“Dear Ed, [I read] about this job in Norway or Iceland… where people hire drinking buddies for the night. Man, if you couldn’t swing this, no one could.”—William H.

The company to which William refers is called the Kind Fairy Agency out of the Ukraine. For about $18, they will hook you up with a drinking pal for the evening.

I do love this concept, but judging from the tone of the company’s press release, I’m not sure Kind Fairy is right for the job: “We are not trying to get people drunk deliberately,” says director Yulia Peeva. “Our main mission is [to provide] good, fruitful conversation.”

“… [W]hen I see that a client is relaxed,” says professional drinking buddy Gennady Maksimov, “I urge him to talk rather than drink more.”

Well, what the hell kind of drinking buddy company is this?! A true drinking partner doesn’t “urge” his buddy to drink less—unless, of course, he’s on the verge of talking shit to a table-full of soldiers of The Mongols motorcycle and murderers club.

And the “main mission” of any true drinking excursion isn’t “conversation.” The main mission is drinking. All that other stuff—talking about problems, exploring philosophical concepts, arm wrestling, picking up hotties, telling jokes, starting bar fights, closing business deals—whatever it is any two drinking buddies decide to do while they drink together—will vary from buddy to buddy. However, the one constant—the raison d’etre—of a having and being a drinking companion is drinking.

Oh well, you get what you pay for, I guess. Eighteen bucks does seem rather inexpensive. Not to be snooty, but I’ll be charging a helluva lot more than that to be a professional drinking buddy. But then, that’s because I’m a pro.

My credentials are impeccable: For one, I like boozing with other boozers, so you won’t be hearing any of this “urge him to talk” talk from me.

Also, as a veteran bartender, I have had plenty of experience breaking up fights, which means there’s a decent chance I can talk Mongols’ Nation out of pulverizing your spine into a fine powdery substance and snorting it. However, if I fail, and a bar brawl with these felonious behemoths is imminent, well, don’t worry, because I have your back… gammon board. It’s at my house, where I’ll be hiding with the blinds drawn.

And what is a bartender but a paid drinking buddy, anyway? For years I’ve listened to the go-nowhere stories of the mumbling masses. I listened as they cried into the pints of their broken marriages, crumbling careers and devastated self-esteem. I’ve listened to them rant about their political ideology, religious convictions and conspiracy theories. I have heard so many brain-butchering tales of exaggerated conquest and valor that I actually grew an extra ear canal to receive all the crap I don’t care about.

The secondary canal runs from the outer ear, to the inner ear, toward the brain, but then dips—bypassing the brain entirely— down the spine, into the intestines, and, finally, into the rectum goes whatever turd of a story (also known as a “mono-log”) that had just been shat into my ear.

So, how does that benefit the client? Well, having a secondary ear canal means you can talk incessantly without worrying about my going into a coma.

Finally, not only am I a talented and efficient drinking comrade in the field; I’m also a scholar of drinking-buddy philosophy.

I know everything about the subject, including: Shot Rotation Theory, The Psychology of Barstool Selection, Quantum Waitress Seduction Mechanics, Beer Goggle Defogging and proper back-patting methods for when your drinking buddy is pitching dinner in the bushes.

I’m also well-versed on the history of drinking buddies. For instance, did you know the concept didn’t even exist until the 9th century? Apparently, two males boozing together was seen as being totally gay, so they only drank alone or in groups. It wasn’t until 865 AD, when Viking warrior Godfrid “Drippy-Beard” Ragnarsson drank side-by-side with Ivar the Boneless—the infamous berserker King of Scandinavia.

Legend has it that Boneless, so named for his difficulties with impotency, was distraught over the sudden death of his queen. And though it was Boneless himself who murdered her in a rage for failing to arouse him, he was still stricken with grief. Not wanting to be alone, he invited Drippy-Beard to join him at the pub.

By all accounts, the meeting was a success:

The two drank long into the night, guzzling mead and devouring cow legs until Boneless had forgotten his despair and nearly split his belly open from all the riotous, blow-hardy Viking hilarity.

The night did end in tragedy, however, when Drippy-Beard made a pass at Boneless during the walk home. It was then that Boneless discovered, as evidenced by the bulge in his tunic, that he was not impotent at all. Turns out Ivar the Boneless was gay as a glory hole in a Gomorrah bathhouse. So, he did what any closeted Viking king would do in this situation—he beheaded Drippy-Beard on the spot.

So there you have it: my drinking-buddy résumé. The cost is $25 an hour, plus you pick up the tab and the cab. Oh, and don’t worry: If you get a bit boozy and decide to make a pass, I won’t lop off your head. I will charge extra, though.

Some of you may remember a recent Sordid Tale about an encounter that occurred outside my favorite neighborhood slaughtering hole, The Tilted Stick, during which a guy named Scotty and several of his friends ambushed me because it was his opinion that I wasn’t local enough to patronize the establishment.

Well, two Sundays ago, Scotty and I crossed paths again.

I’ve dreaded our imminent reunion, largely because I didn’t want to be in the position of having to accept or reject his apology: I didn’t want to accept his apology because, well, how rotten-to-the-core must you be to gang up on a person over such absurd matters as his place of residence? On the other hand, I’m not a grudge-holder. I don’t give a crud about Scotty, except for the comedy of him, which I enjoy sharing with you. So, no, I didn’t want an apology, though I always assumed one was forthcoming.

Imagine my surprise to learn that not only was he not going to say “sorry,” but that this jackass would actually try to instigate another melée—“jackass,” incidentally, being the perfect word to describe him, as he is not quite a tool, not exactly a douchebag, nor hoodlum, hooligan, thug, punk or pissant, but, rather, a raging jackass with whom—on a lazy Sunday evening—I once again came face to face.

As it happened, the same two bartenders were present, as were several of the same regulars from the night of our first altercation. We were drinking and having a good time when Scotty came in. He made his rounds, hugging and shaking hands with everyone he knew. At first, he was oblivious to me, thankfully, as I enjoyed covertly observing him mingling about as if he were The Man, utterly ignorant of how not The Man he really is.

Everything went fine until about midnight, when I casually swiveled my head to steal a glance of my archenemy and—sure as rectums don’t like rolled tacos—Scotty was glaring at me with sweltering, red eyes.

“Is your name Ed Decker?” he asked.

“Yup,” I said, gearing up for a teary-eyed apology that I did not want.

“Are you the guy who writes lies in the newspaper?”

Wait, wait—what!? I thought. This is supposed to be the part where he tells me how drunk he was that night, how he acted like a jackass and that he is sooo sorry, followed by a slap on my back and an offer to buy the next round.

“Everything I wrote in that article was true, dude, and you know it!”

“Not the part about my mother having ‘scotch-sopped titties,’” he said, eyes glazed and burning red.

Oh, comedy gods, I thought, thank you for this gift you have given, the gift of the great giant jackass who brings joy to my otherwise joyless existence.

The passage to which Scotty referred came in response to his initial accusation about my not being local enough to be in The Tilted Stick: “I’ve been boozing in this bar since before [Scotty] was sucking on his mama’s scotch-sopped titty-milk” was the exact quote.

“Dude,” I said, “that wasn’t a lie, it was a joke—a yo-mama joke.”

“You don’t joke about my mother.”

“I wasn’t joking about your mother. I was joking about yo-mama. I don’t know your actual mother.”

“That’s right, you don’t know her, so you don’t talk about her.”

“I wasn’t talking about her!” I spat again, trying to explain  what a yo-mama joke is. “I was talking, in essence, about you!”

I really get a kick out of these Yo-Mama-Joke-Over-Reactors—the ones who become enraged at the mere mention of their mother. I never understood this response. If you never met my mother and know nothing about her, any insults to her character will carry zero weight. You could say my mom fucks baboons in Taiwanese whorehouses to support a $300-a-day huffing habit, and I wouldn’t blink. I happen to know, for a fact, that my mom is sweet on Sumatran orangutans and nitrate poppers. Point is, you don’t know my mother any more than I know Scotty’s. Like my mom, I’m sure his mother is very normal and nice. It’s hiz-mama that’s all messed up.

You following this, Scotty? Your mother probably doesn’t drink at all. But yo-mama is a lush! See the difference? Let’s try some more: Yo-mama drank so much when she was pregnant, she thought you were a beer belly. Or, yo-mama was so hammered when you were born, when her water broke, it was 90 proof.

In her defense, yo-mama wanted a natural childbirth—Natural Light! In summary, your mother is probably a sharp, grounded woman, but yo-mama musta been a stumbling rum-whore to have given birth to a jackass like you.

Anyway, being that Scotty was never quite able to grasp the concept, he reacted the only way a one-dimensional jackass knows how to react when confronted with even the most mildly intellectual premise, and that is to kick back his stool and challenge me to fisticuffs. And, being a bit of an un-intellectual jackass myself, I kicked back my stool and accepted the challenge, at which point everyone in the vicinity rushed to separate us. The bartenders ushered Scotty toward the door as he shouted that I should join him outside, while two or three of the regulars held me sternly in place saying things like, “It’s not worth it,” and promising to buy me a beer if I didn’t follow Scotty outside, which sounded like a great deal for me since I didn’t want to fight in the first place.

When he was gone, we drank and laughed about the comedy of it all. Thankfully, no one jumped me when I left the bar, though I was pretty skittish on the walk home—and I guess, in that sense, the jackass-orists always win.

It was 11 p.m., and I was jonesing for some buffalo wings. So I strolled over to my favorite neighborhood bar, The Tilted Stick. Once there, I ran into an old bartender friend, Teddy Ballgame. I hadn’t seen Teddy in a long time, so I delayed ordering the wings, bought a round and started chatting. At one point in the conversation, I joked about a poster that hangs on the wall titled “Tilted Stick Rules,” which I began reading out loud to Teddy and doing a little comedy shtick on the rules I thought were silly. That’s when a stranger interrupted and said, “If you don’t like the rules, you can get out.”

Naturally, this took me by surprise. I was just joking around with Teddy and hadn’t intended to offend anyone, so I pondered his statement, then informed the guy—whose name (I later learned) rhymes with “snotty”—that we were having a private conversation, but “thanks for the advice anyway.”

“This is a locals bar,” Snotty insisted. “You need to leave,” at which point I thought I was at the Improv because this guy—this apparent victim of fetal-alcohol syndrome—was delivering what I considered to be pure comedy gold.

I mean, it’s hilarious that he was pulling this “locals only” nonsense at all, but what made it an absolute scream is the fact that I am an Ocean Beach local. I do live here—I live here a lot! The Tilted Stick is around the corner from my house. I’m friends with all the bartenders, the manager, the owner, the previous owner, and I even know the previous-previous owner—Henry—who owned it back when it was called The Texas Teahouse (an awesome dive punk-blues bar where The Jacks and Tomcat Courtney used to play), where I easily dropped a thousand quarters into the Missile Command game and drank a thousand Genny Screamers at a dollar per can. I’ve been boozing in that building since before Snotty was sucking on his mama’s scotch-sopped titty-milk, and the fact that he’s telling me I have to go because I’m not local enough is making little droplets of beer spurt from my nose and eyeballs.

“This is a locals bar?!” I asked, trying with all my might not to burst into open laughter. “Well, dang, I guess I’ll be moving along then—just as soon as you go fuh-fuh-fuck yourself.”

And so it went, back and forth, nose to nose, until bartender Jesse separated us, which didn’t matter much because Snotty and his snotnose friends continued talking smack, flipping the bird and basically mad-dogging my ass like I was the bastard child of a Klingon crack whore trying to get a drink in the Star Wars Cantina.

“We’re from here,” they kept saying. “Where are you from?”

I should have said, “I’m from Planet Earth, shit-smoker,” because, really, where the hell is “here”? Which arbitrary border defines you as an insider and somebody else as an outsider? Do they have to live on the same block as you to be local? The same borough? The same city, state, country or continent?

Not to mention—and I want all you “locals only” blowhards to pay close attention—you are not doing your neighborhood bar any favors by running off tourists and other non-locals. Newsflash: The bar wants their patronage, and you hurt the business when you roam in packs and start shit with tourists. But isn’t that how it usually is with these territorial “We’re From Here” queers? It’s this chickenshit mob mentality that says “We’re the insiders, you’re an outsider and we will mess you up because we have numbers.”

Anyway, after giving them several opportunities to cut the crap, Jesse and Jimmy, another bartender, kicked them out of the bar. However, instead of going home and being, you know, normal human beings and shit, they found a hiding place and waited—for an hour! So, Jesse snuck Teddy Ballgame and me out the back door and up the alley to another bar, Lucy’s, where we stayed for quite a while, until Teddy decided to go home and I figured it was safe to return to the Stick and order those chicken wings I still craved.

But it was not safe.

As I arrived at the Stick’s front door, Snotty lurched from hiding and connected a punch to my forehead. I charged full steam, took him down to the pavement with me on top, and repeatedly boxed his torso and neck while his crew kicked and punched my head, stomach and back. When Jesse rushed outside to help, one of the guys pinned him against the wall so he couldn’t break it up. Jesse broke the hold, and he and Jimmy pulled us apart. Jesse shoved me back inside the bar and told me to stay there, which I did. But, get this: They waited again, hiding, again, so they could bushwack me, AGAIN!

At this point, I just wanted to go home, but the bartenders, wisely, blocked me from leaving. It was another hour or so later when Snotty and his ignoramonauts went around to the back door to catch me sneaking out that way, and Jimmy whisked me out the front and walked me home, where I vomited, cleaned it up, then fried some eggs, having never received my goddamn wings.

Epilogue: Snotty and his comedy troupe, were 86’ed from The Stick. The next day, he returned to argue that I had started everything. Good one, Dangerfield! Because everyone who was there knows you started that fight. We also know you’re “from” New Mexico and have only lived “here” a couple of years. But, best of all, we know you cried when they wouldn’t let you back in the bar. You actually, literally, bawled actual, literal tears, which didn’t change their minds, so you said, “Fine! I didn’t want to come in here anyway,” which is pure comedy gold, baby. Thanks for the laughs.

Read about my second encounter with our boy Snotty.

Ed Decker
06.23.10

Thanks, also, to everyone at The Tilted Stick (4970 Voltaire St.) for their support, especially Jesse, Jimmy and Teddy Ballgame, who put themselves at bodily risk to cover my back. Respect! Write to ed@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com.

Drunk Thoughts was a recurring bit I did for a radio show called The Binge on 103.7 Free Fm.  Drunk Thoughts is, in a nutshell, the depraved inner dialogue  you have with yourself when sitting at the bar, drunk.

Drunk Thoughts — March 2, 2007: I Like Breasts

Drunk Thoughts — April 6, 2007: Where’s My Beer

Drunk Thoughts — May 4, 2007: I Am a Good Drunk

Drunk Thoughts (LIVE AND SLOPPY)– June 1, 2007: My Blackout

Dear Mr. Decker, as a working bartender, I feel you are the perfect person to ask this question. I really like this girl but she’s sort of standoffish to me. Except when she gets drunk. Then she’s all over me. I’m really tempted to get her drunk so we can get wild. Is this wrong? Does it make me a creep?

—Dave M., North Park

Dear Dave, So, you want to know if getting a girl drunk so that she might have sex with you makes you a creep? The fact that you have to ask that question tells me that you’ve got a lot to learn about women and booze.

Getting girls drunk to loosen them up for a little jungle sex is one of the reasons Jesus invented alcohol and to not use it in such a manner would be disrespectful to The Lord, so my advice is to start ordering those shots.

However, I must warn you that there’s a fine line between being a fun-loving booze-hound who just want to have a great, fun, drunken date that ends in having wild drunken jungle sex and being a creep, who takes advantage of a woman by getting her so inebriated she can’t tell the difference between his member and a Marlboro.

And that fine line can be found in your level of intoxication.

In other words, are you getting drunk at the same time that you are getting her drunk? Because if you are, then fine—so long as you are getting the two of you drunk for the right reasons: to break a little ice, soften the edges a tad and loosen her inhibitions enough that she might be receptive to the Tarzan and Jane costumes you’ve got spread out on your waterbed should you be so lucky as to bring her home.

However, if you’re getting her drunk while you stay sober, for the sole purpose of having an unfair advantage, both physically and emotionally, then, yes, that would make you a creep.

Throughout nearly two decades as a bartender, I have encountered many creeps. They are easy to identify because, aside from the small bit of white foam leaking from the corners of their mouths, they’ve all got their creepy little methods. For instance, one maneuver I find particularly loathsome is what I call the “secret double,” method.

It usually works like this: The couple will be sitting at a cocktail table or somewhere away from the bar. Perhaps they’re on a first date, or maybe they just met and are hitting it off. When they finish their round, the guy will come to the bar and order, say, two rum and Cokes. Then he’ll ask, as if an afterthought, “Can you make hers a double?” and give me a wink that says, “Hey, you’re a guy—you understand what’s going on here,” wink-wink.

He’ll proceed to order this way all night. Of course, I never actually pour the doubles (though I’m happy to charge for them), and when I deliver the drinks, I give him a return wink that says, “Yeah man, I do understand what’s going on here. I understand that you are Creep with a capital C. I understand that you have no game, so you have to resort to unscrupulous tactics to get women in bed. I understand that secretly slipping extra alcohol into a woman’s drink is almost as bad as slipping her a rufie, and the next time you try to pull that garbage on my watch, I will stop what I’m doing, come around from the bar and tell the young lady, “Your date is a lowlife scumbag that is feeding you intoxicants without your knowledge. Shall I have him removed from the premises?”

If she shakes her head “no” and moves in closer to him, well, so be it. But if she says “yes,” I’ll invite her to join me at the bar, where I’ll make us a couple of lemon drops and toast his creepy ass as security drags it out of the club.

Harsh? Maybe. But it wouldn’t have bothered me so much if he ordered a double for himself, too. It’s the fact that he requested his drink as a single to maintain an unfair advantage that really elevates his slug ranking.

And to any of you guys who want to talk shit to me in the bar tomorrow and try to tell me that I’m breaking the man-code with all this, well, you can go fuck yourselves. I honor the man code, but when a man crosses the line, it’s no longer the man code. It’s the douchebag code, which I do not honor.

So, Dave, you have your answer: If you are the type of guy who gets his date drunk while you stay sober for the sole purpose of taking advantage, you are most definitely a creep.

If you are the type of guy who takes a girl to a restaurant and tells the waiter, on the sly, not to bring the basket of bread—so that she doesn’t have anything in her stomach with which to soak up the alcohol—you are a creep.

If you are the type of guy who nurses his wine, while constantly refilling her glass and urging her to drink more, then you are a creep.

If you are the type of guy who prefers a date who’s unable to talk, walk or defend against your feeble advances, which are the intellectual equivalent of dipping pony tails into ink jars, then you are a creep.

However, if you are the type of guy who likes drinking and screwing, and you like women who like drinking and screwing, and you both get liquored up, together, and go back to your pad and drunkenly hump each other’s brains out while swinging on vines and making animal noises—that is not creepiness at all. That, as far as I’m concerned, is class. Not tea-and-crumpets class, mind you, but the booze and bar class, class, which is what passes for class in my circles. Got class?

For a long time now, I’ve been meaning to take one of those alcoholic screening tests, if for no other reason than to determine whether I am a bona fide alcoholic or just a fun-loving boozer who has it under control.

I guess the reason I never got around to taking the quiz is because I’m a little scared of what I might learn, and also because I’m usually too hungover to concentrate on exams.

Today, however, I finally decided to take the test. After a little research, I chose the John Hopkins University Hospital Alcohol Screening Quiz. The quiz asked a series of yes-or-no questions. Before proceeding, I made a pact to answer them honestly and completely. Here are the results:

Q: Do you drink to build self-confidence or because you are shy?
A: No. Shyness is the opposite of my problem.

Q: Is drinking making your home life unhappy?
A: No. Drinking makes my home life happier. For one reason, W. is a bit of a boozer herself. We host barbecues and consume beer. We have dinner and drink wine. We do shots together. While watching TV, we play drinking games like, Drink Entourage or Drink Curb Your Enthusiasm (do a shot every time Larry says something socially awkward). So much is better around our home because we both booze. Some might call this codependency; we call it a marriage heaven sent.

Q: Is drinking negatively affecting your reputation?
A: This is an ambiguous question. Affect my reputation with whom? Because certainly my reputation with the morality overlords has suffered over the years. But as far as the people who matter–family and friends-type people–my reputation remains as a fun drunk.

Q: Have you ever felt regret after drinking?
A: Have I ever put food into my mouth? Have I ever breathed air into my lungs? Have I ever fallen off a stool in front of a lady and vomited on her shoe? I regret that I must answer yes to this question.

Q: Is drinking jeopardizing your job? Do you lose time from work due to drinking?
A: No. I have not called into work gin-sick since my early twenties.

Q: Have you had financial difficulties as a result of drinking?
A: Another ambiguous question. Are they asking if I spend too much money on booze? If so, then I am inclined to say yes. But if they mean, do I go on benders and squander the rent on hookers and blow, then the answer is absolutely not (I spend only what I can afford on  hookers and blow).

Q: Does your drinking make you careless of your family’s welfare?
A: Definitely not! I’d have W. tell you that herself except she and the kids are on the road right now smuggling moonshine across state lines for me. (Thanks, babe!)

Q: Do you crave a drink at a definite time daily?
A: Nope. I crave drinks at all different times of all different days and nights.

Q: Do you want a drink the next morning?
A: Ah, the old, “Hair of the Dog that Bit You” theory. I’ll never understand this one. How on Earth does sucking on a flea-infested clump of dog dander heal canine wounds? Still, I have always marveled at some of my friends who, after a long night of hard boozing, will wake up the next morning on the couch, rub their eyes, grab a half-empty can of warm beer sitting on the coffee table and guzzle it down without even checking it for cigarette butts. Maybe it’s a sign of alcoholism that I even have friends like that, but the answer is still no–after a bender, I would sooner drink a glass of Satan’s bathwater than consume another alcoholic beverage.

Q: Do you have trouble sleeping when drinking?
A: How would I know? I’m usually passed out by then. I do know that anyone nearby has trouble sleeping when I’ve been drinking, what with my snoring and thrashing and yelling obscenities at myself, so I guess I should answer yes to this one.

Q: Do you drink to escape from worries?
A: No. Drinking booze to escape your troubles is like moving to Alaska to escape the cold. I will, however, admit to embarking on an occasional binge to take a hiatus from a problem, but the only true way to escape a problem is to fix it, which drinking doesn’t do, unless your problem is that you don’t drink enough.

Q: Do you drink alone?
A: Hell yeah! I love drinking wine at my writing desk, or sitting alone on a balcony overlooking a sunset with a stogie in my mouth and a double highball in my hand. Drinking alone is often better than drinking with people and screw you, buster, for giving negative points for it. How is drinking wine alone in my office any more a sign of alcoholism than downing tequila shots with a group?

Q: Have you ever had a loss of memory as a result of drinking?
A: Does water float? Is blood bloody? Have I ever spent an afternoon hung-over on the couch, with the shades drawn, fielding numerous calls from friends telling me outrageous stories I don’t recall about people I insulted and the inanimate objects I molested the night before? I’ll have to say yes to this one.

Results: According to Hopkins University Hospital, if you answer yes to three or more questions you are “definitely an alcoholic.”

Uh-oh. I scored four. Bummer. Oh well–the good news is, it’s out of my hands. All I have to do now is wait for the interventioners to come. In the meantime, I’ll just get drunk and ponder what I’ve learned.

For instance, I learned that the people at John Hopkins don’t know the difference between a boozer and an alcoholic.

I learned that it’s always best to blame your alcoholism on inferior alcoholism testing.

I’ve learned that being an alcoholic means never having to say you’re sorry, except once, when you join A.A., then you have to say it a lot.

And, most importantly, I’ve learned that introspection is a bad thing and not to do it anymore, which I won’t.

e.d.
08/05/07

Originally published in San Diego CityBeat

“The Prohibitionist must always be a person of no moral character; for he cannot even conceive of the possibility of a man capable of resisting temptation.”

–Aleister Crowley
I’ve been waiting for this moment. My long anticipated date with the Green Goddess is tonight. But will I live to tell about it? Or will she make me cut off my ear and wrap it in newspaper like Van Gogh?

The Green Goddess I speak of is absinthe–the notorious, mysterious, allegedly hallucinogenic, herbal, highly alcoholic, bitter, translucent green beverage that is barred in the United States possibly because it supposedly causes in its users episodes of madness, violence and epilepsy.

Being illegal, the only way to obtain absinthe is through mail order (in this case, from a European distributor). So, from an ad I found in the back of Modern Drunkard Magazine, I ordered a cask of absinthe.

Tonight I plan to drink it all.

For tonight’s absinthe-fest, I chose the Classic Method of preparation. For this you need an absinthe spoon, a sugar cube, and an old-fashioned or parfait glass. You put the sugar cube on the spoon and slowly pour ice cold water over the cube so that it drips into the glass of absinthe.

The sugar water clouds the absinthe. It looks delicious, but I’m expecting the worst. This goddess is notorious for her bitterness and her scandalous alcohol content (160 proof). I close my eyes, gulp and list sideways. It’s a cruel swallow.

The notable ingredient of absinthe is an herb called “wormwood.” It’s also known as “wormweed” or “wermuth.” It is wormwood that gives absinthe its bitter taste. It is wormwood that supposedly has hallucinogenic effects. And it is wormwood absinthe that I am sipping now; totally, wonderfully, bitterly illegal.

Wormwood absinthe wasn’t always illegal. It was used throughout history and dates back as far as Pythagoras and Hippocrates, who lauded its medicinal benefits. Champions of Roman chariot races drank absinthe to remind them that every victory is mingled with bitterness. In the late 19th century, absinthe became popular among the decadent Parisian artistic sub-culture. It was drunk by Vincent Van Gogh and Ernest Hemingway; by Toulouse-Lautrec, Rimbaud and Baudelaire. It was drunk by Edgar Poe, Aleister Crowley and all those other disturbed artist-writer types who gathered for this ritualistic sort of happy hour they called “the Green Hour.”

They got throttled on absinthe and behaved the way drunk, wired painters and poets tend to behave. This irritated/confused/frightened the people who don’t understand drunken, wired writer-painter-types–and an anti-absinthe movement was born.

Prohibitionists and politicians of the time hollered about the evils and the dangers of absinthe. Political cartoonists drew these bleak scenes that depicted emaciated absinthoholics hunkered over a table, dripping sugar water from some funky-looking spoon into some funkier green liquid like some surreal freebase scene on Planet Chlorophylus.

Then came the famous Absinthe Murders: In 1905 a Swiss man named Jean Lanfray murdered his entire family. It was learned afterward that he had been drinking absinthe, and news of the absinthe murders swept the world. The prohibitionists made a big deal about wormwood’s role in the murders, and soon after, America and much of Europe deemed it illegal–thus saving the absinthe drinker from himself. Whew!

But what the papers and the politicians and the prohibitionists didn’t say was that he had only two glasses. Of course, Jean Lanfray was also drinking brandy, wine and beer as well, but it was the absinthe that was to blame.

That first glass of absinthe was a hard tilt. The second and third weren’t any easier. You can hardly get past the acrid taste without shutting down some vitals. But the afterglow is a sweet, sweet moss. I twirl the emerald girl in my fingers–what is it about this green? What makes her so green? Is God in the green?

Absinthe is truly a marvel of ancient herbal alchemy. Its creator was probably more regarded as a diviner than a mixologer. What makes absinthe so green is the chlorophyll of the many herbal extracts used in the making. Coriander, mint, lemon balm, fennel and hyssop, marjoram and aniseed (anise) and more are blended in such a way that the chlorophyll retains its verdure.

Consider the times. You had a subculture based around this strange chartreuse liqueur, made with all these ancient herbs, drunk by these bizarre bohemian types who created bizarre art with their bizarre friends and spake in the tongues of their bohemian subculture lingo. It’s obvious, the wormwood prohibitionists were afraid of the absinthe drinker’s counter-culture, revolutionary tendencies.

The bottle is horizontal and the worms are climbing all over me now. Sleep soon, I hope. This wormweed buzz is different and different is good. But as far as drugs of choice go, I still prefer my red wine and green bud because it’s tastier going down. Anyway, the point has been made. I did not kill my family. I did not butcher my ear for love of a hooker. I didn’t even write morose poetry. Hmmm. I guess it must be another oppressive law based on irrational fears.

Does it remind you of the prohibition of another green goddess with medicinal qualities? The kind you smoke with your counter-culture bohemian artist and musician friends, with the bizarre paraphernalia and subculture lingo (420 dude!)?

Remember the allegations at the dawn of marijuana prohibition? They said it caused insanity, epilepsy, violence and death. It’s like a freaking broken record. Ban this, ban that–it is the way of the prohibitionist. I would be laughing right now if I hadn’t just read an article about how they sentenced San Diego medical cannabis grower Steve McWilliams to six months in prison.

They did this because, well, because McWilliams was under the impression that when the citizens of California voted to legalize medical cannabis, that that meant that medical cannabis would indeed be legal.

Silly, silly Steve. Not while John Ashcroft rules your innards it won’t be.

Prohibition is a never-ending cycle of sickly, frightened worms, eating the living from the inside while purporting to be saving our lives. But what life is there if there is no wermuth, no weed, no abandon. Whose life is worth saving then?

“Got tight last night on absinthe and did knife tricks. Great success shooting the knife into the piano. The woodworms are so bad and eat hell out of all furniture that you can always claim the woodworms did it.” –Ernest Hemingway.

To try some absinthe for yourself go to http://www.absintheonline.com/

My head hurts. It really really hurts. My turnip is throbbing so badly I had to beg my editor for an extension on this deadline cuz I can’t hardly write no good like this. And the reason I hurt so badly is because I just returned from Las Vegas – Land of the Bloody Liver Infections. Not that I’m a Las Vegas rookie or anything. It’s just that, this particular trip to Las Vegas was different than the others. This time it was for a convention. And not just any convention. This was a convention to top all conventions: a convention for a magazine called Modern Drunkard Magazine and one can only imagine, with sphincter-clenching terror, what a Modern Drunkard Magazine convention held in the Land of the Bloodshot Moon might be like.

Modern Drunkard Magazine (MDM) is pretty much what you think it is: a 50 page glossy monthly with neo-pulp artwork (think rat pack meets Church of the SubGenius) and heroically written tales about, for and by drunkards. It’s got articles like, “Booze is My Copilot – How heavy drinking cured my fear of flying and made me a better person,” and “40 Things Every Drunk Should Do before He Dies.” It’s got columns, like “Wino Wisdom,” a poetry section called, “Postcards from Skid Row,” and cartoons called “Comics for Alcoholics.” MDM also features my old column from the SLAMM days, “Sordid Tales of a Bartender in Heat,” which explains my affiliation with them.

The magazine is based out of Denver and distributed to New York, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Chicago, Baltimore and pretty much everywhere else but San Diego. Consequently, I have never met any of the other writers, or editors, or even my boss and Publisher Frank Rich. Until this weekend, that is, when Frank invited me to the First Annual Modern Drunkard Magazine Convention in the Avalon Ballroom of Stardust Hotel in the Land of Busted Blood Vessels and showed me the second most baddest, rockingest, filthiest, drinkiest, druggiest, time of my filthy, drinky, druggy life.

The Convention: I sign in at the check in table outside the ballroom, receive a laminate, and step inside. On my left is the bar. Straight ahead is the stage. On my right is a vendor table selling flasks, specialty shot glasses, a 6-man hookah-style beer bong apparatus and various other weapons of mass deconstruction. Next to that, a Modern Drunkard Magazine swag table. Between them sits a keg, at the base of which is a drunken toad desperately hanging on to the barrel like an overboard sailor clings to a buoy. Near the stage, two guys are dragging away some poor rye-eyed clodhopper (apparently the first victim of the drinking contest), and in the center of the ballroom a middle-aged wine cooler hag is flashing her cans to anyone who is brave enough to look at them.

I know it instantly – I am home.

First, I locate Publisher Frank Rich. He’s wearing a black Kenneth Cole over a crimson shirt. Frank is already gin-blind. He dangles a cigarette in his hand and stares off into some unknown horizon across which topless hula gals shimmy to a song the rest of us can’t hear. When I introduce myself he says, “Mista Deckaaah” dragging the last syllable of my name like Dean Martin on a handful of bennies, “So niiice to finally meet you. Let’s have a drink.”

“My people,” I think, holding back a tear, “These are my people.”

Next I meet my hotel roommate. His name is Sid Pink and he is the MC of the event. Sid Pink is cartoon elegance all the way. He’s wearing a white suit and shoes and a pimple pink shirt and pink accessories. After we introduce each other he says, “I’m not much of boozer. I prefer pills,” and pulls out an Altoids’ tin full of various, multicolored capsules and tablets. I dip my hand into his armamentarium, select a shiny red and white, and pop it into my mouth.

This is my welcoming to the Modern Drunkard Magazine Las Vegas Convention in the Avalon Ballroom of the Stardust Resort and Casino. It is the kind of brain-bake you could never throw here in San Diego – America’s Uptightest City. An entire weekend of nearly around the clock gluttony with presentations, and contests, and burlesque, and punk bands, and all the booze, pills, hallucinogens, and amphetamines you can get your filthy hands on. When the convention ends, we stumble to the Double Down Saloon to watch more punk bands, raise drunken fists, and drink vodka Red Bulls until 6 o’clock in the “Holy-shit-is-that-the-goddam-sun-up-there-or-is-the-moon-in-a-pissy-mood?!” morning. Then, after a miserable few hours of sleep apnea, it’s a Bloody Mary Morning Mixer to start the thing all over again.

And the best part of the whole wretched affair was the 3-day drinking contest. It was called, The Clash of the Tightest – and was the kind of drinking contest that made all other drinking contests look like pin the tail on the donkey at gramma’s house; the kind of drinking contest that ends with one man puking on the crowd and the other man laughing as a referee holds his fist in the air; the kind of drinking contest you could never witness here in San Diego – Land of No Kegs on the Beach on 4th of July – And for that reason alone, the story must be told.

Part 2
Clash of the Tightest

Sunday, May 16 – Clash of the Tightest (Final Round):
On stage is a small, square table and two empty chairs. Beside each chair is a large trash can. Behind the table are two commentators sitting on a raised bench. They introduce themselves as Nick and Sid Pink. The crowd goes wild as Sid Pink brings on the first contestant, a guy named James who works the drinkingstuff.com vending booth. James is trim and handsome. Then Nick, the other commentator, says, “Ladies and Gentlemen, “Please welcome to the stage, contestant number two . . . Oggar!”
And the crowd goes nuts.

Because here comes this burly brute with a big bald head and a foot-long goatee bleating down to his knees. Oggar (pronounced Ogre) is 6 feet, 4 inches tall, weighs 350 pounds and is a bouncer at a strip club in Minnesota called Mettlers. He climbs the stage, raises a fist to the crowd, and the Oggar fans chant, “Oh-Ger! Oh-Ger!”

Oggar

The rules of the bout are simple. Contestants take turns choosing a cocktail, which they both must drink within 10 seconds. Then each contestant must perform a simple dexterity test: they drop a ping pong ball into the top of a tube and catch it below. The contest is over when someone either fails the dexterity test, or vomits – giving a whole new meaning to the phrase, “Throw in the towel.”
In the Clash of the Tightest Semi-Finals, Ogre out-boozed Bruiser, a curly-haired behemoth also from Minnesota. Bruiser was even bigger than Oggar, but 23 rounds later found Bruiser barfing in the bottom of a barrel. James got here by defeating the only female in the tournament, a Las Vegas local called Molly Brown who tapped out after about 8 or so rounds of pure rotgut Hell.

Ding. Ding!

Round 1: James orders a White Russian no ice which they both finish with ease and complete the dexterity test.

Round 2: Oggar turns to the crowd and says, “Bring on the Brutal Hammer,” and the Oggar fans howl, “Brew-Tull. Brew-Tull,” because they know it was the Brutal Hammer that put down Bruiser in the prelims. The Brutal Hammer is half red-wine, half vodka in a ten ounce glass no ice.
Round 3: James calls a tequila lime juice and Sid Pink whispers into the microphone, “He’s banking on the lime juice,” and Nick whispers back, “That’s right Sid, he’s hoping it’ll curdle with the milk,” as the contestants guzzle and perform their dexterity tasks.

Round 4: Oggar again orders the Brutal Hammer.

Round 5: James calls for more tequila lime.

Brutal hammer. Tequila Lime. Brutal Hammer. Tequila Lime. . . Back and forth, back and forth and James is showing signs of stress. He’s turning yellow and rocking in his seat like somebody is inside his body yanking out nails with the claw end of a Brutal Hammer; — which is to say, he’s coming apart.
Brutal Hammer. Tequila lime. Brutal Hammer, and James nearly coughs it back. The ref is counting, “10. . . 9 . . . 8. . .” James takes another sip and gags again, “5… 4. . . 3 . . .” James drinks again, fist clenched, head swaying, “3…2…1…” and just in time he slams his glass onto the table.
But the Oggar fans are howling “Foul!” They claim James did not finish the drink. Indeed, there is a considerable amount of Brutal left in his Brutal Hammer. But it doesn’t matter. Before any ruling can be made, James drops to one knee.

It’s between him and Christ now.

Into the garbage pail he points his beak, like a bird preparing to feed her hungry chicks. He’s still on one knee then – hugging the trash can like the trash can is all he has left in this miserable, rotten world; like if he ever makes it out of this mess he would make that trash can his bride, and take that trash can places that that trash can has never seen — and finally James tumbles over, bring his beloved trash can down with him – a lover’s leap to be sure – both of them laying dead on the floor while Oggar and the ref hold his fist high in victory.

“Oh-Ger! Oh-Ger!”

And that’s that. After the crowd clears out, I find James collecting himself against a wall. I shake his hand and say, “A helluva try man.” He looks at me with the sort of cold, blank stare you get from the undead and I fear that he broke something inside that he’s gonna need later in life. Then I go over to Oggar. He’s there with some friends sharing his prize – a 750 milliliter bottle of absinthe. I am in utter awe of him. He just finished a drinking contest which left his opponent lobotomized and now he’s drinking from a 150-plus proof bottle of that bitter green deathjuice from Hell.

“Any parting words for my readers?” I ask Oggar as he passes the bottle to me. “Sure,” he answers, “Clash of the Tightest, seems like the sort of thing that should only happen once in a lifetime . . . But, God willing, this is going to happen every year.”

EJD
06/01/05

Yes Dan, it is as fun and exciting as it seems. A world where peppy bouncy party girls burst out of their tank-tops like a microwave popcorn accident and where time flies faster than a clock on the Concorde — but there is a flip side. Bartending is also a dirty stinking grind. It takes a certain type of person to be a bartender. The question is, Dan, are you the right person?

There will be adjustments you know; a turbulent transformation of lifestyle and worldview. For instance, when you are a bartender your social life is the bar. You go out to bars when you’re not working. Your friends and acquaintances are primarily other bartenders, waitresses, and ever-boozers. And you all become this enormous, deranged, dysfunctional family: Your co-workers are alcoholics; your customers are alcoholics; your lovers are alcoholics; you are an alcoholic (that’s why you want the job right, to be just a little closer to all those shiny pretty bottles?)

How can this not mangle your worldview? You live inside a black comedy and all you can hope for is that you aren’t the punch line. The job is to poison your customers and it’s just so wrong it’s funny. Funnier still because you adore it — despite the fact that the happy peppy party girl is puking in the bathroom because of what you served her.

Oh yes, bartending pays well. Oh sweet farts of Christ – you can make crazy monies. You just wish there was some sort of future in it . . .

. . . So you dream of owning your own bar one day – a fabulous bar; where drinks are cheap as chicken spit; where happy bouncy peppy party girls arrive in droves; where patrons spontaneously erupt into theme song; and where the jukebox is filled with all the Sabbath, Zep, Public Enemy, and Johnny Cash you can get your clammy hands on. And best part about your jukebox?:

No.
More.
Creed.

Creed is verboten. Oh Bliss! In fact Dan, your night club is a place to seek asylum from the Creed onslaught outside — where Creed songs just seem to rain from the sky. And in the absence of Creed, all the happy jumpy peppy party pretty girls will finally discover Mr. Johnny Cash, and he will drape his song around them like a long black coat, and they will hear what it means to sing with emotion — without being a pompous asshole — and the bouncy party girls will stand semi-circle around the jukebox, hold hands, sing and sway, and tear off their tank tops, draping tongues over nipples and . . . er, uh . . . anyway, there’s no future in bartending.

So you want to be a bartender, eh Dan? Please note then, people are going to see you differently. I’ve heard it said, “If a man and his reputation were walking down the street, they would not recognize each other.”

If a bartender saw his reputation walking down the street, he would duck into an alley and hide. Because a bartender’s reputation will always kick a bartender’s ass.

Mavericks, and ever-boozers, and college kids will regard you as noble or Knightly — a sentinel of some magnificent Brewtopia. Yet, adults – the kind with families and careers — acknowledge you with pity or contempt.

Of course, you are none of these.

Your father regards you as some sort of pinko subversive. Your mother wants you to grow up and give her a grandchild goddammit. Your sister will interrogate all your girlfriends. And your brother will try to steal your shifts.

As for your sex life, Yes Dan, oh yes there is plenty of sex. Sometimes even with actual women – sometimes beautiful women who you think of as divine – that they were accidentally discarded from Heaven when God was throwing out all his Creed CD’s.

Yes there is sex Dan. But after time, you notice a trend. You notice the only women with whom you sleep are women you meet in bars. Though you know there is something wrong with that, you are not quite sure what it is.

So Dan, are you the right type of person? Here are some simple questions that will help you decide. 1) Do you like people, but wish you could go through life with three feet of wood between you and them? 2) Can you look into a person’s eyes longer than they can look into yours? 3) Can you tell a joke? Can you take one? There is nothing in this universe more foul than a jaded, humorless bartender with a delusion of authority. 4) Do you prefer the night? 5) Do you drink with dignity? (Sloppy drunks need not apply). 6) Is your skin callous enough?; your chin sturdy enough?: Is your back broad and are your feet hurting enough? Hey Dan, are you man enough to be our man?

It was 1:50 a.m. — closing time after a busy Saturday night at the bar. I had already made the final announcement to the happy peppy party people: “We’re closed, please finish your drinks.” I had even made the final, final announcement: “Time to go. Drink ‘em or lose ‘em.” And now it was time to make the final, final, final absolutely last final announcement:

“Get out now you bastards– out out out — Jesus holy Christ, don’t you people have lives!”

Most everyone had left, except for this little rude drunk prick fuck jerkwad ass blower who was holding a pitcher as though it were and oversized mug and nursing it alone. I put my hand on the lip of the pitcher, and said, “I have to take this now.”

“Slow down dude – what’s your hurry?” he snorted.

“What’s my hurry?? Do I really have to explain this to you — dude?” I asked.

“Look, I paid for the pitcher and I’m going to finish it,” he said, refusing to release his grip on the handle.

So there we were, the two of us, tug-of-warring over a half-full pitcher of blonde beer, the clock clicking dangerously close to the 2 o’clock mark, my patience completely and utterly drained, and him glaring at me – red-eyed and glassy, like a demon emerging from an overly chlorinated swimming pool.

“If you don’t let go of this pitcher,” I said, “I’m going to rip off your limbs and play H.O.R.S.E. with your torso.”

Thankfully, he let go.

This is just one example of thousands and thousands of patrons across the country who simply do not know how to close a bar. I guess these people just don’t understand the consequences to our livelihoods if we fail to get you out before 2a.m.; don’t understand there have been a million kooks, drunks, rookies and pricks before them who also refused to relinquish their pitchers. I guess, just like everything else, knowing how to properly close a bar is an art, a skill, and a science — that must be learned. And I guess it’s my job to learn-ya. . .

How to Close a Bar
(Hints, Rules and Etiquette)

1) Guzzle and Go Goddamit: This is the first and most important rule and it comes in two, easy-to-follow steps:
A) Guzzle.
B) Go.
So much good can be accomplished by guzzling-and-going. For instance, when you guzzle and go, the next time you walk into the bar, the doormen and bartenders and regulars won’t be whispering behind your back, “Psst — that’s the guy who flung his dung all over the walls last week.”
Yes, yes of course, nobody understands more than me, the urge to hang on to that last pitcher – oh lovely pitchy-pitch filled with chilly droplets of golden goodness – for dear life. But dude… there’s beer in the outside world too! They’re called “liquor stores,” and if you guzzle and go right now, you can get there before it closes.

2) No Face-Punching: Studies have shown, closing the bar often leads to unsolicited acts of face-punching. Try not to punch any faces as you head out the door. Face-punching is bad on the knuckles. Wall-punching, jukebox-kicking and nine-ball-through-the-window-throwing are not recommended either.

3) No Bathroom-Ducking: Hiding in the bathroom is an old trick that doesn’t work. Besides, the party is over now. The last of the unclaimed happy peppy party girls is outside; hooking up with some dude she has to settle for because you — clearly the stud of her dreams — are sitting on the crapper making sure you drain every last bubble out of that bottle of Bud, bub.

4) Think before Acting: During closing time one night, a guy stripped off all his clothes and wrapped himself around a beam. I suppose – nay, I am certain – that if he had taken just one short moment to Think Before Acting, that he would have decided against rubbing his Johnson against the grain of an old, wooden support beam.

Admittedly — because the bouncers had to pry the kook off the pole, one extremity at a time — his antics bought him a few extra minutes inside the bar. But he ended up in an alley-puddle – naked, drinkless, cashless – with mud in his buttcrack and splinters on his balls.

5) No Girl-Molesting: Studies have shown a higher incidence of girl-molesting at closing time. Sordid Tales does not recommend groping any breasts or asses as you exit the establishment – even if the breasts or asses seem to be “begging for it.”

6) Have an Exit Strategy: Think ahead. Start organizing after hours parties no later than 1 a.m. (Somebody needs to invite the happy peppy summer girls. Somebody needs to go on a beer run. Somebody needs to score the drugs). Of course, always invite your bartender. Then he’ll come over to your house, grope your girl, break your dishes, dry-hump your lasagna leftovers, piss on your mattress, and pass out in your tub.

EJD
11/27/02