When she didn't find any, she stayed for a GUINNESS or two anyways. And she seemed to be on the prowl because in between fits of laughter, she was making eye contact with almost any male that would pay attention to her. At one point, she even had her eyes locked in on one of the CUSACK BOYS. When he realized that, he bid a hasty retreat, not wanting to become the latest victim of the MADAME...

So after all of the bizarre events of the evening, my bartenders and I were relieved to have survived the evening with nothing more than pruned fingers from cleaning so many glasses and such. Kudos for a job well done!

I'm beat. I'm outta here.

NUFF SAID