Tuesday, March 18, 2008

ST. PATRICK'S DAY RECAP: THANK GOD IT'S OVER.

St. Patrick's Day has come and gone. Thankfully, the day went relatively hassle-free and no one got hurt during the day-long drinkfest. First thing I realize is that as far as St. Patrick's Days go, this one wasn't nearly as busy as last year's. Maybe a huge part of that was because last year, St. Patrick's Day fell on a Saturday while this year's holiday fell on a Monday. Who wants to go buckwild when you know that you have to wake up early for work the next day? There were some notable things, however, that caught my attention during the course of the day. For starters:

THAT DAY BARTENDER GUY (better known as LABEL DROPPER) is a man who truly loves himself. It's comical to listen to him heap praise onto himself throughout the day; it's even funnier to watch everyone roll their eyes whenever he does. Especially my barback, NACHO LIBRE.

Take a wild guess as to who our first customer of the day was (at 10:10am to be precise)? Yup, none other than TURBO, who strolled in with a rather subtle outfit. He ended up hanging out for a while, chatting up startled tourists in between pints of Black Cherries.

These two cuties were our first female patrons of the day. When they came in, I couldn't help but to have high hopes for the rest of the day. Instead, I ended up seeing a lot of drunken, sloppy bitties, exhibiting loud obnoxious behavior most of the afternoon. Fabulous.

Speaking of loud, obnoxious behavior, here's something that's been bugging my ass for the past few years (Anyone with true knowledge of the Irish/European culture, please, PLEASE help me out here): What is it about Irish folks straight from the motherland that cause them to have such a chip on their shoulders whenever they are asked for proof of age? It seems that more often than not, whenever I ask someone from Ireland for proof of age, they immediately go on the defensive and want to challenge you to a fight? As if I'm challenging their manhood or something?

Last night on at LEAST three separate occasions during the course of the night I came across a group of guys visiting from Ireland. All three times I got threatened with violence simply because I either A.) Refused entry into the bar because they didn't have ID. B.) Refused entry into the the bar because of drunkenness of a member of their group. It's like this huge chip forms on the shoulders of these "tourists" and why? If you don't have your ID or if you decide to show up to a bar drunk as a funky skunk, it's not my fault that you couldn't get in. So take a chill pill and take it down a notch. It's nothing personal. Jeez.

And what's the deal with those folks who want to act like "Big Money Grip" and buy drinks for everyone..... then blow a gasket when they get their bill? If you are going to insist on buying rounds of drinks for every Tom, Dickhead and or Harriet, then as my man James Brown used to say, "You got to pay the cost to be the boss"..... .

Then there's the JACKASS of the DAY. It seems (yet again) that every St. Patrick's Day produces a lot of candidates for this "honor". Within that group of idiots, one person usually stand out from the bunch. This year's winner is an employee of the City of New York (I'm sure you can probably figure out which department this person works with).

From the moment he got out of the cab, this guy had trouble written all over him. Surly, dismissive, rude, obnoxious.... And that was even before he got into the bar. At one point the bar was pretty crowded and the front windows were opened to get some air flow into the place. Next thing you know, JACKASS decided that he didn't want to stay in the bar anymore. So instead of placing his beer on the bar and leaving out of the front door, like most normal human beings, this JACKASS decides he'll circumvent things by jumping out of the front window, beer in hand.

So of course, I go after him and take the beer from him and proceeded to give him an earful about his stupid stunt. He decides to challenge myself and BIG BLACK as well as FIRE MARSHALL ED. Words were exchanged, at which JACKASS decided that he was going to challenge FIRE MARHSALL ED again (Now you know he wasn't going to get away with that). Keep in mind that he's in a public situation with PLENTY of witness to boot. Eventually JACKASS is dragged into a waiting cab and they drive off. What a JACKASS. It's people like that who gives his profession a bad name.

The rest of the day was filled with interesting characters doing interesting things, all under the guise of alcohol. As I write this update, I realize that my nerves are frazzled, my knees are throbbing, my feet hurt like hell and I smell of dry beer. Why do I put myself through this year after year?


















I think that I realize that all damnation aside, I enjoy running into old friends that tend to come out on special days such as St. Patrick's Day. The mini-reunions that take place make it worth my while, although I will still say that I'm glad that this day only comes once a year.


Now that the holiday has come and gone, next on the list of fun events for this week is tonight's ELEPHANT PARADE. Ringling Brothers is back in town and to ring in the event, the traditional Marching of the Elephants to Madison Square Garden takes place TONIGHT at approximately midnight. As always, we host our ELEPHANT PARADE PARTY where fanatics partake in dollar mugs of Bud and Bud Light while waiting for the parade to begin. It's a sight to see. I don't know what's more amazing: The large elephants marching up 34th street, or the fanatics who go running after them. Check it out for yourself.


Nuff said.