I was walking over to the local liquor store to purchase my writing supplies for the night when I came across two young guys sitting on the curb.

“Excuse me sir,” said one. “If we give you money will you buy us a twelve pack of MGD? We’ll pay you a dollar.”

My first thought was, Wow, a whole dollar – Then I’ll only need 4,999 more to retain a lawyer for the Contributing to the Delinquency of a Minor charge.

My second thought was to curl my fingers around his larynx, and holler into his ear, “Don’t ever call me ‘sir’ you little puke."

My third thought was, I am a bartender -- I have a duty to not furnish minors with alcohol.

Well, it just keeps getting harder and harder to rock out in this town. It breaks my heart. As you know, Rob Hagey and his people over at San Diego Street Scene made some drastic changes to their event this year: 1) They changed location. 2) They went from three days down to two. 3) And most notably, Street Scene became an all ages event.

I don’t know about you, but whenever I hear the phrase, “All ages event,” I develop a rash on my eyeballs. Because it means those of us who are old enough to enjoy a little beer with our rock ’n’ roll will have to watch the concert from the beer garden. And beer gardens blow big time.

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.

From the Mailbox: “Dear Ed, I’ve been reading your bartender column for over four years now. I’ve always wondered, is bartending as exciting and fun as it seems? Does it pay well? If so, how do I get a job?”

Dan/La Jolla, CA

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?)

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 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.

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: