Turf Log - I Hope I Get Old Before I Die...Oh Wait...Too Late!

I was sitting at The Drink Hole having a quiet early evening beer, and over my shoulder I overheard some guy talking to the bartendress. He was using every bad, cutesy line you could imagine while trying to garner her attention and affection. And worse, he delivered them in such a hackneyed, stale, pre-loaded fashion, they sounded as canned as if Travis Bickle had spent the day in front of the mirror rehearsing them. To top it all off, he was loud. Nothing worse than sounding pre-recorded AND loud. No subtlety to his delivery at all, and he was so loud it would interrupt everyone else around's flow. You know the type. There's a difference between having a good time and F-ing up everyone else's good time.

Without even seeing the interaction, I could feel the embarrassment the bartendress ("Cookie" or "Snowflake" or "Kandi" or whatever her name was that day) had for this guy. The disdain and distaste she had for his feeble attempts at being charming.

I knew that this guy had been spreading ill-will between bartendresses and happy-go-lucky bar-flys at every bar he had ever visited. I knew that this thick layer of plastic-coated dullard had numbed my favorite bartendress (for the afternoon) from being receptive to anyone who might be genuinely spontaneous and witty who might come along.

You see...I'm not much to look at. I have what they call "a good face for radio". But when I manage to turn on the charm, I can actually think quickly on my feet and whip out the "suave and debonair".

And once I've managed to catch a girls attention, these mountain-man, haggard looks with the dour demeanor slip away as she notices that I've got the manly yet sensitive blue eyes of an "Adonis"!

As the knob at the bar rambled on and on and on and on...and on...talking louder than everything else at the bar, and laughing even louder at his own trite and uninspired attempts at being funny, I feel the lowering cloud of "ain't gonna be any fun in here tonight, thanks to this dill-weed" falling over the joint. So I decide to turn and look over my shoulder and see what this guy looks like so I can avoid him in any of my haunts in the future and move on.

I turn to see a guy in his mid-40's, just enough over-weight to look "lazy" at first glance, and what's left of his greying hair making a fast retreat to the back of his skull. With a mixture of pity and contempt I turn back to my beer and think to myself, "Geez!...I'm sure glad I'm still young and cool!" and "I hope I have the decency to stay away from this kind of thing when I get like this guy!"

And almost simultaneously as those phrases ring through my head, I turn and catch myself in the mirror.

Sigh.

But you know?

I really was something back in the day.

I'm the guy who once said this...

Ya shoulda seen it!

I was really somethin'!

Talk to you soon.

Sing us a song Jerry Jeff...Let the juke box soothe me.