A Night at the Bar, Part II

After the loss and miraculous recovery of my wallet, I felt I should treat my friend to a drink. You know, for karma. At the bar where I had a curious incident a few months ago.

Everything's relatively normal this time until there's a shift-change and the Sunday night bartender steps up.

Something is clearly up with this bartender. Skinny blonde chick with pierced gums. Parker Posey face. She's either a little drunk or a little high or a little both.

Friend X and I are deep in conversation when she just situates herself in front of us and involves herself in the conversation as if we'd been talking to her the whole time.

We try to humor her.

It seems like that's always the mistake. Trying to humor crazy people.

She keeps on invading our conversation. Not in a calculated way, as an intro to asking us if we wanted another round. She simply forces her way into the conversation. Like a drunk berzerker. Pretending to know what we're talking about and going off on what she thinks about this and that.

After hearing literally two seconds of our conversation: "Who's this Johnny guy? He's sounds GAY! He sounds like he's closeted gay and I just wanna PUNCH HIM IN THE FACE! Is he a douchebag? HE SOUNDS LIKE A DOUCHEBAG."

Appreciate that nothing we were talking about had indicated anything about our friend Johnny's sexual orientation or even whether he was good or bad. We were having a conversation that, from the outside, should have sounded fairly innocuous -- and suddenly this woman's completely hijacked it and flown it into the mountains.

Then she fixates on me and my tattoos.

"I gotta be honest, I've been looking at your tattoos since I got here."

More patterns. It's like my ink is a magnet for drunk/high/crazy girls. Specifically at this one bar.

She handles my arms for a spell before looking up at me and asking, "What's your background?"

I know what this means but, still, I ask her to clarify.

"I mean, are you Korean? Are you Filipino?"

I confirm that I'm Filipino.

"Like my boyfriend!" she says. "You look like my boyfriend. He's a tattoo artist."

I ask where he works.

"All over the place. Mostly New Jersey. Whoa, this one's intense..."

She fixates on another tattoo on my arm. I tell her it was the most painful one to get.

"Oh yeah, I know it. I got one... here..."

Without warning, she lifts up her sweater and flashes us this major tattoo situated right BETWEEN HER BOOBS. (She's wearing a bra but that doesn't make this gesture any less shocking.)

Sometimes, you have to listen to the instinct that tells you someone is fundamentally unsafe.