Drunken customers

I'd love to hear some stories about you've handled drunken people you've run acorss, either on this job (where you probably don't have many) or in old jobs, like when you worked at a car wash in high school.

I wrote before about Drunky Drunkerson and his family who came to our Adirondack attraction and got themselves kicked out halfway through for a number of infractions, although I think the most grave one was not watching his 1-year-old daughter who my wife twice had to pull back from the water.

Drunkin Drunkerson, a new guy, came yesterday. It was my first up-close look at someone too drunk to know what they were doing.

FIRST VISIT: During a rainstorm that would have closed us, were it not for the teenagers out there, Drunkin and a woman come in with another man and woman. Both men clearly are impaired. They have to be pointed the correct direction. One man continually trips over his feet, twice falling into a bush. I finished a phone call and went out to suggest they come back later. They decide that "rain is going into all the wrong places" and leave. They say that the other guy was in a motorcycle accident and broke his wrist or ankle the day before; that's why he's so unccordinated. Uh huh. Normally, we give them rain checks so they come back, but I gave them their money back, hopeful they wouldn't come back.

SECOND VISIT: Drunkin decides to come without shoes -- a point I notice when he comes out to use the restroom, which happens to be a portajohn. He gave me hell for having the door locked (in a previous installment here, I wrote about how a neighbor came and dumped garbage in it; now it's always locked). I told him he needed shoes, but he said he left them on the course. But he hadn't of course, and kept playing barefoot. As I sent him on his way, he told incoming customers that I was kicking him out for ths second time, and tripped on his way down the stairs. His wife told me to fuck myself, and then said I've live longer if I'd lighten up. Drunkin then came in a moment later and told me he was going to call the cops because I was discriminating against a veteran. He was a Navy SEAL and just got back from Iraq and it was the first time he could take off his boots. He finally left, barefoot, walking down the middle of the road.

THIRD VISIT: We spotted him on the side of the property, drinking beer (he was carrying what remained of a six-pack), looking at the lake but I don't think he saw us. He came in a few minutes later, solo (I suspect the woman he was with knew what was coming next) and said he wanted to play. I told him that he wasn't welcome, and he went back into his song and dance. I think my favorite part was when he looked at the radio controlled boat my daughter got me for Fathers Day and said "When I drive mine all around the lake I'm going to be thinking about you and how you FUCKED me!" (How truly sad and pathetic.) As he left, he added, "You know what you need? You need to get laid. Go eat some pussy."

We stopped accepting new customers 10 minutes later and I walked some things to my car. I saw him and the woman walking along the road so I went back inside. When I came back out, I found beer and spit all over the front of my car.

 

I had one at, of all, places, Baskin-Robbins.

Dad sends kid in from the to get ice cream. On the way back out, kid drops everything. Kid comes back in, crying, and I told him I'd be happy to rescoop his order if he would wait a minute (we were slammed). Kid goes back out to the car.

Dad comes in, screaming, demanding we rescoop the entire order right that second. He's clearly drunk. I told him to hold on, that we would replace his stuff (for free!) but he had to wait. He goes off on a rant about how he won't wait, fuck all this, blah blah.

I ignore him and keep helping other people.

He takes one of the dropped ice cream things (it was like a pie with ice cream and fudge on top), and throws it across the counter at me. Not like a major league throw, but a toss hard enough to get shit all over me. Before I have a chance to react, he leaves.

Here's the best part: I thought I had recognized the little boy, and as the car pulled away I knew from where. He was the little half-brother of one of my high school friends. And I knew from my friend that the dad beat the little boy (you could tell, too, the kid walked around like a scared cat). So I called Child Protective Services on his ass, not only for beating his kid but for "assault" of a minor for throwing ice cream at a 17-yr-old. He had to go to court.

 

I was a bar bouncer, so I have plenty of experience with drunks.

Once, a big fight broke out near closing time and some poor bastard who had nothing to do with anything wound up on the bottom of a pile of about six guys who were fighting.

The best friend of the poor bastard tried to come to his rescue. He walked over to the pile, reached down and tried to pull his buddy out from under the pile — by the hair. Needless to say, it didn't work.

To diffuse fights, I had a specific technique: Get behind a guy, put my right arm around his throat, get his left arm in a hammerlock and lift him off the ground about two inches. Then I'd tell him he could breathe again as soon as he calmed the fuck down. Usually, the guy would kick like hell for about 20 seconds until he realized I was serious. From then on, though, no problems.

I found it to be a much better solution than trading punches.

 

College edition
When I was in college, a lot of my fraternity brothers worked at the same bar where two more of our members were managers. So we all frequented the same bar of course and used it for all our gatherings (alumni receptions, homecoming parties, etc.)
So during our Homecoming party during my junior year, some drunk comes busting in through a crowd of people and falls face first on the floor. I see a couple of bouncers, who are in our fraternity, trying to get through the masses as well. They're pointing at the drunk on the floor and telling me to get him.
Turned out this guy had taken a bottle upside someone's head in the main bar for some perceived slight. I pounced (and being over three bills I use the term pounce lightly) and wrestle the guy to his feet with the help of a few of my buddies. This guy starts swinging again, so we run him head first into the door and then throw him outside. Once outside, it takes all of us basically sitting on him to control him until the cops arrive. He's biting, flailing, kicking, etc.
The cops get there, take our statements and then one of them comes over laughing. Says "This guy sure knows how to keep a low profile. Turns out he's a Marine who's gone AWOL." Nice.

Grownup edition
Last Saturday, a good friend of mine came into town. Her boyfriend owns two bars downtown, one a live-music establishment and the other your basic dance bar. My friend sees one of her ex-boyfriends and stays engrossed in conversation with him for an hour. This, of course, pisses off the current boyfriend. He grabs me and head down to his other bar. She eventually catches up at closing time, which is 4 a.m. in our fine city.
So we're walking outside, trying to gather everyone for the trip back up to the live-music establishment for some after hours entertainment.
My buddy, who is a part of the group, points at a guy on a Harley and says he's not going anywhere because of all the traffic. Evidently the Harley guy had a buddy still on the sidewalk because all of a sudden some drunk guy, probably in his mid-to-late 30s, is pointing and yelling at my buddy telling him to fuck off.
He starts to come at my buddy and I quickly step between them, politely pointing out all the police officers around us. He hears none of it, keeps telling my buddy to fuck off and tries to shove me out of the way. I give him a shove, but with so much force that it knocks him back into the police officers. The cops promptly put him in a head lock, throw him up against the wall and then cuff him.
The cop comes over and says he saw what happened, needs a statement from me and my buddy. So they separate us and take my buddy's statement first. Cop comes over to me, I give him my statement and he's amazed because their identical.
Cop says "Your buddy said the exact same thing. Fuck that guy, he's going to jail."

I've done a lot of stupid shit in my life, but I've never been so drunk as to feel 10-feet tall and bullett proof and I'm amazed when someone can get that way.

 

Once upon a time ago in a land far, far away, I was a waiter.

You always had to be on the lookout for people who drank to much as management was very worried about any legal action that could be taken if they went out and drove drunk.

Anyway, one day I had these two guys and all they were doing was drinking beer. After beer. After beer. After beer. Etc.

I told my manager I thought we should get them some food, at the very least, and he gave them a comp order of fries and eventually cut them off (without pissing them off, which can be hard to do).

The guys were real thankful for the free grub.

But not thankful enough to give me a tip. Drunk bastards.

 

When I was the weekend cop reporter at my first job, one woman got a DWI Friday night and another one Saturday morning. She blew a crazy high number on Saturday, it wasn't John Bonham/Steve Clark high, but it was waaay over the legal limit. Plus, she was tooling around a school while she was bombed.

 

The other night, a local banker (who is called Big Bird by her employees because she's 6-5 and has big hair) who I have never seen sober called up and wanted the news side to do a story about her name and birthday wish being posted on the marquee of the old theater in town that's being remodeled. When they told her they weren't interested, she started screaming until someone finally hung up on her.

 

Night shift in the ER, especially this last month...need I say more. If it weren't for alcohol and cigarettes, I might be out of a job. IMportant note to all...it's not a good thing to be an interesting case.

 

Well, I had a drunken booster grab me once as I was leaving the press box at a I-AA (!) game once, to complain about a headline (I wrote the story, not the headline).

That was a Saturday night. Monday afternoon, the booster apologizes to me in the AD's office ... I hadn't complained, but the SID had seen the whole thing.

 

I just saw the thread title and immediately wondered if MMSW had been one of our servers somewhere this weekend. Whew! ;D

 

1. Drunk calls at 9 p.m. Saturday night wondering why the Sunday paper isn't at his doorstep. He is informed of his error, that he probbly just took a nap and woke up disoriented. He's convinced that it's 9 a.m. Sunday because the sun is rising (in fact, the sun is setting).

2. Drunk in front of me at KFC, complaining that he'd rather have a hot woman than hot chicken.

3. Car dealership owner calls drunk to complain about golf coverage of a tournament he sponsors.

 

Do we work at the same place?

(Actually, this seems to have happened to almost every sports writer I've ever met.)