It’s 10:22 PM, and you’re in line for a bar that you’ve been to enough to know where the bathroom is but not enough to have a rapport with the bartenders. Since drunk people our age act like children, lines for bars are as chaotic as the ones at Disney World. The person behind you is in a Cold-War-like argument with his girlfriend, the person in front of you appears to be curing seasonal allergies with a key, and nobody in your group can stand straight. After the longest eleven minutes in your life, you put your hand out to get stamped, the bouncer mumbles, flip your wrist, and because you have no idea what the fuck he’s saying, you laugh. He doesn’t like this and angrily repeats himself. FLIP YOUR WRIST. You flip your wrist faster than a 2014 Tumblr girl with that stupid infinity tattoo and make your merry way in. It’s at that moment that every man is overcome with this feeling of confusion. What do I do with my body now? You pregamed, but not enough to where you can confidently talk to anyone with a uterus. Music is on, but if you dance, you’ll look crazier than fucking Donnie Darko, so instinctively, you nudge one of your friends and head to get a drink.
Getting a drink at a bar with anyone in their early twenties is like being sandwiched between one of the dancer’s on Lizzo’s new TV show, Watch out for the Big Girls, and an offensive lineman for the Lions on a Spirit airlines flight. Your elbows are exchanging jabs, you can barely breathe, and someone just farted, and much like Henry Kissenger’s relationship with Cambodia, they aren’t going to take accountability for the bomb. When you’re in distance to where you have your elbow on the bar, it’s important to maintain etiquette. Shoving your debit card with forty-two dollars on it in the face of a tattooed millennial to the point where you’re touching their uvula isn’t going to get you a shot of espolon any faster. When you finally get service from someone that’s pissed because a bunch of underage people didn’t tip her, you pay a Netflix subscription for something that you’ll finish in four minutes, and if you’re smart, a beer too.
You’ve got twenty-four liquid ounces in your hands, but you’re swarmed. If Trent Richardson was in this position, he would be stuck within five feet from where he got a drink for two hours, but you’re like Nick Chubb. You find the holes in the coverage and break off. This is the point in the night where having a platonic female friend is so advantageous. During the day, I’m just a man, but when I’m at a bar, and I have a girl or two around my friend group, so we don’t look weird, I’m fucking Mary Wollstonecraft. As the night progresses, drinks start to go down, and bank notifications start to go up. As you begin to converse with random people, it goes okay. Your one line about the death of Queen Elizabeth makes girls laugh at an Andrea Bargnani three-point percentage clip. Finally, one seems kind of interested. Here’s the thing about meeting a girl at a bar: drunk girls who are interested in a guy are like boomer republicans, and drunk guys are like used car salesmen who are way too enthusiastic that somebody is interested in the product. When a girl’s drunk and interested in a guy, somebody can come up to her with any issue and her response would be my friends are sooo annoying.
Hey Kara is in the bathroom crying because something happened to her Dad!
Ugh, Peyton I’m actually talking to someone right now
His heart exploded bending down to pick up some parquet tile at Home Depot
UGH, I’m sorry, my friend are soooo annoying.
This will happen at least once in your quest to find a partner. Sometimes you go home with a Snapchat, and sometimes you go home with someone excited to show you pictures of her Mom’s four-year-old dog. Life in the big city.
