Take My Life ... No, Seriously. Kill Me
How was my weekend you ask? You'll be sorry. Sunday comes and it's already time for work. (OK, I was 45 minutes late technically but I got home from work at 6am you can't really expect I'm going to be back by 4pm the next afternoon, can you. Well, can you?) So, promptly at 4 :45 ....OK, it was 5, I come breezing through the front door give a half a salute to the opening bartender heading for the back bar to eagerly and quietly peruse my Sunday Times. Out of the corner of my eye I see what looks to be a gentleman being helped back on to his barstool by another patron. I suppose I should be concerned but I really, really want to read the paper. I turn around and check them out for a few minutes and manage to convince myself that maybe the older guy just needed some help on to his stool after all, and with that tra-la!, I head for the empty back bar. I no sooner take off my coat and sit down in a comfy wing back chair and begin leafing through the sections when I hear an unmistakeable *THUD* which is clearly a sound I know too well, the sound of a drunk hitting the carpeted floor.
With a heavy heart I open the door and sure enough, another patron and my bartender are scooping up said drunk off the floor. They're heading right for me. We decide to park him on a couch in an unopened back bar for a while. Sometimes, they just need a half hour to get their shit together but more often, this is just a prelude to more horrible behavior. At any rate, I can't in good conscience toss somebody to the curb that can't stand up, I'm already annoyed with the opening bartender for letting him get to this point and I am now the proud owner of a 60 something year old drunk man. Oh, happy day.
Two hours go by, at some point Neo shows up. I shorthand the story and let him know to behave normally. We do our Sunday chat part talk about our issues part dish the dirt on co-workers. Every once in a while the drunk in the corner manages to get our attention as he continually mumbles phrases but occasionally seems to really be communicating. At one point in all of this he does, in fact, manage to let me know that he wants another drink. (right) Eventually, after dozing in and out, he seems to be more coherent and in fact asks to go to the bathroom.
"Help me up."
"Buddy, if you can't get up I'm not gonna let you walk around. If you want to stand up stand up."
Just help me up. C'mon, one, two, three."
Against my better judgement I one, two, three him up and help him to the bathroom. I notice he doesn't lock the door and think great, I won't have to break in in a few minutes. Sure enough after about 10 minutes just as I'm going to check on him, another customer opens the door and clutches her pearls. Shit (I hope not). I look in the door and my drunk in the corner is now drunk on the floor. His head is wedged up against the porcelain sink, his pants are undone, he's got one hand on the toilet bowl trying ( I assume) to pull himslef back up. He's also peed everywhere and on himself. Fighting off my first impulse to just lock the door and come back in a week when he's dead, I start to pick him up.
"I'm fine, I'm fine. Don't pick me up."
"You're lying on the bathroom floor covered in piss, clearly, you're not fine."
I help him to his feet and his doing that spaghetti leg thing as I'm trying to hold him up while he buckles his pants. Clearly, he is not up to this kind of complicated maneuver, and he's concentrating so hard that he forgets to stand. I'm trying to prop him up but he outweighs me by at least 100lbs.
"You have to stand up. Stand on your own two feet, what's wrong with you?"
"Jus haff to buckle up theshe pants...."
"You fuckin drunk stand on your fuckin feet I can't hold you up! Son of a bitch!"
I have totally lost patience by now, and Neo must have heard me start swearing and asks if I need help.
"Yes!"
Now Neo comes in to hold him up and I get the rare pleasure of trying to buckle up his piss soaked jeans. I manage the bottom two buttons as his stomach is too distended from drinking to get the top ones. I give up and close the belt and we lead him out of the bathroom. By then, my doorman has arrived for work and he and Neo lead him to a chair by the front door. I am literally covered in sweat. He finally managed to get down the stairs to the outside (where he promptly fell again). After several attempts where even cab drivers refused to pick him up, the fresh air seemingly revived him enough that he could stay on his feet and get a taxi to stop for him.
Now, I know what some of you are thinking. Why did we get him so drunk? We didn't. According to my bartender he arrived kind of drunk which is apparently a normal occurrence. He had half of a martini and part of a beer. Apparently, some other bartender somewhere else did all the damage, we were left to clean up the result. Still, I did have a strongly worded discussion with that bartender in that I could care less if somebody's a regular customer or not, if they arrive visibly drunk from somewhere else we don't push 'em over the edge. It always backfires, and this time it backfired on me.
The very next day, again early in the night (on a Monday for god's sake!), I overhear my doorman in a discussion by the bathroom with somebody, basically a back and forth you have to leave now, no I don't want to deal. I can tell the doorman is in over his head so I get ready to be bad cop at the same time my doorman is coming to get me. By the time he gets to me the man had managed to lock himself in the very same bathroom from last night. According to the doorman, the customer was found alseep, standing at the urinal, pants around his ankles with his dick in his hand. (Why, oh why they don't come and get me then, I'll never know.) At any rate by the time I discover that he's locked in the bathroom I arrive just in time to hear that other unmistakeable sound. Yep. He's puking. Delicious. It's all I can do now but wait. I can't leave. It's very rare to catch the Pukatrator in action. Most times the filthy pigs yak in a sink or down the wall and just leave it. ( Aside to everyone: I know at the time that you're drunk, but in all my legendary days of drinking and drugging and Exctasy and what have you I have never, never ever thrown up in anything but a toilet, unless it was outside. It's a big round hole in the floor. Lean over and blow chunks. How hard is that?) So I was highly motivated to wait this man out. If he opened that door and his innards was everywhere I was going to turn him right around and make him clean up after himself. Eventually, the friend he was with that night arrived to wait with me. He had had a couple drinks but was far far away from the condition of the other guy. Which leaves me to believe it was a Better Living Through Chemistry situation. C'mon, the man passed out while pissing.
After a good half hour and me rapping on the door to get a response he did finally emerge. He's a regular I've seen many many times but never in this condition. A quick spot check by me, and except for a bit on the toilet seat he did manage to clean up after himself. Aren't people great? So I asked if he was feeling better and while he was wobbly, he was coherent and I let his friend take him off to talk. I should have made sure they left together, I just naturally assumed they would. About a half hour later I discover to my horror that friend is gone but Pukatrator remains. He's heading for the back bar, I'm confident no one will serve him any more liquor and I decide to let him be.
*THUD*
Fuck!
And I should ask him to leave at this point but honestly, as a person I just get really worried about sending people out into Manhattan if they can't stand. People drunkenly fall off subway platforms and get killed a few times a year. It's such a yeah, yeah thing in NYC they only get a little 1/8th page blurb in the paper. But I would feel awful if someone left my place and got squashed by something. Besides, he just passed out, again. I leave him sleeping. I just..... I can't. Another 1/2 hour goes by and suddenly T---- is asking for the doorman, who I have sent on a break.
"What's wrong?"
"The dude is throwing up."
I rush in and more accurately he's heaving and spitting but everyone has moved to the other side of the room in horror. Notice, nobody puts down their drinks and leaves, they just relocate and watch. I run to grab a bucket in case he really does yak and R-- rushes over to get him to the bathroom. So there I am standing outside the toilet, again. A few minutes later he emerges. Looking decidedly pale and with wet spots on his shirt. Marry me! I had located his coat, scarf and bag.
"Time to leave."
"Yeah."
So I helped him on with his scarf and coat and handed him his bag. I escorted him to the door. He started listing to one side. I steadied him. He looked a little surprised.
"I've got you."
He got to the front door.
"You want some help down the stairs?"
"No, I'm OK."
"OK well, grab the railing."
He made it down fine.
"Get home safe."
"Thank you. Good night."
Please don't fall in front of the No. 6. I thought to myself.
