Sunday, August 2, 2009

THE WACKNESS.... (long post)

That's how I would clarify Saturday. It was one of those days that sucked from the time I woke up until the moment my head hit the pillow.

The day started out with a phone call from MR. LOW-KEY, one of the regulars. Normally I don't answer the phone in the midst of sleep but if it's from a good friend then I'll make an exception. As it turns out I should have let the call go to voicemail. I answer the phone and he immediately puts someone on the phone. It turns out to be the voice of a former employee, a nice enough young lady with a barrel full of issues and a satchel full of drama. She said that she came by the night before to see me, but I wasn't around. So she came back again to say what's up. I found that to be a bit odd and unusual, so something must be up. So I went to the bar and met up with her.

As I suspected, she began telling me about the drama in her life and it was a lot of stuff to take on so early in the day. We talked for a few more minutes and I finally had to leave because the stories weren't adding up or making sense, so I took that as my cue step away. I wished her luck in her situation and left the bar. As it turns out, she did have a shitload of drama come her way and thankfully I wasn't around for the brunt of it. Or so I thought.

As I went to prepare for the night shift, I got a visit from our friend from earlier in the day. She looked as if she had a few in her and was also visibly upset. She wanted to hang out in the bar for a bit and since it was quiet for the moment, I allowed it (against my better judgement). So while I was running around taking care of some other issues, she ordered a drink. When I saw that she had a drink I cursed to myself; I forgot to give the bartenders the heads up on not serving her. So I went over and instructed them to make sure not to give her any more alcohol. So A.M., my female bartender went to collect money for the drink; Our dear friend wanted to start a tab so A.M. asked for a credit card and a driver's license, the standard procedure for opening up a bar tab.

Next thing you know, "our friend" screams at me at the top of her voice, "Are you fucking kidding me?! Don't she know I used to work here?" (I hate when people do that, by the way). I told her to relax, that A.M. was following standard procedure. She begrudgingly gave up the credentials and grumbled under her breath. She was relatively cool for awhile, chatting up some poor guy's ear while I hoped that some of her friends would hurry up and pick her up (we got a phone call from her friends saying that they would pick her up). She goes to the bathroom and after a few minutes, she returns and gather up her things to leave.

Now looking back in hindsight, what I should have done was let her leave. She's grown up to do her own thing, let her do it. But of course, I listen to my heart and my heart said to keep her at the bar, look out for her until her friends arrive. What the hell was I thinking?

Our friend was cool for a moment, then out of nowhere, she begins BASHING A.M. for no reason at all! Apparently she was still bent out of shape about being asked for her ID, because she began spewing out all of these rude, obnoxious comments that shocked me and everyone else that was sitting around me. I told her to stop it, that she was being rude and obnoxious and she began bitching about how she was a better looking bartender and brought in a crowd and so on. I finally snatched the ID from the bartender, grabbed "our friend" by her hand and snatched her out of the bar, where I proceeded to rip her a new asshole. She tried to justify her actions with such nonsensical gibberish that I finally said "Enough!" and told her she was no longer welcome at the bar. She said she will never come to the bar again and staggered down the street. Sad.

So with that incident kicking off the night, things could only get better. You're talking about The Swanfather here. It doesn't work that way.

We had a reunion party set up for a group that met in college. 20-25 people. They rolled in at about 10 pm and for the most part they were pretty cool. They were having a good time and more or less keeping to themselves. However, with every group there's always one or two bad apples that can screw up a situation. In this case, there was this one guy, a "little fella" who for some reason, kept pushing SULLY T's buttons. If it wasn't one thing, it was something else. And it takes a lot to push this guy's button, he's the most happy-go-lucky fella I know. At one point SULLY T got so fed up with the "little fella" that he refused to serve the guy. Oy vey.

We also had a group of NYPD who were actually pretty cool. They kept to themselves and had a great time, though some of the girls in the group were getting a bit annoying with the song requests on the IPOD. They were actually the highlight of the night.

Then there were the drunken idiots. Yes we get our share every night. It goes with the territory. However, for some reason, on this night we got more idiots than usual. I don't know if it was because it was Saturday and that's when most of the amateur drinkers tend to come out of the closet, but it was a pain in the ass to deal with.

So we're getting close to the end of the night and this group of jerkoffs come into the bar. As it turns out they looked as if they already had a few in them. They go to the bar and the first thing they order is a round of Captain Morgan shots. Who does that? Then another of the idiots tried to steal a bar mat. At that point I knew it was time to cut these guys off. So I went to give the bartenders the "cut" signal (meaning cut them off); Apparently they were on the same page because they had already given the "heave-ho" signal to my door guy and he was in the process of asking the group to leave. Things got interesting from there.

As we go to escort the knuckleheads out of the bar, some friends of the knuckleheads decided to voice their displeasure and next thing you know, what started out as a easy escort out of the bar turns into a full-on melee as the group of knuckeheads and the Third and Long staff (consisting of me, our doorguy, SULLY-T) tumbled out of the bar. I had some gremlin hangin on my neck when out of the blue, CUSACK and AFFLECK made their way into the fracas and pulled the gremlin off of my neck.

Once the smoke cleared, the knuckleheads were screaming at us, egos bruised (among other things) but at least they were out of the bar. They continued to yell and scream when one bystander (who happened to try and break up the first fracas) ended up having words with one of the knuckleheads and next thing you know the four knuckleheads started pummeling him. Of course there aren't any cops around when you need them so I put a call into 9-1-1 to get them here before the poor guy got his ass kicked. Then a funny thing happened.

After about a minute of full-on beating from the knuckleheads, the guy stood up like Hulk Hogan and laughed at them. He began berating them, challenging them to bring their best shot at him. The knuckleheads ran across the street and the guy followed them, yelling the whole time like a mad man. They get across the street and he screamed at them again; not sure what he said to them but next thing you know, the group turned around and hi-tailed it up the block, with the guy in pursuit. It was one of the more bizarre things I'd seen in a long time and brought an ending to a bizarre night.

Oh, it turns out that the guy was a U.S. Marine, just home from Iraq. As for the cops, I'm still waiting for them to arrive.


I hate Saturdays. Bring on Beer Bingo.



Nuff Said