Well, I walked out of work
And I was tired as hell
Another day come and gone oh well
Somewhere there's a drink with my name on it
Thus starts the finish of my Monday night, 11/23/09. I'm nearing the tail end of a week of double shifts -- 9-5 at the old job, 5-? at the regular job, grit your teeth and hold onto something so you don't fall down.
It's 1:16 a.m. I'm at the office working on a widget that's due Tuesday night, trying to get it as far along as possible before I leave. Upstairs, my colleague Stan (all names changed from here on out except when I cannot resist) is working on a widget of his own. It's our most important widget of the season, and it's due in less than an hour. I text him:
I'm referring to one of the many undistinguished and indistinguishable watering holes that line the streets near our office. Stan is a guy who enjoys a good end-of-day beer as much as I do, so I know he'll find it hard to resist, no matter the hour.
He delivers his widget just before deadline and joins me on the 4th floor. Robbie, the widget fabricator I'd been working with, also agrees to come along. Robbie often works the late shift and apparently working the late shift means sometimes going across the street to The Bar -- because each time I've gone there with Robbie he's been on a first name basis with every bartender.
The Bar: it's roughly one step up from a Blarney Stone -- aggressively Irish and pretty dirty and lacking in any specific charm. Not too tough but you wouldn't be surprised if somebody punched you in the back of the head while you were taking a piss. Its claim to fame: the food is edible and the staff is a hoot and it's less than 400 feet from our office door. Plus, stuff seems to happen there. So it has become our local bar, for lack of a better one.
So now it's 2:30, and we head out into the night for our 390 foot walk to The Bar. We cross 3rd avenue, and Jimmy, one of the friendly off-the-boat Irish bartenders, is pacing outside the bar.
"Did you happen to see a fella in an overcoat over that way?" he asks us. I say no, Stan says no, but Robbie says maybe he did.
"The fucker just broke my window," Jimmy says.
We look and sure enough there is a nice big hole in the window, about the size of a loaf of bread. Jimmy fills us in: apparently a businessman came in a few minutes earlier, pie-eyed, and ordered a drink. Jimmy refused to serve him, giving him a glass of water instead. The Drunk finished his water, then walked outside and hailed a taxi. He opened the taxi door, pivoted, and hurled his pint glass back at the bar, smashing the window. He then leaped into the taxi and ordered the driver to floor it. It was the perfect getaway plan, except for one unforeseen complication: the light was red and the cab could not move. Out of The Bar rushed Jimmy, and with all his strength he pried The Drunk from the backseat. A tussle ensued, and somehow The Drunk wriggled free and scampered away.
Which catches us up to the moment when we arrive. Robbie says, yeah, maybe we saw a drunk-looking business dude back that way, and we all turn and look in that general direction. As if on cue, here comes The Drunk, wandering cluelessly back towards 3rd avenue, back towards the scene he just caused and the beating he narrowly avoided.
"That's him," says Jimmy, then pauses for a second. He looks the three of us over, then asks, "Which one of ya is the fastest?"
We all look at each other and shake our heads. No, no, no. We are not going to chase down The Drunk for him. We tell Jimmy so, and then I add, looking at The Drunk, "I think you can catch him, Jimmy."
At this point The Drunk is walking away from us, up 3rd avenue, and he's about 150 or 200 feet away. He seems to realize where he is, and glances back over his shoulder at us, assessing his own danger level. It's like that moment in a nature film when the wounded antelope is drinking from the stream but also keeping tabs on a group of nearby lions out of the corner of his eye. He thinks maybe he's OK, maybe he's far enough away, the lions appear to be resting...but he knows he's not in the clear.
"Jimmy, look at him, he's weaving, he can barely stand. You can catch him," I say. Jimmy doesn't look like much of a sprinter, but still I believe what I'm saying.
"Robbie, mind The Bar," Jimmy says, then begins a surprisingly graceful gallop across 3rd avenue and up towards The Drunk.
Robbie goes inside to mind The Bar, leaving Stan and I standing there to watch Jimmy and The Drunk. Jimmy catches him at the corner of 45th and 3rd, and they begin arguing. They are still within sight but out of earshot. The Drunk tries to bull his way past Jimmy and the tussle is on. They are grappling and shoving and finally they go down to the sidewalk together, awkwardly. Jimmy has the upper hand, The Drunk is really trying just to squirm away, but we feel guilty leaving Jimmy all alone, and we also fear he may beat The Drunk up so badly that the cops end up arresting the wrong man.
Stan, who had just returned from a trip to North Carolina early Monday morning, says, "I better go make sure he stays out of trouble. Will you take my suitcases inside The Bar?"
So I take the suitcases inside The Bar and what a scene it is. If 5pm is happy hour, we need an entirely new term for 2:37 am. It's the hour of possibility, it's the hour of despair, it's the hour of regret, it's the hour of elation, it's the hour to play the fool and take a chance and ruin a good thing. It's the countdown to last call and it's your last chance to get out before it's too late. I've been a part of that pivotal hour so many times, and I always end up on the short end. But I don't recall ever being stone sober as I find myself on this night in this Bar.
In this Bar, there are about ten people. All men, I believe. All drunk. All staring into space or talking too close and too loud. Harmless sad sacks for the most part, but two characters will eventually stand out. I will get to them in a minute.
I head to the back of The Bar with Stan's suitcases. Robbie is sitting dutifully near the part of The Bar where the bartenders exit and enter, and I ask him if in the absence of any actual bar employees he's empowered to get us a drink. He says probably but I can tell he's a little uncomfortable with the idea so I don't push it. We wait for Stan for about 2 minutes and then I decide maybe it's best if I go see what happened with The Drunk.
I go back outside and I see them in the distance, the three of them on the corner of 45th and 3rd. I jog over and survey the scene: The Drunk is pancake flat in the gutter with Jimmy's knee in his back, holding him down. Stan is standing on The Drunk's jacket to make it even more certain that he can't get away. The Drunk is drunk alright, he's hollering and squirming but somehow not slurring his words.
"This is ridiculous," he says. "Are you really sitting on me like this? I'm well within my rights to punch you in the face."
"Nobody's punching anybody," Stan says, foot on jacket.
"Get off me!" says The Drunk. "I'm gonna start recording this. I'm recording this!"
I can tell I'd hate this guy even if he was sober. I ask if anyone has called the cops, Stan says yes.
"I'm recording this! You guys are in trouble!" says The Drunk.
The cops arrive, Jimmy explains the situation, they haul off The Drunk. The three of us walk back to The Bar. This marks the end of any real action in this story.
We get back to The Bar, Jimmy gives the three of us a beer on the house for our help. We play some music from the internet jukebox. Why don't I love internet jukeboxes more? Why do I crave the limitations of an old fashioned jukebox?
There are four men in a group talking. One of them says, "Now I don't mind being the sausage...I just don't want to be the only sausage." They all mutter a few things...there seems to be some sort of low-key disagreement or negotiation going on.
At the center of this negotiation is a one-of-a-kind creature who goes by the name of Mossimo. I am not changing his name because I don't think it's his actual name. He was just introducing himself to everyone who would listen: "I am Mossimo." The easiest way to describe Mossimo would be: if
Mango had a gayer cousin, it would be Mossimo.
You often hear homophobic comments like, "I don't care if they're gay...I just don't want them rubbing it in my face." A lot of straightish dudes seem to have the irrational fear that gay men want to seduce them and have sex with them. It's ignorant and small-minded and there's just no place for that kind of thinking. Get over yourselves, straight dudes: most gay men have far better stuff to do than try to convert you to a life of homosexuality.
But then there is Mossimo.
Mossimo is not helping America become a more tolerant place, he is not changing opinions or enlightening the closed-minded. He is 5 foot 4 inches of flaming stereotype. He needs love and sex and he will take it wherever he can get it. In the 45 minutes we hang out with him, he throws himself at every man in The Bar (and yes, it did cross my mind that maybe The Bar becomes a gay bar after a certain hour, in which case: my bad, Mossimo), straight or gay. He flirts with Robbie, who is fascinated by people and cannot get enough Mossimo. Mossimo gets Robbie to put the Pussycat Dolls on the jukebox (hmm...perhaps I am realizing what I don't love about bottomless jukeboxes), and Mossimo sings and dances and puts on an incredible display of so-over-the-top-you-wouldn't-believe-it-if-you-saw-it-in-a-bad-movie gayness.
At one point, Mossimo decides that he wants to make a play for Stan, who like Robbie and myself is married and straight. Mossimo asks Robbie if he can think of a celebrity who Stan resembles; apparently this is his go-to entry line. Stan has red hair, so Robbie decides to be a dick and says "Carrot Top." Mossimo apparently has no idea who Carrot Top is, and approaches Stan with a "Hey Carrot Top...how you doing?" Stan is perfectly willing to be friendly with Mossimo, but tells him to cut out the Carrot Top business. Mossimo retreats temporarily, then returns moments later with "Hey Carrot Head...why you don't wanna talk to me?"
So that is Mossimo. Then there is Kevin.
Kevin is a 50 year-old Irishman, drunk beyond all possible reason, and he simply won't stop talking. In his leather jacket and skinny tie, he'd be sort of dashing if it was 1982. Kevin is a genius, Kevin is a celebrity, Kevin is an intellectual, Kevin is an M.D. and a PhD, Kevin has been at the center of every significant global event of the last 30 years...according to Kevin. His favorite maneuver is to quote a line of poetry, get lost in the middle, then stare at you as if he's about to throw a punch. Then he'll say, "Fuck you!" before smiling and saying, "Yeah, baby!" He pulls this about ten times. In the hour I sit with him, he drinks 4 big glasses of whiskey and I'm guessing they were the last 4 of maybe 24.
He's obnoxious but somehow keeps redeeming himself with some tidbit of fascinating information or a good story. Here are a few of Kevin's conversational highlights:
-He says he taught Shakespeare in Cambridge. "Yeah, Harvard," he says as if someone forced him to admit it. He claims to be one of the best Shakespeare professors in the world -- his words.
-He says that he really wrote the screenplay for "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" and that while he loved his good friend Hunter S. Thompson, Thompson's substance abuse problems were out of control.
-He is also friends with Johnny Depp. In fact, Johnny and his wife Vanessa rented Kevin's flat from him when they first moved in together in Paris.
-He tells a long and winding story about Depp, which is just getting interesting when Kevin delivers the last minute of it in French. None of us speak French, but we nod politely. He then laughs out loud and says, "Johnny's a cool guy, man."
-He claims that he once owned two prominent newspapers.
-He alternates every few minutes between "Don't you fucking know who I am?" and "Don't you know who the fuck I am?"
-At first he says that The Drunk is lucky that the cops were called, because it's an Irish bar and usually the Irish just kill people for stuff like that. Then he says, "Wait...that's not true. All violence is terrible" as if he is being quoted. (Now I guess he is.)
-He shakes his head in disgust when Stan tells him his family is originally from County Cork. When I tell him my Irish last name, he just stares at me as if my people have been stealing food from sick babies for 1000 years. He hates us but cannot stop talking to us.
-He demands to know our favorite poets, and it turns out that he means Irish poets only.
-He says that in his work for the United Nations, he negotiated a transfer of power in an African country that technically made him the President of that country for approximately 12 hours.
-He sort of offers me something -- it's not clear if it is drugs or sex, but when I decline, he says, "Yeah, not that I'm into that anyway but I guess some people here are."
-At one point I ask him his full name and he tells me, and I type it into my phone for future reference.
So that is Kevin.
Around 3:30 I decide I better leave, with another double-shift looming in just a few hours. It's been one of the most memorable and, in its own bizarre way, thrilling bar hours in my life.
When I wake up in the morning I google Kevin. I confirm that he ran two newspapers and taught at Harvard. He is currently a big shot at the UN.
Johnny Depp is unavailable for comment.
Replacements,
"If Only You Were Lonely," 1981.
Labels: drinkin', Mossimo, the bar
Time for the annual end of year/beginning of year post. This end/beginning of year, like most, finds me in Southern California, which is better than it could be. Everything's better than it could be.
