In the Event that You Want Another Drink
It’s probably best that if you want another drink, you don’t remind me of the time that friend of yours didn’t realize he was supposed to blow out his flaming shot of chartreuse before he downed it and then proceeded to spill it and light the table on fire.
It’s also a decent idea not to bring up the Halloween that you wore a children’s superhero costume and were left at the end of the night sitting on a bar stool in your underwear and a wife beater, only your thin eighteen-year-old forearms still covered by the leftover shreds of said costume. It’s not that I won’t serve someone who’s dressed inappropriately (I do it for the recently divorced all the time. To the 55-year-old guy in a fedora: I know what you’re doing. It isn’t working on me or anyone else in here.) it’s just that you’re likely to get fewer beverages because I don’t exactly trust your judgement.
In fact, it’s probably a good idea that if you’ve ever done anything of a suspicious nature in the bar where I work (for example: starting a fistfight, brought a particularly horrible friend along that swore at me last time, or cried (and loudly too)), that you just not mention it in hopes that I’ve forgotten.
I would also advise against yelling at me or telling anyone else in the room to fuck off—the quickest way to get rid of a problem that’s on fire (especially one that walks in already drunk from somewhere else) is to not to pour booze on it and hope it goes out on its own. Remember that as a waitress pretty much the only power that I have is to not serve you (or to lick your straw before I bring out your glass—which is always an empty victory unless I tell you about it), and so if you make me squeamish right away I’m going to exercise that right.
If there are any drugs in your system you probably shouldn’t mention them. The same thing goes for if you’re waiting for your dealer. I realize that cocaine makes you think that you’re a sparkling conversationalist, but this isn’t small talk right now. It’s a felony. I will quickly go from thinking, “Geez, he has fantastic pupils,” to thinking, “I need to get this guy out of here.”
And if you really want that second martini, don’t comment on my physical failings. I don’t care if you’re on a terrible blind date right now and the woman next to you would rather that you died before the end of the night than spend the rest of it with you. Do not try and deflect from yourself by picking me apart as some odd manner of validating her. That’s your last cocktail, you’ve done this to yourself, and I’m about to call you a cab. Actually, I’m going to call you two cabs. Because if I don’t your date runs the risk of murdering you too.
Under the Bridge. Bratislava, Slovakia 2015