The Che Guevara of Bartending

The First Essential Scary Truth

The bar wasn’t full, three people at the counter, and one table of four in the lounge. My partner was taking ten minutes to make the vodka tonic and three martinis for the group.

I banged out the five or six drinks from the various servers and put in the food for the bar denizens while I watched my partner drag himself through the four drinks. He finally ran them to the table and scribbled down the food order. Another ten minutes. Not even the Sunday Night Football game’s commercial breaks took this long. Their order: a shellfish platter for four.

Finally, after running the ticket to the kitchen and joining me behind the circular bar, I asked the 24 former bar back from Connecticut what took so long. “Like fuck you, dude. They couldn’t make up their minds.”

“My man you will be first against he wall when the bartending revolution comes,” I laughed.

“You want to rape me,” he said, obviously shocked. “That’s like so gay dude.”

I suppose if I would’ve explained the meaning of the cliché he would have thought I was threatening his life. So much for being the Che Guevara of Bartending.