The Booze Thread

[Sgt PSN]

Turns out it wasn't posted that long ago at all.....it only feels that way.  It's also important to note that Dio was the first person to comment on the story.  I don't know why it's important to note that.  It just is.   

December 21, 2008, 10:00 pm

By DAVID KRAMER

One thing I miss about drinking is hanging out in bars.

For years my wife and I resisted owning a television, so I would use my local bar like the family room, and go there to watch sports on TV. My wife used to tell me with pride that during the summer months, when the windows were open at my local, the bartenders would see her walking by on her way home and shout greetings to her outside, whether I was at the bar or not.

My local bar was Peter McManus over on 7th Avenue and 19th Street in Manhattan. It's an Irish place with worn banquettes and stools and an old, beat-up bar complete with a fish tank and photographs of family and patrons going back for generations.

I used to joke that I was surprised to be treated like a regular over there because I always considered myself to be firmly irregular. And as much as I did frequent the place, there was a group of guys and women who were always there. From my vantage point, they were the real regulars. Still, I was treated really well at the bar no matter how often I showed up.

McManus is one of those rare New York bars that still understands and holds dear the concept of the buyback — a drink on the house for every few you buy. And depending on the bartender and the length of my drinking session, the buybacks could be plentiful. Every now and then, the cadence of the buybacks would increase and I would find myself going one-for-one with the bartender, which made it difficult to slip out in a moment of polite one-upmanship.

I thought this was just great. I knew that buybacks didn't go to just anybody. They were a perk of the inner circle, the handful of patrons who were genuinely liked and trusted by the staff. So a buyback didn't just mean free beer — a great concept on its own. It meant acceptance. It meant I was on one of the rings of the inner circle.

Of course, there was a trade-off for all those buybacks; you had to tip nicely. Most nights I drank too much, left big piles of cash on the bar and staggered home. Being a big tipper was not something you could accuse me of in most circumstances. I still remember going out for dinner with my grandmother in Florida, where after an obscenely large early-bird special, she packed up all the extra food and the basket of rolls to take home and told me to tip one dollar per person. This was etched firmly into my tipping ethos.

When my wife and I got married in the early 90's and we started looking for a place to live in Manhattan, my only condition was that our apartment be near a bar I liked. We lived briefly on Second Avenue in the West 30's, but I didn't like the local bar very much so we soon moved to Chelsea, where I settled on McManus.

This was about 1993 and I was becoming more and more obsessive about the Knicks at the time. I was a loud and vocal fan, and soon became friendly with the bartenders during the prime Patrick Ewing-Charles Oakley years. I hoped to drink them to a championship. I often laughed to myself about the fact that I lived within walking distance of Madison Square Garden, but could not think of a more magical place to watch those games than from a stool in My Bar.

After a few years on 21st Street, we decided to move. I remember walking into McManus and telling Bruce, one of the bartenders there, that I was about to move out of the neighborhood. I remember his glum expression as he told me to wait a minute, then left and came back with a beer.

"This one's on me," he said. "Where are you moving to?"

"Twenty-fifth Street!" I said, holding my free beer. In those days, any place above 23rd Street was decidedly not Chelsea, and we both laughed hysterically. I don't think I paid for a drink the rest of the night. Despite the long commute I now had, I managed to maintain my regular status.

                                                             *    *    *

Last winter when I was still drinking — long after the demise of the Knicks — I was in McManus. I was sitting next to Bruce at the end of the bar where the off-duty cops and bartenders typically hung out. On this particular night there were no cops in the house; it was relatively slow. Suddenly, at the middle of the bar, a customer began yelling at one of the bartenders. The guy had been cut off. And he didn't like it. Everyone at our end of the bar looked over with concern, and the guy opened up his jacket like he had a gun in his waistband. All around me everyone jumped into action.

Someone grabbed a bat and jumped over the bar. Bruce got up and he and a bunch of others ran and began pushing this guy out the front door. For a split-second I just sat there. All alone now, sitting at the bar, I considered that after all these years, I had never been in a bar fight. I had no idea what to do — and that guy had a gun for all I knew.

Something drove me just then to jump up. I started across the bar and made it in time to join in on pushing the angry customer out the door. We all got outside and almost on cue a police cruiser stopped on the corner to see what was going on. They guy took off and the cops never got out of their car. They didn't chase him; nobody had really seen a gun anyway. We all went back inside and drank some more.

When I got home I woke up my wife. I told her about how I had been in my first bar fight — if that was what that was. Then I told her the details of what had happened.

I told her about that split-second, how I was frozen on my bar stool and didn't know what to do. But then every free drink that I had ever had, and the potential of that ending — forever — flashed before my eyes. No more special treatment. No more buybacks ... The thought was staggering. I just had to do something.

She couldn't believe I had been so stupid: "You have a son!" She couldn't believe I would run right into the scuffle when there may well have been guns involved. What would she have done if I had been shot or killed?

I promised her I would never do anything like that again, and now that I am not spending time in bars, it's an easy promise to keep. But to tell the truth, even now, I know there is just no way I could have lived with myself if I had been still sitting on that stool when all the guys from the bar came back inside.

Bad judgment? Sure. But I wouldn't blame the alcohol. I never did have very good judgment, and still don't, even though I am sober.

[Seabiscuit36]

His doctor was right about his drinking!

[Diomedes]

That is garbage rambling from an AA meeting.

F

[Eagaholic]

Reading it again, that story is douchier than I remembered.
So if I got it straight, he just about lived in NYC bars for many years of his life until one night there was a "bar fight" where a whole bunch of guys shoved another one out the door who possibly may or may not have had a gun, and the guy ran away. So he doesn't go to bars anymore and now his wife isn't afraid.

[methdeez]

Don't forget about him also complaining about not getting enough free liquor.

[rjs246]

Most people who have ever had a drink think that their personal version of drinking is the most interesting thing the world has ever seen. I know this first hand because my drinking has always and will always rule and you're all a bunch of lightweights with terrible drinking stories compared to me.

That story, though, was scraping bottom. It was pathetic on a level that is difficult to achieve. Most former drinkers lament the life they led and the decisions they made and therefor actually had a reason to quit. This guy liked drinking and the worst decision he ever made while drinking was to push someone out of a door as part of a mob of out-the-door-pushers. Sounds to me like he quit drinking because his wife is an uptight funholehair and still pines for the life because he never had a good reason to stop in the first place. What a douche.

[Munson]

Yuengling released an Oktoberfest beer....I bought a 6 pack but haven't tried it yet. I've not been a big fan of their beers outside of the lager, but i have hope they'll do seasonals well.

[rjs246]

Oktoberfests, and all pumpkin flavored beers, can go farg themselves. Just awful.

[Munson]

I don't like pumpkin at all but I've been able to find a few autumn beers that I like. Dogfish's is alright, and I love the Sam Adams fall brew, though I don't think that's specifically pumpkin.

I'm not sure if Yuengling's is supposed to be pumpkin flavor either but if it is I'll send you a case.

[PhillyPhanInDC]

Oktoberfests, and all pumpkin flavored beers, can go farg themselves. Just awful.

Sam Adam's Octoberfest is the jesus.

[rjs246]

[PoopyfaceMcGee]

Oktoberfests, and all pumpkin flavored beers, can go farg themselves. Just awful.

This couldn't be more true.

Also, while I occasionally like a decent IPA, it seems like the craze has gotten to the point where people will order pretty much anything on the menu with "IPA" in the title. I just don't get it. It's a good change of pace, but why would I want to go all hoppy all the time?

Still, I'd order an IPA before a garbage fall seasonal.

[ice grillin you]

IPA's are unbelievably gross

[hbionic]

IPA's are like sleeping with a tranny. It's just weird at first, but eventually, it gets palpable. IPAs ladies and gentlemen.

[phattymatty]

i have tall boys of shlitz in my fridge right now so i'm no beer snob but shock top makes a good, cheap pumpkin beer.