I got to the bar at 7, like always. There were people sitting in our designated seating area, however. I mean there was a guy literally in my seat! Eh, whatever, I don’t own ‘em. So I sat further down the bar and gave M a smile. She looked back at me and meh’d a bit. She was having a really shitty day. So we talked a while, traded stories and so on, and she had some coffee. It all helped.

I decided to have something other than beer. Remember I have an ulcer. Which is why I can generally only drink beer and only a handful at that. So when I decide to have a vodka cranberry I have to ask for it to be made “for a 90lb girl” and hope the bartender takes me seriously. M takes me seriously, and she understood and even already knew the why so I thought this would be fine. She held up the glass to make sure she hadn’t added too much vodka but I was lost in thought.

I took a sip and realized: M had made the drink for a small-built female. M is a small female, see. She also has the tolerance of a tank. You see where this is going, don’t you? She made it much weaker than she would’ve for herself, to be sure, but stronger than she thought she did. I didn’t bother to correct her, it wasn’t really bad enough to set off the ulcer. So long as I was careful, so I was.

Agnes, the new waitress, was on her first full shift. And as the band breaks, they mention the tip jar. So, being helpful, she grabs for it to take it around for them. Well, generally? Never do that. But the thing that send M and I into five minutes of hard laughter was not the grab but the look on the face of the guy who normally does the job. He had this moment of utter panic when someone else touched the jar, followed by a gaze that said only “dear lord you’re setting fire to my small child!” Priceless.

Later, the always friendly Mike Wendel showed up, as last night’s special guest star. He sat down, and only checked the basketball score on his phone every ten minutes or so. I was proud of him, I know that isn’t easy. He likes his basketball, you see. He likes it a lot. I think I heard him mutter something about a “precious” later on, but I digress.

Mike and I sat around and drank. Then I had a dim memory of the date and sent an emergency bar text to Laszlo! Laszlo got back to me right away and let me know that last night was the 75th anniversary of the repeal of prohibition. So we had a drink to that. Like you do.

Last night was, however, kinda special. Let’s see … there was the guy who was so stoned he ordered a beer, drank it and then sat there sucking on a lollipop. He then asked for a second beer. M asked him to pay, he got confused. Then he asked to speak to someone in Spanish. This all unraveled that he didn’t even remember asking for the other beer. He then left, stumbling, clutching his grape lollipop tightly.

There was the woman in the corner. I think she was already kinda far gone when she came in. She wanted a “light” apple martini. Something about her seemed off, to all of us. She was also kinda pushy. Then she drank less than half her drink and wandered off.

Some of M’s good friends showed up, too. We’d actually heard stories about these guys, and they are great guys. Friendly and fun. So we all tried to work out how one of them ended up so wrecked the other night that when they got him home his shoes were off and he had puke on his socks. No one had seen him do it. Many theories were tossed around: He threw up directly in his shoes and then put them back on, he took his shoes off to stand on the toilet and try to throw up, he almost got mugged and the guy wanted his shoes but then he threw up and saved them, he took his shoes off for fun and someone else threw up on his socks. Anyway! There were many theories.

Hammerpants showed up and had managed to bruise his hand during krate (still pronounced Krah-Tee) somehow. Because it isn’t Hammerpants if it doesn’t involve an injury. This is a man who proudly told me he had almost finished building a new bike with his GF and had only bled on it once.

M told us about this creepy guy we had seen around before who, over the weekend, grabbed her ass not once - but twice. Somehow he kept all his limbs. I don’t know how that worked, exactly, but there you go.

At one point M had to run downstairs for ice and she stops and looks at me, with her “I love to cause trouble” grin. “You’re in charge,” she says to me, “make sure no one gets behind the bar while I’m gone.” Of course having two of her good friends, who were also bartenders, sitting at the bar didn’t hurt either. Yeah, useless fake power for the win!

Later we were discussing how her coworkers and boss used to say she was too nice. “Wait,” I said, “no one said you were ever too nice, right?”

“What are you trying to say?” she asked, shaking her head.

“That, uhhh, you don’t worry about being too nice?”

“Uh HUH,” was all she said in reply. Then she told us all how she did, in fact, used to be far too nice and has now reconnected with her rage. Warms the heart.

Eventually we had to go home. So we did. Well, M didn’t, she was still working. But you know what I mean.