The Screaming, Attention Hungry Girlies

Between changes in the time and the weather, and the impending holidays, we're sliding into the busy time of year at the bar. My average sales during any given shift have increased significantly because we're getting more people, which means more drinks, and more of everything else - like the goofballs, egomaniacs, the totally oblivious, and all manner of poor and non-tippers.

In the midst of all this, I find myself having an anti reaction to people who are troublesome. The more impatient and needy they are, the more relaxed I am. They can wait another minute on their drinks while I check on another table. Nobody has ever died from the lack of a beer. They'll be fine. I think it's due to the fact that I've been doing this for two years now and I think the bar and its patrons hold little left to surprise and astound me.

Now, let's skip ahead. Saturday night, we have a little rush around nine and it dies off and by eleven Julia and I look at each other and say, "Hey, maybe we'll close early tonight." You can already guess how that turned out.

Enter the very, very happy group. This group was mostly populated by girlies needing attention. One, in particular, fulfilled the role of Instigator. She was the one who began the screaming-at-the-top-of-her-lungs and dancing wildly with complete obliviousness to anyone in her path of destruction. Since she was a... let's call it excessively curvy, gal who had a wider bodily circumference than most, this spastic behavior encouraged me to put some distance between us as, had I been caught unawares, she would have easily steamrolled me in a most painful manner.

So, screaming. Lots of screaming and dancing. A few rounds of shots on various people's tabs. Not once, nor twice, but three times, I was propositioned to "shimmy" for them. But, you know, always leave them wanting more, right? That and the fact that I find the idea of putting on a show for a group of people who've been drinking is not in the least bit appealing to me.

Now that you've got a vision of this group (eight in all), imagine them hanging out for two and a half hours. Right. Fortunately for them, two things were working in their favor: the bar was mostly dead, so there wasn't anyone in particular for them to annoy with the spectacle, and I was bored and a little fascinated by the train wreck taking place before my eyes. Instead of get frustrated with them, or irritated by their antics, I simply brought another round of shots and then ignored them for a while so I could go downstairs and wash some glasses with younger Dave, or chat with Julia, or make fun of the group with various people. That last one was, by far, the one I did most.

By the end of the night the girlies were dancing on the bar while Jan took pictures of them. Since one of the owners was approving of their behavior, I felt free to just sit back and watch without trying to intervene or get them the hell down. They all closed out their tabs, and that part was funny. There's a stereotype that women, and especially women in groups, are lousy tippers.
Girly one: $35 tab, $3.50 tip.
Girly two: $55 tab, $0 tip.
Guy one: $20 tab, $5 tip.
Guy two: $70 tab, $14 tip.
Needless to say, the grain of truth in that stereotype held true tonight. Still, I didn't feel particularly angry at making $3.50 on $90 of drinks. It was a boring night by then, and it was fascinating to watch them make gigantic fools of themselves. Drunk girlies in need of attention are always quite the spectacle. One of them, the excessively curvaceous instigator, got up on a table during the dancing-on-things escapade and when they left, said the top of this table was no longer parallel to the floor, but rather, pointint toward it at a forty-five degree angle. Again, I feel no guilt, since Jan egged them on.

Moral of the story: The next time you're tempted to make a spectacle of yourself in public, remind yourself that people are watching. The number of people watching is more than you think it is, and they're definitely making fun of you. Remember kids, not all kinds of attention are good attention.