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June 14, 2007
blue lights all around
the common grace insights in the my morning jacket song golden are staggering - especially for someone like myself who has no qualms about wandering into a bar from time to time and having a few drinks. of course these things must be done in moderation otherwise one ends up draining one's bank account and filling out his or her formely super sexy cells with not so super sexy fat cells to the extent that it takes the better part of a year to burn it all off and get back to looking relatively amazing. which sort of follows the ebb and flow of my own particular odyssey and thank you to everyone who believed in me and sent me cards and letters and off brand fat burning medications....you know who you are.
it's only been recently that i have begun to venture out to the bar again - which don't worry there will be no relapse. i have slain that dragon and given all of my forgiving sweatpants to the goodwill. but what i hadn't counted on was that this return to peak physical form would attract the untoward attention of older men...yikes!
when i pushed open the saloon doors on sunday nite i ended up sitting at the bar - something i have never done at this particular establishment...but james - one of the old bartenders from hoppy's was there and i hadn't seen him in months so we ended up talking for awhile at the bar and that was the first time i noticed him. he was standing there near the server's station with a stupid beatific grin on his face staring directly at me. i just kind of nodded my head and forgot all about it.
after james left i sat at the bar finishing my beer and watching the intoxicating nba finals and every once in awhile krista would show up on the stool next to me and we would chat for a few minutes - and then she would vanish to tend to her tables. i don't know exactly how the subsequent sequins of events unfolded but suddenly the grinning buffoon from a couple of hours earlier was sitting on krista's stool and he was drunk. and he was chatty.
he introduced himself as johnny and we talked cordially for a few minutes - and i tried in every way possible to impose the unmistakable fact that i was not gay to this gentleman but he just wouldn't buy it - he did start offering to buy me shots. when i refused that rather bluntly he insisted on buying the beer i had ordered just before he sat down. johnny confessed to me that he had been in the bar since 5:00 that afternoon tapping the rockies courtesy of coors light. when i asked him if he had seen the infamous coors light twins anywhere he just stared back at me blankly.
and that's precisely when i decided i could no longer be civil with johnny. he knew nothing about auburn athletics even though he matriculated there several decades ago and he tried to knock my hat off in a playfully gay way. well - gay or straight if you mess with the university of miami you are bound to get cut. probably by ray lewis with that hunting knife he used to kill those guys after the super bowl a few years back....but the fact that he could not converse intelligently about the aformentioned (and) twins...well that was the straw that... instead johnny wanted to talk about his house and how he wanted to sell it so he could move downtown to be closer to the nightlife. in chattanooga? where!?
so for the next several minutes the conversation went thusly:
johnny: you're a nice guy.
me: silent.
johnny: you're shy aren't you.
me: nope.
insert akward pat on the back/equally awkward handshake.
rinse and repeat.
as i was paying my tab i looked down to the end of the bar and krista is laughing jovially at my plight. in fact - i suddenly had the sensation that everyone in the bar had put aside their entrees and their beverages to watch the events unfolding at the bar. through her laughter krista half heartedly apologized for making no attempt to rescue me - and as i walked by to my car i was dumbfounded that such a thing could happen. to me. i mean this incident could have been lifted directly from the life of timothy scott calhoun manor. only i was propositioned while fully clothed in a bar - there was no naked hot tubbing involved. scotty's not gay indeed!
| By young_christopher | 10:37 PM
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Comments
Posted by: Micah at June 15, 2007 8:00 AM
Posted by: young_christopher at June 15, 2007 9:12 AM
Posted by: Micah at June 15, 2007 12:18 PM
Posted by: Nick at June 20, 2007 12:42 PM