A man walks into a bar; this not a joke. He first asks the bartender for a glass of water, at which point, the bartender explains that if you ain’t paying, you ain’t drinking. The man bursts into tears. The bartender asks why the long face. Really, this is not a joke.
It seems that the old guy’s wife had run off with another guy, leaving early this very same morning while he was still in bed. If that wasn’t enough, the Camaro-driving sonofabitch ran over his what-would-be-best hunting dog, if only he ever hunted. The dog could climb a tree and throw the raccoon to its death, or say he said.
So his old lady is gone, and his favorite dog is dead, and all he can think to order is a glass of water, because she took the money in the Maxwell House can in the kitchen that they had been saving for a trip this summer to Panama City Beach, and she took the bank card from his wallet on the dresser, and the checkbook which was also on the dresser, and the credit card was long overdrawn, and to top it off, it’s Veteran’s Day, a fucking bank holiday, and the old guy fought in the first Gulf War, and through much VA therapy had just learned to manage his PTSD, but he couldn’t get any cash out to buy a drink after his woman ran off with another man, who ran over his favorite dog, as they made their getaway.
Lord knows how he’s going to afford the colonoscopy and all, especially after being laid off down at the factory.
This wasn’t the shittiest day ever, or even week. This is the shittiest life on record.
The bartender acquiesces and gives him the glass of water, and a shot of Kentucky Gentleman chaser on the house. That was about the time the Asian geisha-style siamese twins walked in with the midget, but we will save that one for later.
Then this leather fag walks into the bar just like it’s 1980 and it’s San Francisco, which it isn’t. He’s got brass knuckles on one hand, and a cricket bat in the other just to increase his odds. He stomps over to the guy, who’s now in the middle of his first house gin and tonic, and smacks him square in the jaw with the knuckles and then square on the knee with the bat as he descends from the stool to the floor.
The dude asks what the fuck did you do that for, and the queer says that’s because your daughter ran off with my old man.
The midget with the four gold rings in each ear plays a song on the juke box.
He says that wasn’t my daughter, that was my wife. Mr. Castro feels so bad he buys the guy a Grey Goose martini and they spend the next half hour licking wounds and talking about what they lost. Then they talk about church and childhood. Then about the rough start the Astros are off to. They talk about the midget and the siamese twins, and Mr. Tightpants says he almost switched sides for some Arabic siamese twins that he ran across while trying to figure out something to do during the first Gulf War. The two realize they have something in common – the Gulf War – not the siamese twins or wishy-washy sexuality.
The homo says he has to leave to throw his ex’s shit out into the street so the whole neighborhood will know what an asshole he is, and thus will know that a period of mourning will ensue behind the doors of his house. Don’t come asking for a cup of sugar.
That’s when the ducks come in, and man were these some rich ducks. They start ordering rounds of drinks for the whole house, but being ducks they were lightweights, and most of them started passing out under tables, on the bar, in the toilet. One was even found asleep floating around in the bathroom sink. He was a small duck.
The bartender brings three of the leftover duck drinks to the old guy and he drinks them all: peach schnapps, amaretto sour, shot of Jaeger from the duck with the frayed Astros hat.
About this time the bartender says something along the lines of last call, only to be followed by you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here, or if you don’t work at the bar, or you are not fucking someone who works at the bar, get the fuck out, or something like that. The guy thinks briefly of propositioning the bartender – a feeble attempt at eeking out a few more moments here and a few less moments at the house that was once their home.
The siamese twins leave, each trying to weave in an independent direction. The midget follows trying to push his face into the unified ass of the twins. The ducks all start to awake and stir and depart the bar in a V formation. Quack, quack.
Then there’s the veteran, the man, now alone. He thinks of the street girls out on the boulevard. He thinks of the all-night liquor store. He thinks of his 10-years-his-junior wife on the way to Panama City Beach with his Panama City Beach money and a guy in a fucking Camaro, with t-tops. He thinks of how easy it is to be a drunk when your life has gone to the crapper, and how being drunk at such times, can make the whole world seem new again.
He thinks he shouldn’t have mixed all those drinks, but beggars can’t be choosers.
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