Another week, another story. Don’t be too excited now. I know everyone is just sitting at home and waiting for the next story to come out, right? Like a full time job. Anyhow, let’s get started shall we? Ready, action. It’s Saturday night and I’m at the last bar of the night. It was a goodbye party weekend for one of my dearest friends, so you know what that means, lots of shots. Whenever there’s an actual reason for going out, aka birthday, going away party, etc. shot are always non-negotiable. Otherwise you just look like an asshole. Oh, I know it’s your special day and all, I’m just not feeling it. Shut the fuck up and take your shot. Sorry, getting sidetracked. So, let me say again, it was the last bar of the night, it was late and I’d probably already had too many before I even got to the last bar, because really when you get to that point where you just want to keep going, it’s actually the ideal time to call it a night and go home. But let’s get real, who has the self control to do that? Certainly not me.
Now I was with my roommate whose goodbye party/weekend it was, so she was obviously in even worse shape than me and kept wandering off. So I’m sitting there by myself and I see a guy by the bar scanning the room and I knew automatically he was looking. I tried to busy myself and look anywhere but his direction but to no avail. He was a lion on the hunt and I was the perfect pray. He b-lined it straight to me and introduced himself. I tried (and probably failed) to look enthusiastic but he didn’t seem to care one way or the other. He offered to buy me a drink (those bonus points got him out of the red, maybe) and he went back to the bar to get my drink. Meanwhile two girls came and sat next to me, taking his seat, which I wasn’t terribly concerned about. He came back with my drink and decided the best thing to do was kind of, hover over me, not cute, while asking me the normal get-to-know-you (bar version) questions. He was boring and not particularly attractive with no game, so weirdly enough, he wasn’t drawing my full attention. Particularly since I kept needing to scan the room and make sure my dearest roommate wasn’t passed out somewhere. He left to use the men’s room and a blond, long haired Australian took his place. The Australian got obvious bonus points for his accent and for being attractive. However, he then told me his name, the same as my ex and completely killed any chance he had. Although not his fault and possibly unfair, but really, it’s just weird, right? Also he then started telling me that he was in a band and that they had come to New York and were planning to travel the U.S. for three months to try and make it. I told him I thought that was great and asked him where his tour was taking the band. He replied saying they weren’t actually on a tour and they didn’t have any shows lined up, just that they were gonna travel around to the big cities for three months trying to “make it”. Far be it from me to give anyone career advice but it seems to me that if you really want to make it in the music industry you should probably have a bit more of a plan then going on vacation.
Anyway, at this point the first guy came back and was somewhat outraged by the fact that I was now talking to someone else. He seemed to be under the impression that since he had bought me a drink, he had exclusive rights, or some shit like that. Sorry pal, not quite. I mean one drink, we’re practically dating right? Yeah, no. Mr. One was so persistent in barging into my conversation with Mr. Australian that eventually Mr. Aussie gave up and went to find easier fish to fry. Not that I was all that heartbroken to see him go, but now I was stuck back with Mr. One again and he was way worse than the Australian. The conversation was terrible and he wouldn’t take any of my hints to leave, so eventually I struck up conversation with the two girls who had sat down next to me. They were friendly and we proceeded to all become best friends (the kind you never see again of course). Mr. One kept trying to take part in the conversation but none of us were really having any of that. Finally Mr. One asked me:
“Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Sure” I replied.
“Are you straight, lesbian or bi…” he kind of trailed off as if me being bi was his last hope.
“Oh, I’m a lesbian,” I replied matter-of-factly “I thought you realized that.”
He paused for a moment before asking “Are you sure?”
Ha. Am I sure I’m a lesbian? Either you are dumb or just extremely unobservant with no common sense. Obviously I’m not a lesbian which would mean, or at least hopefully point to the fact that I am not interested in you, at all. Mr. One finally took his leave at that point. I chatted with the two girls until last call and then went to find my roommate, who had been bobbing in and out all evening, and we left. However the evening wasn’t over quite yet. On the train a guy came over and sat next to me, introducing himself as “Grits”. Being drunk and at that point also rather tired, my filter wasn’t working quite as well as usual and so I replied with “Grits, like the southern breakfast cereal? Like cheese-grits?” He was good natured and said yes, exactly like that. I was wearing a bow barrette in my hair, one of those classic american apparel ones and Grits said, “I like the bowtie in your hair.” I laughed and thanked him. What better place to wear a bowtie than in your hair? My roommate and I got off a few stop later and I said goodbye to Grits.
Needless to say, sometimes you do need to save the best things for last, because that definitely saved my night. A few annoying suitors can be easily remedied by something entirely random which makes your night a bit better. Occasionally you need those silly chance encounters to remind you that New York is a great place, full of a mix of bad and good people who can annoy the shit out of you, or bring a smile to your face.
This post is dedicated to one of my dearest friends jkramey.
25shotsandcounting 