Gator Country Blues….or, Where are the Normal Bars in the Gainesville Area?
“…You go call your crew/ We can rendezvous at the bar around two…”
I have had a couple of requests for some more interesting old stories, so I wanted to share one with you guys from a little over a year ago when my friends and I made the mistake of staying in the Gainesville (Florida) area for a few days. As always, this story is 100% true, with no hyperbole required.
After my second year of law school, I really needed a break. I couldn’t take one right away because my crappy first-half-of-the-summer law firm job started right after exams, so I scheduled a week off in between the end of my first firm job and my second firm job for a little R&R. I spent the first half of the week with “Wifey,” and planned to spend the second half of the week with some old friends in a rustic cabin in the middle of nowhere in Central Florida. The cabin was about 40 minutes from Gainesville in a tiny-ass town where our cell phones did not work most of the time – a perfect place to relax and get drunk with no interruptions. My cohorts on this mission were no other than “Fat Stack” and “Cue,” of W.B.-ing fame, M.C. Coppin, and “Puff,” a friend of mine from way back who I could easily write two books about due to his tendency to end up in some of the funniest and most bizarre situations you can imagine. Although I tend to blog about the legends of Puff a lot more in the future, I will just tell you now that although he is amazingly “book smart,” his lack of “street smarts” – partly due to him being born in a different country and being used to different customs – really gets him into trouble sometimes, as you will see.
A lot of funny things happened on our first two days at the cabin, including Fat Stack getting so drunk and so sick that he ruined a great game of Texas Hold ‘Em; M.C. Coppin impersonating a U.S. Marine; and yours truly trying to teach Puff to shoot targets and play lacrosse. Unfortunately, none of it translates well into blogging, so I’m just going to fast forward to the last two nights.
On our third day at the cabin, we were getting really restless from being in the same podunk town, so we went out seeking some entertainment. Cue bravely asked a few “locals” loitering in the parking lot of a closed convenience store where the nearest bar was, and twenty minutes later, we were there. We were warned to make sure we acted like “we were from around there,” or else there might be trouble. Immediately, we should have realized that we should make other plans, but we went out of a pure sense of adventure.
When we walked into the bar, Cue said it made him feel like a scene out of a movie where the music stops and everyone stares at the newcomers. We got a lot of dirty looks from the locals, in part because Puff and Cue stuck out like sore thumbs. You see, M.C. Coppin, Fat Stack, and I knew that in a country bar, no one would be “dressed to impress,” and so we all wore T-shirts and shorts. But for some reason, Cue and Puff dressed in pants, dressy shoes, and button-down shirts, and were easily the most well-dressed people in the whole bar. Needless to say, the bar was a huge dive. The place had live (bad) country music, very little selection of drinks, and, get this, two separate counters – one for beer, and a separate one for alcohol. What’s weird is that they didn’t even have enough of a selection for one bar, featuring only a few kinds of beer and alcohol. Despite the fact that we were 10 hours from Tennessee, all of the alcohol bottles I saw were whiskey-colored brown. No vodkas, rums, or anything. And don’t get me started on the guests. I think the five of us had more teeth than the rest of the 20 patrons or so put together. Most of the guys were in tank-tops and many of them had shorts with an elastic waistband.
Well, we walked up to the bar and I had a very clear strategy that I shared with Cue – we should all order one “Bud” – no Bud Light, no Michelob Ultra, no Corona with Lime – just Bud, Bud, Bud. Wouldn’t you have guessed it, but Puff’s clueless ass strolls up to the bar and asks “Do you have any Smirnoff Ice?” Three or four patrons gave him a sideways look as the bartender informed him of the four or five beers they served, not one of them any type of malt beverage. Cue took over and ordered a pitcher of Bud and we sat down. After pouring the beer, we looked around and I saw one of the strangest things I have ever seen. At the next table, I shit you not, was a guy with a beer sitting by himself, with a Cabbage Patch doll propped up in the seat next to him, as if they were an old married couple out on a Friday night. I don’t remember exactly, but I think he even had some type of blanket or napkin or place setting on the table for the doll. It was the craziest thing ever. As the crowd got drunker and rowdier, and the music got more and more country, we decided to leave. As we got up and walked out the front door, two women were walking in. One said to the other, through a not-so-full mouth of teeth, “Damn, girl, all the good guys are leaving!”
----------
The next night, we decided that we needed to go to a city if we were going to find our kind of bar, so we drove the 40 or 45 minutes to Gainesville to find some entertainment. Now, as a Florida State grad, or, as I should say, as someone who has gone anywhere except the University of Florida, I knew that Gainesville was a major shithole only masquerading as a city. However, considering the experience we had the night before, I felt things could only get better. I was so, so wrong.
After dinner, we went to an area near the University hoping to find a cool bar. The first bar we went into had a nice drink selection but was, we discovered, almost totally empty. We all ordered a drink and sat down. On our side of the bar, the only other people there were four girls who looked like they had seen better days, and, in the corner, a 250+ pound, 45-year old white woman with a 20-year old, 150 pound black man. The woman was sitting on a bar stool while he was dancing for her to the music, stopping every few seconds so they could make out. Cue suggested we leave, and I seconded, but Puff had us stay another half an hour asking us repeatedly if he should hit on one of the four girls. After working up the courage, he finally did, but she wasn’t having it. Finally, we moved on.
After walking along the street, we noticed one bar was the only one really hoppin’ in the whole area. It was called the “University Club,” or some generic name like that, and it sounded like the perfect place to have a few non-Budweiser drinks and meet a few co-eds. So, the five of us decided to go in. As we made the trek inside, I noticed more and more irregularities. First, unlike most of the bars on the strip, you had to enter this bar in the back (which was dark and dingy) instead of from the street. Second, there were several really tall women in evening dresses inside. Thirdly, there were a lot of 40-year old guys with shaved heads dancing, and hardly any guys our age. Fourth, there were not a lot of “love connections” going on, as it seemed like people were just in groups with their friends. Then, it hit me.
“I think this is a gay bar,” I said to Fat Stack. He looked around.
One minute later….. “I think this is a gay bar,” Cue said to me.
One minute later…. “I think you’re right…this is a gay bar,” Fat Stack said to us.
One minute later….. “Guys, I think this is a gay bar,” M.C. Coppin said.
Thirty minutes later….Puff realizes it’s a gay bar.
You see, as we spent more time in the place, and huddled closer and closer together, several things became apparent that we had missed when we walked in:
1. The tall women in evening dresses were actually men in evening dresses.
2. The 40-year old men were all dancing with 20-year old men.
3. The Budweiser bar tap had a rainbow symbol on it, and so did the bartender.
4. The reason why everyone was huddled together with people of the same sex was because they WERE making a love connection.
As we were sharing our observations, and huddling closer together, we realized that Puff had separated from the group. We looked around for him for a few minutes, and then we saw him a few feet away. Puff had walked up to a group of two or three girls and was hitting on one of the girls. We tried to get his attention to signal that it obviously was a lost cause, but he was in a groove, or so he thought. So, the four of us stood there waiting for him, trying to decide which one of us was “with” the other one of us for purposes of staving off the horny 40-year old men all around us. Puff was talking to the girl for a while, clearly not taking "no" for an answer. Eventually, he came back to the group, kind of dejected. I told him the girl might have been a lesbian, but he didn’t believe me. As soon as we all were within arms’ length of each other, we had the last swig of our drinks, took one last look around for memory’s sake, and walked briskly out the back door, cursing Gainesville, asking aloud why a gay bar had such a benign name, and wondering where all the normal bars were.
In retrospect, both stories could have been a lot worse, and so in a sense, both nights were non-events as much as they were events. However, you have to remember that this was a group of five guys together with a combined drinking experience of over 40 years, and we were 0 for 3 in finding normal bars. I guess it serves us right for trying to add a little “excitement” to an otherwise peaceful weekend. So, take my advice, folks. If you ever find yourselves in a secluded getaway spot, enjoy it for what it is, lest you find yourself trapped against a bar counter, with an overpriced beer, watching a bald guy with no shirt grind against a male co-ed hitting on another man in heels and an evening dress.
I have had a couple of requests for some more interesting old stories, so I wanted to share one with you guys from a little over a year ago when my friends and I made the mistake of staying in the Gainesville (Florida) area for a few days. As always, this story is 100% true, with no hyperbole required.
After my second year of law school, I really needed a break. I couldn’t take one right away because my crappy first-half-of-the-summer law firm job started right after exams, so I scheduled a week off in between the end of my first firm job and my second firm job for a little R&R. I spent the first half of the week with “Wifey,” and planned to spend the second half of the week with some old friends in a rustic cabin in the middle of nowhere in Central Florida. The cabin was about 40 minutes from Gainesville in a tiny-ass town where our cell phones did not work most of the time – a perfect place to relax and get drunk with no interruptions. My cohorts on this mission were no other than “Fat Stack” and “Cue,” of W.B.-ing fame, M.C. Coppin, and “Puff,” a friend of mine from way back who I could easily write two books about due to his tendency to end up in some of the funniest and most bizarre situations you can imagine. Although I tend to blog about the legends of Puff a lot more in the future, I will just tell you now that although he is amazingly “book smart,” his lack of “street smarts” – partly due to him being born in a different country and being used to different customs – really gets him into trouble sometimes, as you will see.
A lot of funny things happened on our first two days at the cabin, including Fat Stack getting so drunk and so sick that he ruined a great game of Texas Hold ‘Em; M.C. Coppin impersonating a U.S. Marine; and yours truly trying to teach Puff to shoot targets and play lacrosse. Unfortunately, none of it translates well into blogging, so I’m just going to fast forward to the last two nights.
On our third day at the cabin, we were getting really restless from being in the same podunk town, so we went out seeking some entertainment. Cue bravely asked a few “locals” loitering in the parking lot of a closed convenience store where the nearest bar was, and twenty minutes later, we were there. We were warned to make sure we acted like “we were from around there,” or else there might be trouble. Immediately, we should have realized that we should make other plans, but we went out of a pure sense of adventure.
When we walked into the bar, Cue said it made him feel like a scene out of a movie where the music stops and everyone stares at the newcomers. We got a lot of dirty looks from the locals, in part because Puff and Cue stuck out like sore thumbs. You see, M.C. Coppin, Fat Stack, and I knew that in a country bar, no one would be “dressed to impress,” and so we all wore T-shirts and shorts. But for some reason, Cue and Puff dressed in pants, dressy shoes, and button-down shirts, and were easily the most well-dressed people in the whole bar. Needless to say, the bar was a huge dive. The place had live (bad) country music, very little selection of drinks, and, get this, two separate counters – one for beer, and a separate one for alcohol. What’s weird is that they didn’t even have enough of a selection for one bar, featuring only a few kinds of beer and alcohol. Despite the fact that we were 10 hours from Tennessee, all of the alcohol bottles I saw were whiskey-colored brown. No vodkas, rums, or anything. And don’t get me started on the guests. I think the five of us had more teeth than the rest of the 20 patrons or so put together. Most of the guys were in tank-tops and many of them had shorts with an elastic waistband.
Well, we walked up to the bar and I had a very clear strategy that I shared with Cue – we should all order one “Bud” – no Bud Light, no Michelob Ultra, no Corona with Lime – just Bud, Bud, Bud. Wouldn’t you have guessed it, but Puff’s clueless ass strolls up to the bar and asks “Do you have any Smirnoff Ice?” Three or four patrons gave him a sideways look as the bartender informed him of the four or five beers they served, not one of them any type of malt beverage. Cue took over and ordered a pitcher of Bud and we sat down. After pouring the beer, we looked around and I saw one of the strangest things I have ever seen. At the next table, I shit you not, was a guy with a beer sitting by himself, with a Cabbage Patch doll propped up in the seat next to him, as if they were an old married couple out on a Friday night. I don’t remember exactly, but I think he even had some type of blanket or napkin or place setting on the table for the doll. It was the craziest thing ever. As the crowd got drunker and rowdier, and the music got more and more country, we decided to leave. As we got up and walked out the front door, two women were walking in. One said to the other, through a not-so-full mouth of teeth, “Damn, girl, all the good guys are leaving!”
----------
The next night, we decided that we needed to go to a city if we were going to find our kind of bar, so we drove the 40 or 45 minutes to Gainesville to find some entertainment. Now, as a Florida State grad, or, as I should say, as someone who has gone anywhere except the University of Florida, I knew that Gainesville was a major shithole only masquerading as a city. However, considering the experience we had the night before, I felt things could only get better. I was so, so wrong.
After dinner, we went to an area near the University hoping to find a cool bar. The first bar we went into had a nice drink selection but was, we discovered, almost totally empty. We all ordered a drink and sat down. On our side of the bar, the only other people there were four girls who looked like they had seen better days, and, in the corner, a 250+ pound, 45-year old white woman with a 20-year old, 150 pound black man. The woman was sitting on a bar stool while he was dancing for her to the music, stopping every few seconds so they could make out. Cue suggested we leave, and I seconded, but Puff had us stay another half an hour asking us repeatedly if he should hit on one of the four girls. After working up the courage, he finally did, but she wasn’t having it. Finally, we moved on.
After walking along the street, we noticed one bar was the only one really hoppin’ in the whole area. It was called the “University Club,” or some generic name like that, and it sounded like the perfect place to have a few non-Budweiser drinks and meet a few co-eds. So, the five of us decided to go in. As we made the trek inside, I noticed more and more irregularities. First, unlike most of the bars on the strip, you had to enter this bar in the back (which was dark and dingy) instead of from the street. Second, there were several really tall women in evening dresses inside. Thirdly, there were a lot of 40-year old guys with shaved heads dancing, and hardly any guys our age. Fourth, there were not a lot of “love connections” going on, as it seemed like people were just in groups with their friends. Then, it hit me.
“I think this is a gay bar,” I said to Fat Stack. He looked around.
One minute later….. “I think this is a gay bar,” Cue said to me.
One minute later…. “I think you’re right…this is a gay bar,” Fat Stack said to us.
One minute later….. “Guys, I think this is a gay bar,” M.C. Coppin said.
Thirty minutes later….Puff realizes it’s a gay bar.
You see, as we spent more time in the place, and huddled closer and closer together, several things became apparent that we had missed when we walked in:
1. The tall women in evening dresses were actually men in evening dresses.
2. The 40-year old men were all dancing with 20-year old men.
3. The Budweiser bar tap had a rainbow symbol on it, and so did the bartender.
4. The reason why everyone was huddled together with people of the same sex was because they WERE making a love connection.
As we were sharing our observations, and huddling closer together, we realized that Puff had separated from the group. We looked around for him for a few minutes, and then we saw him a few feet away. Puff had walked up to a group of two or three girls and was hitting on one of the girls. We tried to get his attention to signal that it obviously was a lost cause, but he was in a groove, or so he thought. So, the four of us stood there waiting for him, trying to decide which one of us was “with” the other one of us for purposes of staving off the horny 40-year old men all around us. Puff was talking to the girl for a while, clearly not taking "no" for an answer. Eventually, he came back to the group, kind of dejected. I told him the girl might have been a lesbian, but he didn’t believe me. As soon as we all were within arms’ length of each other, we had the last swig of our drinks, took one last look around for memory’s sake, and walked briskly out the back door, cursing Gainesville, asking aloud why a gay bar had such a benign name, and wondering where all the normal bars were.
In retrospect, both stories could have been a lot worse, and so in a sense, both nights were non-events as much as they were events. However, you have to remember that this was a group of five guys together with a combined drinking experience of over 40 years, and we were 0 for 3 in finding normal bars. I guess it serves us right for trying to add a little “excitement” to an otherwise peaceful weekend. So, take my advice, folks. If you ever find yourselves in a secluded getaway spot, enjoy it for what it is, lest you find yourself trapped against a bar counter, with an overpriced beer, watching a bald guy with no shirt grind against a male co-ed hitting on another man in heels and an evening dress.
posted by TheRealDookie | 10:40 AM
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