Loud

Saturday night was a long one. Bouncing again. I need the money. Sue me.

I’m standing in a spot just inside the front door, being what you might call the secondary ID guy. I’m there because they like having me inside to keep an eye on things and direct the guys in my section during situations – as opposed to standing outside and spending all my time checking licenses. That’s what you get when you’re “senior man.” You take the lead. I hate that shit.

So I’m there, and a guy about five feet from me keeps screaming. He’s screaming all kind of shit.

“DID YOU GRAB MY ASS?”

He would scream this every time a group of girls walked past.

“FUCKIN’ YANKEES!!! FUCK BOSTON, MAN!!! FUCKIN’ YANKEES!!!”

He kept yelling this at a TV for no apparent reason. There was no game playing.

This went on for at least fifteen minutes before I finally told him to shut the fuck up. I didn’t ask him to move, and I didn’t ask him to tone it down. I told him, in no uncertain terms, to “shut the fuck up.”

He was a skinny fat guy with thin forearms who smoked a cigarette every ten minutes. He was wearing an Affliction shirt. When people like this irritate me at work, it’s easy to tell them to “shut the fuck up” because they’re not doing anything back to me unless they have a gun, which they don’t because we check.

What I need to know, though, is why. Why do they do this? Why do people insist upon screaming like that? Why are there loud-laughers in the world? Why does everything even remotely funny in a bar, lounge or club require some guy who’s borderline emphysemic to guffaw at just the right pitch to elicit a palpable aura of irritation from everyone within a twenty foot radius?

This is what I have for you today. I have this because I thought about it for a while at work. That wasn’t the only time I said “fuck” to someone, either.

A fat guy in a black polo shirt two sizes too small came to the door with four other people. When I asked them for ID, he said, “Oh, dere wit’ me.”

I said, “I need their ID.”

He said, “I said dere wit’ me.”

I said, “And who the fuck are you?”

Then Ray – yes, Ray from the book – told the guy to “get the fuck outta here.”

Since I only just started paying attention to this shit again this weekend – and by “this shit,” I’m referring to bouncing – I’ll tell you this much: patience and tolerance levels are at an all-time low. I could see it up front – you had one chance to be nice to the door guys, otherwise they (we) treated you the way Ray treated the fat guy in the shirt that made him look like a sausage. It happened all night, and I don’t blame the guys for losing it on some people.

Everyone I know has shit going on. Serious shit. So, bar/club problems? No fucking way. Not about to put up with it.

Tomorrow I’ll tell you about the fight, and the debate over whether Affliction and Ed Hardy shirts are a "weakness" or a "sickness."