Gin and Soda

Carlton is "married." Damnit. This is what I was told last night by my other bartender, Chris. He just happened to mention "Carlton's wife." (Note that I said "my other bartender," as if the other patrons in the bar are merrily borrowing them from me.) Carlton was there but wasn't working, apparently having been off the clock for an hour or two but was hanging out with friends. He came up to me eventually and was talking about how he lived in Dallas, blah blah, and "his girlfriend" blah blah they live together blah blah......so, it's been one of those long term things, apparently, and Chris being a man associates long term with "marriage." Wew, I can still dream naughty things about him without guilt! The dance continues. He talked to my friend and me for a while tonight. I had never been on the same side of the bar with him before, and in addition to my gin and soda, I was drinking in everything that was him. A sweet thing. He just bought a classic Mustang...I told him I was a classic Chevy person. He's a republican, I'm a democrat. Oh well, never the two shall meet. It was difficult to concentrate on what he said, as I couldn't help but stare at his lips.....grrrrrr. He mentioned having a dream about me last night, something about me reading a book, as I oftentimes do at the bar when I'm not meeting someone. Our conversation progressed, I asked him something about college, and then suddenly he was gone. Zip zagging away as usual. Maybe I'll learn more next time. On a side note, the manager Paul was talking to us frequently as well. Seriously, I should just get a part-time job at this place. But anyway, he hands my friend and me our bills, and she notices that one of my gin and sodas is on her bill. So we point this out to him and he takes them both back. I had eaten and had three drinks, we were there for about four hours. The ticket I returned to him was for $18.50, but when he handed back the new one he had comped everything but one drink and my bill was now $3.50. My girlfriend and I just sort of gasped and then looked at each other's bills...he had done the same thing to both. No reason, no explanation, he just winked and said "See you next time." God, I LOVE this bar....

Have you heard that song? The "Mmmm-mmm-mmm-mmm, I love this bar" song? It's by Toby Keith. Sexy sound. I love that song because I completely know what he's singing about. That home away from home kind of place where you feel like Norm and recognize people. We all love bars. Who doesn't? Well, I guess people who don't drink. We feel sorry for those people.

Sure, I love the bar. But the reason why I love the bar is the bartender. It's a known fact that the more you frequent a drinking establishment and the more the bartender gets to know you, the less he starts charging you for the drinks. It's extremely handy. I am female, however. That must lend its benefits. Regardless, I've got these two main places I go to in town. I go for the atmosphere, sure, but most importantly because I can sit down and have a drink within 3.5 seconds without ever ordering. At one place in particular, I only get charged for every other drink. It's sweet.

I dated a bartender once. My friends and I always went to this same country joint in Austin. Every Friday night, dancing the night away. We were super buff back then. We worked out, hard, Monday through Thursday at the gym. Sweat pouring down the stair-climber, upping the weights to a heavier set for fewer, harder repititions. And then on Friday we danced. We did not go there to pick up men...actually, I was the only non-married one. We went there to dance. All night. And then one day this hotty bartender was there. He was hot. Hahhhhhhhht. I flirted for over a year across that bar. I had already decided to move out of Austin for a job when we all went dancing one night. He and I met in the bathroom hallway, him coming out, me going in. And he gave me "that look" and touched my oh-so-flat and tight tummy that was peeking out of my shirt (it was the style, you know). Just a quick touch, as he passed by. It was one of those moments when everything stops, and you're only aware of the two of you. I melted. It was very quick, and then he was gone down the hall, back to work. I stayed until closing that night, and we kissed on his driveway as I dropped him off at home. His roommate had borrowed his car. Convenient. We dated for two and half years. My family was thrilled when they first heard about him. We're Irish. We love all bartenders. But eventually the two of us changed and went our seperate ways. We still e-mail. He's married now and lives in New York.

So this other regular place I go to now in Fort Worth has a hottie bartender. His name is Carlton. An old-fashioned name, but you've got to admit that it's hot. He's not an actual, datable kind of guy. He's a safe, "I just want to look at you and drink my gin really slow" kind of guy. The "I'm just going to do naughty things to you in my mind so we never have to date and break up and realize we wasted our time" kind of guy. Besides, he's younger than me, a Republican, and is, well, a bartender. I don't know much else about him. He could be a nuclear physicist for all I know, but I'm thinking he's just a bartender. He talked about college tonight, about being in a play once. I learn these short, fleeting facts about him now and again. He moves so fast while working...I only get these short sentences out of him and then he's rushing down to the other end, filling drinks, serving food.

And this is all perfect. For I don't want to know much more. I go to be with my friends, to have great conversation, eat good food, and to watch that sexy little thing zig and zag all around that bar. Well, and to flirt outloud in a naughty way now and again. He just smiles. You'd do the same, I'm sure.

Liquor makes people do funny things. Well, of course, there are the not so funny things... like driving your car into a ditch or over your cat in the driveway. Or, even worse things. But all in all, we get a little ballsy when we're tipsy and we do things we wouldn't do otherwise...and funny things happen.

Take my friend Matt, for example. He was singing and dancing on top of a table in a Houston bar last week. This weekend, he ticked off a large, burly boyfriend of this girl that he chose to dance with, who subsequently decided to make out with Matt's neck. Matt, obviously, allowed the neck-make-out to ensue, and thus burly boyfriend caused a "bar scene." Even better, two weeks ago this "older woman" came on to him pretty hard in a bar. They got to talking, she said she was from "deep Europe" and that her name was Rossette. Eventually ol' Ross got tipsy crazy and suddenly yelled, "I hate women!" and some other expletives that even I can't write down. Come to find out, good looking older woman was really a heavily make-uped man in a dark bar. Funny shit.

A couple of years ago I went to a favorite bar with a girlfriend of mine. It was a Tuesday night, I think, but we didn't care and ended up drinking more than expected and having hours of great conversation. She's a lesbian, which lent for even more colorful conversation once our inhibitions were down. Because, let's face it...when you get to really drinking and talking, you're going to talk about sex. It's like an unsaid rule of drinking. And I don't mean sex jokes. I mean you talk about sex. So, this guy that we now call "Moby Dick Man" was sitting close to us at the bar reading, of course what else, Moby Dick. He's there a lot, always alone and always reading. Moby Dick was his companion for quite a while. But that night, sitting closeto my friend and me, I noticed he hadn't flipped a page in a looong time. So I quietly signaled my friend in that sly way that only girls can do, and we sauced up the lesbian conversation just for fun. He got an earful.

So I saw Moby Dick man Friday night. He only had a newspaper with him. He circled the bar at least five times, as there wasn't an open seat, and I guess he thought that if he just circled it onnnnne more time that a seat would be available. He always sits at the bar. It must have been pretty stressful for him.

Anyway, my lesbian girlfriend was there, and her partner, and Matt. We drank a couple and then headed downtown. Ended up in an Irish pub, McIntires, though the only thing Irish about it was the neon sign in the front window. We find a spot at the end of the bar right in front of one of those dollar trivia game machines. So, naturally we have to play trivia. And since I've been drinking, I of course put in the five dollar bill instead of the one. Just a funny little thing you'll do while drinking, spend a lot of money. Luckily for Matt and the lesbians, there was "Erotic Trivia." And I say lucky for them because every now and again when we got a question right a picture of a naked woman popped up on the screen. Much cheering was had. And I'm sure much talking was going on among the group of frat boys that were standing behind us. Ahhh....just another night on the town.

So, in sharing with others that I've started a blog, I've learned something very important. No one gives a shit about my blog. Or blogs in general, for that matter. Well sure, if you're the Rude Pundit or something (http://rudepundit.blogspot.com), then people what to read your blog. But if you're just some normal person with self-adulating dreams of being reeeeeally interesting, you're one in a million. Only your mom will call you and tell you how great it is. Figures.

So I've been to a couple of happy hours since my first posting, and to my surprise, nothing really interesting happened. Usually when you get together liquor and, well, anybody, something entertaining is bound to happen. But not to disappoint, I do have something to write about. (Hi mom.) Last night interesting things happened that caused me to NEED to drink, so I'll talk about that.

I don't have children. Maybe some day I'll be lucky enough to be married to someone who is totally dedicated to family, and together we'll start one based on love and commitment. But for now, I just get to watch other people with their kids and wonder what it's like, or take notes on what I don't want it to be like.

Which brings me to my very important point....what if you have kids and they're fucking ugly? I met two of the ugliest kids on the planet last night, and amazingly and horrifically, they were related. I mean, what's the chance that BOTH of your kids will scare rocks back into the dirt?

I was taken to this play performed by 120 students of a "summer theatre camp." At one point, the woman next to me taps me on the shoulder and says, "That's my son." Good God woman, why do you point him out to people?! The kid is only around 10, so hopefully he'll grow out of it, but daaaaaaaang.

His mother is the typical Texas soccer mom...very pretty, long blond hair, manicured nails. The father is less handsome than she is, but not "fugly." I tried my best not to stare at this kid during the show. LIke it would have really been obvious in an audience of 500 and a cast of 120 where I was staring. But it was kind of like when you're at a social event and in walks some women with huge boobs that she's barely covering up with a dishcloth of a shirt, and you don't want to look because you are a straight female, but she's obviously wearing that shirt because she wants people to look, so you do your best to nonchalantly stare at them several times. (If you're male, take out the "nonchalant" part.)

So the show ends and I'm chatting with parents of dog face and up walks the 13 year old daughter. Holy CRAP she's ugly. GOD, how is it POSSIBLE that these two people spawned these rodents? It's like every microscopic aspect of possible ugliness from the parents all got together for a party on these two kids' faces. Minutes pass, and the instructions in my head become deafening, "Exit promptly and consume large quantity of gin."

Which is what I did, of course. It was difficult eating my breaded and baked orange roughy to not compare it to those kids' faces, but the dirty martini helped me smile. Here's a toast to not having kids yet. Ooh, and here's another toast to having another drink. Wew.

There were, however, some nice moments during the show. It was quite trite, and haphazardly put together, but some of the music and singing was actually quite beautiful. There were several themes throughout, about love and loss (the show was dedicated to an 18 year old who died from cancer), parents and kids, things like that. The one line that really stood out to me was during a song about how life isn't really much without love.

A little girl sang, "Can you still dance, even when you are far away?"

I smiled and closed my eyes. Yes...yes, you can.