My Two Cents: Beware the dangers of the late-night bar scene
Kate Barker
Issue date: 4/1/09 Section: Opinion
It is a typical weekend night, the minute hand is itching toward last call, the playlist has started over from the top, and though you cannot pinpoint exactly when, it seems that the local watering hole has morphed into the annual Village Idiots Convention.
Inside voices were abandoned hours ago, dance moves have disintegrated into jerky convulsions, the smashes of glass bottles hitting filthy concrete floors are erupting like popcorn kernels towards the end of their cook time. There are few upstanding citizens remaining.
Most girls, as it is commonly known, are either about three misinterpreted sentences away from bursting into tears, or perched on the edge of an enormous blow out with a close friend over a previously unvoiced grievance that occurred first semester (freshman year). The waterworks are just barely at bay, and it appears that, for some, maintaining balance is becoming more and more of an insurmountable task.
Girls can be found repeating stories within a five-minute time frame, spitting out potentially offensive opinions to unsuspecting classmates and bar employees, and dropping their cell phones into mixed drinks. Brain filters seem to have gone on temporary smoke breaks, and nonsense is flying like spittle. This behavior is irritating, unattractive, and most decidedly un-ladylike, but as far as I am concerned, it does not present the biggest issue in the room. In a confined and cramped dive bar, being destructive trumps acting annoying.
Because, and though this can most certainly not be said about the entire male population, boys can become just that: highly, bizarrely and dangerously destructive. Girls may yap your ear into non-being, but it is unlikely that come 1:30 a.m. they will become suddenly and irrevocably convinced that everyone in the bar is either "looking at them funny" or "coming at them." But there often is a gentleman who becomes quite sure of just that. And, horribly, the fate of the evening can realistically rest in the hands (read: fists) of this one fixated drunkard. No one and nothing is safe. Unsuspecting potted plants, street signs, plaster walls and people all become attractive punching bags as soon as the aforementioned individual adopts this mindset.
Inside voices were abandoned hours ago, dance moves have disintegrated into jerky convulsions, the smashes of glass bottles hitting filthy concrete floors are erupting like popcorn kernels towards the end of their cook time. There are few upstanding citizens remaining.
Most girls, as it is commonly known, are either about three misinterpreted sentences away from bursting into tears, or perched on the edge of an enormous blow out with a close friend over a previously unvoiced grievance that occurred first semester (freshman year). The waterworks are just barely at bay, and it appears that, for some, maintaining balance is becoming more and more of an insurmountable task.
Girls can be found repeating stories within a five-minute time frame, spitting out potentially offensive opinions to unsuspecting classmates and bar employees, and dropping their cell phones into mixed drinks. Brain filters seem to have gone on temporary smoke breaks, and nonsense is flying like spittle. This behavior is irritating, unattractive, and most decidedly un-ladylike, but as far as I am concerned, it does not present the biggest issue in the room. In a confined and cramped dive bar, being destructive trumps acting annoying.
Because, and though this can most certainly not be said about the entire male population, boys can become just that: highly, bizarrely and dangerously destructive. Girls may yap your ear into non-being, but it is unlikely that come 1:30 a.m. they will become suddenly and irrevocably convinced that everyone in the bar is either "looking at them funny" or "coming at them." But there often is a gentleman who becomes quite sure of just that. And, horribly, the fate of the evening can realistically rest in the hands (read: fists) of this one fixated drunkard. No one and nothing is safe. Unsuspecting potted plants, street signs, plaster walls and people all become attractive punching bags as soon as the aforementioned individual adopts this mindset.
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